Long hard road July 17, 2007

After going through the hoops for a private homestudy we realized it is very difficult to be your own agent. Meaning, searching without an agency for a child available for adoption on adoptuskids.org or the like. It is a full time job trying to fax homestudies to agencies, follow up, etc. The adoption process is very messed up, full of holes and errors and people working long, hard, over booked hours and yet, you cannot get through to anyone. I know it is not the case workers faults, its just a system that is overloaded and full of red tape and errors. And the children wait…as do we. We wait for them, they wait for us. Neither of us knowing who the other is yet. Now we have decided to go with our state agency. Initially we were told our private (and expensive) home study would be reused with the state, but it is not so. We are now going through the state process, more paperwork, more interviews, and now in the final stretch we find that before we can have a child placed with us we have to complete 12 – 3 hour courses. So now we are craming in 4 classes a week for the next 3 weeks, hoping to be done by the second week in August.The bedrooms are set and decorated. In our home lie toys, beds, cribs and car seats all awaiting a child or children. Since the age range we are open to is from infant to 7 years old we were required to purchase car seats and a crib just incase. It’s all part of the licensing for foster to adopt care. It’s sad to walk past empty rooms and see the crib and toddler beds each day…but exciting at the same time. Hopefully soon we will know more.