Gathering our documents

For the past week or so, in between getting ready for a conference at work, I've been writing our dear birthmom letter, biographies and general content for our profile. I've also been making arrangements for the animals to go to the vet to be brought up to date on vaccines and getting the house ready for the homestudy. We got the homestudy application today. I am leaving for work for a few days at the end of next week. I hope to mail our profiles and homestudy application before I leave. Then we will really be making progress! Once our profiles are received by the attorney, he will start showing them to birthmoms in his office. This is so exciting!

Dear birthmom letter

I'm trying to write a letter to women who are considering placing their children for adoption. It's required. And it's so much harder than I had thought it would be.

Meeting with adoption attorney

This afternoon we traveled to a meeting with an adoption attorney. He is in a small town about 90 minutes from here. Well, 2 hours from our house, but 90 minutes from my work. We first talked with the attorney's assistant about some basics in adoption and specifically this practice. Then we spoke with the attorney, first about ourselves and our background, and then about how their practice works and what we could expect. The attorney is very nice. One of the ways I have been evaluating agencies and attorneys is by how welcoming they are. I try to think of how I would want to be treated if I were a birthparent contacting these folks and I think I would feel very comfortable with this attorney. He really put us at ease talking to us. I don't know if it is a strategy crafted over the years or just his personality. I suppose it doesn't matter. He said he encourages birthmoms to realize that adoptive parents are afraid the birthmom will try to take the baby back, and he encourages adoptive parents to realize birthmoms are afraid the child won't think they were loved or wanted. I thought that was a good way to get each side to realize the other feels vulnerable as well.

He has a small, local practice, but has been doing this for >30 years and is well known amongst hospitals and doctors in the area. I guess this is how he gets most of his referrals. We will have a greater chance at finding a referral if we do some of the legwork ourselves, which I don't mind. There are some great online resources and other ways to go about this. His costs are very reasonable, so if we do not receive a placement within a reasonable amount of time we would be free to work with someone else and not lose too much of our budget. While I hate to always be conscientious of costs we do have to watch our budget to make sure that we do not dig ourselves into a hole we can't get out of. Plus, the money we don't spend adopting #1 can be spent on #2 ;).

We still have to meet with an agency later on this week. I am trying to be very careful to make sure we know all our option in case there is a situation that would work better for us.

Baby, we're trying to find you!