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Lots of people have been writing about the online article about in vitro fertilization (IVF) and the accompanying blog post about the issues surrounding multiple births from IVF in the online edition of Sunday's New York Times. The comments were astounding, especially reading them as an adoptive parent who struggled with infertility myself. Why would I link to an article about infertility on an adoption blog? Many of us who have, or are planning to, adopt infants came to adoption after struggles with infertility. Some of us stopped before IVF, some of us had more than one unsuccessful cycle of treatments, and some of us had a child through IVF but wanted to complete their family and were unable to do so without more interventions… [more]

An increasing number of adoption agencies have potential adoptive parents make videos as part of their profile. In our case, it was also a part of our home study. I'm not sure why, but there you are. Videos are generally not that long. Our video was about 10 minutes or so. They can vary in quality from a "home movie" to a professionally shot, scripted production. There are some video companies out there who specialize in potential adoptive parent videos. In fact, we were given names and samples from two companies when we did ours. The only thing all the videos have in common is providing expectant parents with more information to choose a family for their child. Whether or not you choose… [more]

This latest OAB Roundtable prompt was a tricky one. It’s all about privacy vs. blogging your heart out (so to speak): This round’s topic was suggested by adoptive parent blogger Rebecca: privacy, blogging and open adoption. Figuring out boundaries is difficult when you write about your personal life. Any on-blog mention of family, friends or co-workers risks invading their privacy. Bloggers who write about or post pictures of their children are accused of exploitation. Where is the line between your own experience and other people’s personal lives? What information is yours to share and what rightfully belongs to someone else? Add the overlapping relationships of open adoption to the mix and you’ve got yourself a potential ethical and personal mess. And… [more]

Loss is a part of any adoption. A first parent's loss of their child; an adoptee's loss of their biological parents and the life that they could have had versus the life they currently lead; and in a much more minor way, an adoptive parent's loss of the biological child they did not have. In an open adoption, those losses are much more stark, much more eaisly recognizable. Not that they're any easier to talk about. Once things are out in the open, it's at least possible to deal with reality rather than what might be, what could be - and not what's real. In our case, we've dealt with loss in many different ways, all of us. M had, I think, the most difficult time… [more]

When people talk about an adoption being open, there are certain things people expect when they hear that phrase "open adoption". Pictures and letters at least once a year, probably, but certainly more than that. Regular visits. Frequent phone calls, letters, packages from both birth and adoptive families. From the very beginning. Our adoption hasn't been that way. What our agency called "open adoption" well...wasn't. No identifying information was to be shared; and if it was, the agency officially didn't want to know about it. When visits happened, they were to be in a neutral location with a social worker or other moderator present. We were told that other adoptive families used cell phone numbers for contact, because cell phone numbers aren't associated… [more]

An autobiography, either written, videotaped, or both, is usually a part of any home study. At our agency, we were asked to complete both a written autobiography and a 5 minute video. The idea was that the written autobiography would be a part of our profile that expectant parents would see first; then, if they were interested, the video would be available to them as well. An autobiography is a little like the profile that is filled out at the agency at the beginning of the home study process. Rather than being answers to a series of questions, it is more like a narrative. It's the story of your life so far, in as much detail as you feel comfortable sharing. As our social worker told… [more]

This is (a very belated) part of the first Adoption Carnival, hosted at Grown in My Heart. It's a pretty big topic: What did people forget to tell you about adoption? What did they omit or conveniently not tell you before you adopted or relinquished your child? There are so many things, but I'll try to keep them at 10.

• I wish that someone had told me how frightened I would feel about having a brand new baby at home. Every other mother I knew seemed so at ease and happy. I just figured that I was going to be a terrible mother from the get-go; that all my IF problems and miscarriages meant that I was going to be a horrible mother.
• I wish someone had warned me

An adoption home study usually consists of at least three parts: a written autobiography for each member of the potential adoptive family; interviews of each member of the potential adoptive family (conducted by a social worker), both separately and together; and a home visit. I've already written a bit about the home visit, so I thought I would write about the interviews this time. In our case, we had interviews immediately after we completed our autobiographies. Like the autobiography, you will be encouraged to reveal everything about yourself. Merely from observing several couples in our pre-adoption classes, I would guess that there are few people who actually reveal everything about themselves. You need to decide, barring anything that would come up/had already come up in a criminal… [more]

I wrote in my previous post about our own disrupted placement.   Up until the Friday before Labor Day weekend, we had been preparing to be the parents of a 2 month old baby boy.  Everybody supposedly was excited about the adoption.  Everybody except me.  I couldn't understand why I wasn't sure, why I had doubts, why I didn't feel any excitement.  Then we got a call 10 minutes before we left to meet Lil' D's family and become his (at least temporary) parents, and we knew. It was our social worker with bad news.  Lil' D's family had decided to postpone the placement "for now".  They wanted the long weekend to bring him home and say goodbye.  The agency would be in touch on Tuesday. That seemed reasonable.  We were disappointed… [more]

Usually, an adoption has a few "simple" steps.  The adoptive parents have a homestudy completed, to ensure that they are suitable candidates to parent a child.  Then they're placed in a queue.  Depending on the agency involved and their own criteria for "suitable parents", it can be short or lengthy.  Then you wait.  And wait.  And wait some more. Finally, there comes the day when the potential adoptive family gets The Call.  Then they meet the baby (and usually, at least in our state, the baby's original family).  Then they're placed, then there's the finalization, and they all live Happily Ever After. Sometimes it doesn't work out that way. I don't personally know of too many adoptive parents who haven't had at least one instance of a failed placement.  For the purposes of… [more]