Open Vs. Not

One of the biggest eyebrow raisers among our adoption choices is the choice to have an open adoption.

Initially we were not overly interested in this particular option oursleves. It certainly seemed less complicated to just have a baby magically appear out of thin air without strings, baggage, and biological ties. From what I've read most people initially feel this way. Perhaps that's in part because of our culture and the information we've received about adoption. More often than not when you think of birthmothers I think the negative images dominate. The loudly unhappy woman who starts a website opposing adoption in all forms. The Lifetime movie about the teenager forced to give up her child who lurks behind trees and stalks the unexpecting adoptive couple.

Could these things happen, absolutely. Would we want a bitter and angry person involved in our lives, of course not.

But the truth is this, that woman (and man, assuming the birth father is involved) are a part of our adopted child's life. They just are. I think any person with a biological connection to another person (hello, everyone) knows that blood is important. Like it or not, it matters. For reasons emotional and otherwise, that connection is an important one, and a valid one, and one that won't just "go away" because we choose not to acknowledge it.

Emotionally I am glad that when our child has questions about why he or she was given up for adoption, we'll know the answer. Because we'll know his/her birthmother we'll know what her situation was. Who she was, how old, and why she felt that adoption was the best choice for her child. And, hopefully, we'll have an ongoing relationship with her that allows us either in person, by phone, by letter or email to let her tell the child these things herself. There's no worry that she'll be built up into some amazing "BIRTHMOTHER" that is better than us, or preferable to us, because she'll be human, just like us, and our child will see that.
On a more practical level, we'll be able to have access to our child's medical background. And those change...so when our son or daughter's birthgrandparent develops heart disease, we can be told, and our child will have as complete a medical history as possible.

Will it be complicated? Yes. But, hell, life's complicated. And the second you think it's not, that you've got it figured out, that's when the lightning bolt comes out of the sky to remind you otherwise (hello, experience speaking...). And the fact is, adoption is complicated anyway. Birth parents, real parents, biological parents, first parents, adoptive parents, mom, dad....there's a lot happening there. There are a lot of emotions involved. Fear, love, excitement, anxiety, eagerness, dread. Everyone involved has layers of things to "deal" with.

I almost feel like having an "open" adoption is a little akin to just being "open" in general. Instead of keeping things quiet, or putting them away, they're out there. They exist. They ARE. That's a lot more in line with my personality than secrets and closeted skeletons. So why not just face these things. Will it always be an easy road, of course not...but since when was parenting easy anyway? Will I want to eat these optimistic and rosey-glassed words later, no doubt...but when have non-parents not said stupid things that just display their ametuer perspectives? :)

For those wanting more perspecitive, here are some websites I have found insitghtful:
The agency's information on open adoption: http://www.adoptionhelp.org/open_adoption/

This one talks more to birth mothers, but gives a good perspective and helps me understand her expectations: http://www.openadoption.org/bbetzen/parent.htm#parent

Of course a simple google search will provide plenty of other informational site, testimonials, and other resources.

-Melissa

Money Trail (like Oregon Trail, but less fun, and no dysentery)

So we've had some amazing loans made to us by family members. Instead of being completely unsure where the heck all this money is going to come from, it's starting to materialize. We are insanely touched and grateful.

We're almost halfway to the goal...which is funny since none of it is actually our money, and that's what I wanted to address.

So some people know (and now anyone reading this does) that adoption is super mad expensive. There are a variety of adoption options (haha "adoption option"...like Conjunction Junction except more about getting babies than combining sentence parts...) and of course they all come with different price tags. Briefly (because I know most about what we're doing of course, as opposed to the various and sundry things we are NOT doing) here are some; foster care/adoption from social services is free...in fact, depending on the situation you could actually come out monetarily ahead with this option. You certainly don't pay anything, and you get a monthly stipend for the child until he/she is 18, and if he/she is a "special needs" child (this could be as severe as you're thinking, or as mild as ADHD or needing glasses) then you get grants and such from the government. Foreign adoption runs in the $20,000-$50,000 range. Independent or relative adoption can be anywhere from $5,000-$50,000, and agency adoption is $15,000-$50,000. Those numbers are based on my research and shouldn't be depended on, but can give you a basic range. Of course we've decided to go with agency adoption, and our expenses shouldn't top $20,000. They may even be as low as $18,000. Yeah, I know...I just said 18k was low. Perspective sure is a funny and shifting thing ain't it?

