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09 June 2010
Yay! (or Yeah!) We are pre-approved to adopt a kid!→[More:]
We have more forms and junk to fill out, but it's moving along nicely.
Forgive me for being crass (and/or late to the party), but what kind do you want? I mean, some people do the outside the US thing, others just want a newborn, etc.
As someone who is adopted, and whose brother is adopted, and who knows from what kinds of hell homes we were both taken from and into which loving homes we were placed, I can only say:
youngergirl44 - we're applying for the foster-to-adopt program in our (US) state. We'll become licensed foster care parents first. When we've had a child in our home for over 6 months, we're eligible to adopt him once the parental rights have been terminated.
We'd prefer a boy between 2 and 6, but the next step is to get more information about which children are available to adopt.
WolfDaddy - both the maid of honor and the best man at our wedding (our best friends, natch) were adopted.
joining in the congratulatory chorus here - YAY! Best of luck with all the rest! And speaking of books, it kinda blew my mind when I stumbled onto the fact that Jamie Lee Curtis has written popular children's books for adoptions families, like "Tell me again about the night I was born". It sounds like a pretty sweet book, and here I've had no idea that she adopted her kids a lifetime ago. I don't keep up on celebrity news at all.
It's great you want to adopt, but I guess I have mixed feelings about the termination of parental rights. Sometimes it's appropriate, of course, and in the child's best interest, but other times parents going through difficult circumstances can be unfairly and prematurely pressured to terminate rights (you can have this child back if you give up that child, for instance; one of my brothers was on the wrong end of a deal like that). Foster parenting usually involves the goal of reuniting families whenever possible.
Anyway, I don't mean to be a downer or anything, just food for thought.
Pips: there are two tracks in foster care in Wisconsin. The goal is always to reunite the kids with their families. One track is for kids whose parents are likely to do what they need to do to get their kids back. They are not put up for adoption. The other track is for kids whose parents are less likely to do so - BUT, if the kid cannot be reunited with the parents, there is an exhaustive effort to place him with another family member. Only if that fails are they put up for adoption, and even then it's a long process for termination of the parents' rights, which can fall through at any time. It was stressed to us that termination is a last resort and that judges do not take it lightly.
I am sure that the system does sometimes fail, and I am sorry for your brother's experience. It is definitely not our wish to adopt a child who could instead be with their birth family. I hope that our home is the safest and best place for the child if nothing else can be done.
Thanks for your response and clarification. To be honest, my brother contributed a great deal to his own situation and heartache, I'm sorry to say (long story). It's wonderful of you and your husband to open your home this way. I was a foster child myself at one time in my life (another long story). I hope it all works out for you and wish you every happiness.
My observation of the whole child-intervention-social-work apparatus in Wisconsin is that it is highly variable by county. I hope you're in one of the good ones.
dhartung, we're in Milwaukee county. I have been impressed with the people I've met so far, but like I said I recognize that the system has its failings, and the social workers are terribly underpaid and overworked.
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