Adoption Update

Truth is, there is no update per se...

Just an email from our caseworker explaining the process and the wait. 

Up until now, we didn’t understand the process and why the wait was 6-9 months before we should see any activity on our profile.  As I’ve mentioned before, this news was hard, but here we are nearly 3 months into our wait and it’s flown by.  I can’t tell you how thankful and relieved I am to see how Kris and I are handling the wait so far.  We are busy in our day-to-day life and relishing every second we have left just the two of us.  For the first time in over 2 years, we are worry-free and truly enjoying our life together.  We’ve done everything possible on our part to start a family and now we just simply have to have faith and wait.  Amazingly enough, it’s much easier than it sounds…

Most families do not see very much activity, if any, for the first 6-9 months and then it picks up the longer that you have waited.  Gladney tries to show the profiles of the longest waiting families first, if possible, to give them the first chance at being shown. 

Here is the short version of how adoptive parent profiles are shown to birth families:

A birth mother caseworker (BM caseworker) lets the adoptive parent caseworkers (AP caseworkers) know their birth mother is ready for profiles.  Birth mothers aren’t allowed to see profiles until they are in their 3^rd trimester.  The BM caseworker then gives the AP caseworker the birth mothers background information along with a list of things the birth mother is looking for in a family. 

From there, AP caseworkers look through every family that they have to see: 

·         Who is open to this birth mother’s background

·         Of these families that are open, who meets the birth mother’s requests

That will usually narrow it down to a group of 20 or so families.  Gladney will then take the 5-7 longest waiting families and show their profile first and then if the birth mother does not find a family out of that round, Gladney will continue showing profiles until she picks or Gladney does not have anyone else to show.

There are unique situations that can arise in which we will likely not wait 6-9 months before a birth family has an opportunity to see our profile.  For instance:

·         If a birth mother sees one of our online profiles and calls Gladney because she is interested in our family.  Gladney will then make sure our interests are aligned with what we are open to vs. what the birth mother is looking for in a family.

·         If a birth mother has very specific requests, we meet what she is looking for in a family and Gladney believes we would be a really great fit.  The example our caseworker provided was:  She is looking for a family younger than 35, open to yearly visits, with some Asian in their background, and have no children yet – that would be a match!

The point of all of this is; the wait is not guaranteed to be 6-9 months.  This is just an average wait that Gladney has seen among most families.  They want to keep our expectations realistic.  I get it.