As I've said, we're borrowing the majority of that. We could certainly save up and have the cash on hand in a decent amount of time, but in my opinion even 6 months is just more time than I want to spend waiting. Mostly I feel that way because the process, once we actually start it officially, which we haven't yet, but that we're hoping to start either this month or in July, and... wait..what was I saying? Oh yeah, the process will take 12-18 months to complete, at least. So, we'll pay a crazy amount of money, do a ton of paper work, and then wait. Then we'll get picked, and we'll wait, then we'll get a baby. So from right now, my optimistic hope is that we'll have a child in 2 years tops. And that's optimistic. Could it happen faster? Indeed it does, sometimes. But realistically you can't set yourself up for that because it doesn't always happen that way. Thus, I'd rather not wait any longer than I have to to get officially started. Hurray for Hurry Up and Wait.

So we're borrowing, and we'll pay it off while we wait, and then... Then! Then, once we have our new son or daughter, and we're basking in the glow of parenthood (or, you know, wallowing in the stench of puked up formula and dirty diapers), we'll tell Uncle Sam that we spent X amount of dollars on our adoption, and he will GIVE US BACK up to $12,000. Then we'll tell Uncle North Carolina Sam that we spent N amount of dollars on adoption, and he will GIVE US BACK up to $6,000. (If you adopt a special needs child you get those full amounts regardless of how much you actually spent.) So, worst case scenario, that's when we pay back the loans we're taking out now. While it may seem insane to go into debt over this, that pay back at the end makes it seem less stupid. To me anyway.

So that's that. Going into debt for anything is often imprudent...and the stupid cliches that are all over adoption websites and literature that say some crap about how bringing home a baby is priceless (anyone else see a credit card commercial in there?) are annoying mostly because regardless of what you'd give to bring home your own precious son or daughter...if you don't have it, you don't have it. Regardless, it feels like this short lived debt just won't be that big of a deal in the end.

Remind me I said that when I'm paying the bills next month. :)

-Melissa

*The financial info above is all based on the research I've done, and the things I've been told by an adoption lawyer who I'm not paying (bless her heart, she totally could have charged someone for that kind of advice) and from the agencies we've interviewed. Disclaimer: Don't base anything other than a Trivial Pursuit win on this information.

Roadblock

As I mentioned before, there are just so so many choices in this process. It is great to have such a level of control and to have so many options, but it also adds to the overwhelming nature of this situation.

We've been "deciding" for a while whether or not we were even prepared to start down this path. You consider all the difficulties, the length of the process, the extra challenges added to your life and that of your child. You consider the benefits of not going through medical procedures to get pregnant, the benefits to the child, the blessing you could be to a woman not yet ready to parent. You search your heart, and those of your family and close friends.

Then you decide. Yes. Yes, I want to adopt. We want to be parents. We want to welcome a child not born to us into our home and our hearts. We want to raise that child as our own, because she will be.

And you start researching how to make this happen, because you've spent all that time deciding it's what you wanted. And the truth falls square in your lap. It's one of the most expensive endeavors you've ever undertaken. And while that knowledge was somewhere in your mind during the process, it just wasn't at the forefront, because honestly, it's not that important. Except that it is. It's perhaps the most important part because without the money, there is no process. There are no homestudies, or agency marketing plans, no lawyers finalizing anything. Nothing.

So I think we've found an agency we like. I'll elaborate on that and the process of finding them, but for now we're stalled out. I have a couple of job prospects, and we're dotting our financial i's and crossing our financial t's in order to convince a bank that we're good for the money, but who knows if it'll be enough. It's a shame that money is so important because it's really just not.

-Melissa

*Editor's note...this post is not one where I'm trying to get pity or where I'm secretly hoping people will offer us money or anything like that. It's just where we are in this process, and I promised to share the process here on our blog.