We had a crazy few days. Thursday evening (Feb 19) we got an unexpected call from Courtney with FAC. She said there was a special circumstance involving a birth mother who'd delivered a baby girl a few weeks before and had chosen to parent her baby (after having picked an adoptive family prior to the birth). Now she was reconsidering adoption but was having trouble picking a family. Courtney wanted to know if she could show our profile PDF to the birth mom. It was a good situation for us because we would not have to pay anything or travel unless she picked us (because the first matched family had already paid prior to the birth). It was an African American baby girl. We agreed to present while realizing it was a long shot.
Friday evening we heard from Courtney and the birth mom had asked to speak with us and 2 other families on the phone the next morning. We were in Birmingham for the Mercedes Kids Marathon and the call was scheduled for right before we needed to head out to the race. Courtney called us ahead of time to answer some questions and give us some tips for the call. Brad and I prayed for the entire situation before the phone rang.
The call itself went well. The birth mom had some questions for us, primarily about how we would handle raising a black child in a white family. I guess she was satisfied with our answer because after calling Courtney from the car on the way to the race, we got a text a few minutes later that the birth mom really liked us! Later that day, we found out that she had spoken to 2 other families after us and liked both of them as well. We were asked to have another call with the birth mom the following morning. We decided to head home for the call because if she picked us, we would need to be prepared to travel within a day or so.
We got home midmorning and rushed around picking up the house and getting set up for our call. Nothing about the adoption came up in this call, but I was writing down every tidbit of information that she revealed to us in case she picked us. I wanted to know as much as I could about her to tell her/our daughter one day.
Over the next couple days, the birth mom still had not made a decision. We found out some other information that had us concerned that this birth mom really did not want to place her daughter for adoption. That information combined with her continuous delays and inability to "choose" between us and another family and some scheduling problems resulted in us asking Courtney if we could withdraw from this situation. It was hard but we felt this was the right thing to do. We have not gotten any specific information since that time about this situation, but we think that the birth mom still has not signed consent for adoption.
We did get all our paperwork sent to Courtney except our children's medical and our home study, which SHOULD get there in the upcoming week. We found out there was one additional clearance required by Alabama for ICPC that we had not completed yet. In the middle of doing all this we had some crazy weather that brought snow and missed school days.
Courtney said she would start presenting us when she got our final documents. It was a crazy stressful whirlwind few days, but it did help us to get prepared when it finally does happen for us. Hopefully March will be an exciting month for us!
Saturday, February 28, 2015
Tuesday, February 17, 2015
February 2015 update
I wish I could say we have moved on to the next phase by now, but the past month has been very frustrating. I never imagined we would be midway into February and still just waiting on our paperwork to move forward. Then again, how many times during our adoption process have we found ourselves waiting longer than expected? It is almost comical at this point, yet I don't know whether to laugh or cry.
Since last month, we have finally completed our profile book after making a few suggested cosmetic changes, namely to make the background of the pages more "colorful and adventurous." Brad got a kick out of that suggestion and used it in a Valentine surprise for me:
Our profile is being printed into books that will be shown to potential birth moms, and I got the shipping notice on the books today.
We have not seen our home study yet because we have been waiting on our fingerprint clearances to come back. For the past month we have been trying not to nag our social worker too much about the delay and if there is a way to confirm everything is okay (as in it was received and is being processed). I had this fear that it was never sent or received and all this waiting will have been in vain. Last Friday (the 13th) Brad called DHR in Montgomery to ask them about it and they said something to him about it being sent to our county of origin. We were originally fingerprinted at the local DHR for foster care. So he called them but the person who answered was new and all he got out of that conversation was that Lifeline was not a vendor in their system. We also spoke with our social worker and another person at Lifeline who handles the clearances and we really didn't know what to make of this. Apparently this is not typical--of course. Yesterday was President's Day so DHR was closed. A friend spoke with a social worker at DHR (who maybe remembered us from foster care), and we were instructed to call her when DHR opened today to see what she could do. Brad called and she said she could easily get us the "Letter of Suitability." We weren't positive that's what we needed so he called our social worker and asked that she call DHR. Well, praise the Lord that is what we needed! I was working through lunch and answered a call at our office number from a friend and former coworker who now works at DHR and she said "I have your letters. You can come by and pick them up. I wish you'd told me sooner that you needed this because I could have done it for you." I'm hoping that one day we will see God's timing and sovereignty in this 2.5 month long wait for a letter we could have probably gotten 2 months ago if we'd known who to call.
The next step is simply to review our home study for any corrections and then just wait for our social worker to mail us notarized originals. She also has 1 other piece of paperwork we need. Once we have those items in our hands and our profile books, we will be mailing a large packet of documents to FAC and hopefully be able to start presenting to birth moms! It is finally starting to feel real!
There are a lot of babies coming on my side of the family in the upcoming weeks. I had a cousin have a baby boy earlier in February, a niece due in March, and another cousin expecting a baby boy in April. Here's to hoping little baby Bernard will arrive in May. :)
Since last month, we have finally completed our profile book after making a few suggested cosmetic changes, namely to make the background of the pages more "colorful and adventurous." Brad got a kick out of that suggestion and used it in a Valentine surprise for me:
Our profile is being printed into books that will be shown to potential birth moms, and I got the shipping notice on the books today.
We have not seen our home study yet because we have been waiting on our fingerprint clearances to come back. For the past month we have been trying not to nag our social worker too much about the delay and if there is a way to confirm everything is okay (as in it was received and is being processed). I had this fear that it was never sent or received and all this waiting will have been in vain. Last Friday (the 13th) Brad called DHR in Montgomery to ask them about it and they said something to him about it being sent to our county of origin. We were originally fingerprinted at the local DHR for foster care. So he called them but the person who answered was new and all he got out of that conversation was that Lifeline was not a vendor in their system. We also spoke with our social worker and another person at Lifeline who handles the clearances and we really didn't know what to make of this. Apparently this is not typical--of course. Yesterday was President's Day so DHR was closed. A friend spoke with a social worker at DHR (who maybe remembered us from foster care), and we were instructed to call her when DHR opened today to see what she could do. Brad called and she said she could easily get us the "Letter of Suitability." We weren't positive that's what we needed so he called our social worker and asked that she call DHR. Well, praise the Lord that is what we needed! I was working through lunch and answered a call at our office number from a friend and former coworker who now works at DHR and she said "I have your letters. You can come by and pick them up. I wish you'd told me sooner that you needed this because I could have done it for you." I'm hoping that one day we will see God's timing and sovereignty in this 2.5 month long wait for a letter we could have probably gotten 2 months ago if we'd known who to call.
The next step is simply to review our home study for any corrections and then just wait for our social worker to mail us notarized originals. She also has 1 other piece of paperwork we need. Once we have those items in our hands and our profile books, we will be mailing a large packet of documents to FAC and hopefully be able to start presenting to birth moms! It is finally starting to feel real!
There are a lot of babies coming on my side of the family in the upcoming weeks. I had a cousin have a baby boy earlier in February, a niece due in March, and another cousin expecting a baby boy in April. Here's to hoping little baby Bernard will arrive in May. :)
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