Alright. NOW I can write about our decision. I was just waiting to hear back from our social worker. As it turns out, she merely said, “yep, OK” to herself when receiving my email and didn’t see any need to respond. I contacted her by phone and she knows so now you can know.
There are two problems with the situation we find ourselves in right now regarding the adoption process. One, we are becoming increasingly uncomfortable working with our agency. For some reason all of our situations, and all of the ones we’ve heard about from other people, are going through a social worker in another part of the state. This other social worker is incompetent at best, unethical at worst. Unfortunately our social worker persists in working with her despite how she’s bungled several situations from both birthparent and adoptive parent perspectives. We don’t anticipate her working with any local situations in the near future, so the likelihood that we’d have to work with this other social worker is quite high. We’re to the point where we can’t be sure whether or not our next situation will be handled capably and ethically. So we’ve decided that we’re not willing to compromise on our standards for an ethical adoption just so we can be parents sooner.
Second, we’re tired. The failed placement has taken a lot out of us and has affected other parts of our lives that need some serious attention at the moment. It would do us a world of good to take a few months’ break before plunging back into the hell of waiting.
What we’ve decided to do, then, is to leave our agency and look for a new one in Iowa. By the time we arrive we’d like to have everything transferred and be working directly with an Iowa agency. Towards the end of our time in PA (we’re moving at the end of July) we’ll release our profile for anyone due after our arrival in Iowa.
I’m not happy that we’re back to square one with agencies, but this year we are MUCH more informed and have a better idea of what we want. I don’t think our agency has a contract with the devil or anything, but now I’m looking for different things. Specifically, I want an agency that has some built-in barriers to agency coercion and a bonafide plan to inform potential birthparents as well as possible about their parenting options.
Right now we’re considering Luthern Family Services. They can do an update of our PA homestudy so we won’t have to pay for a whole new one. Here’s what I like best though: when a woman comes in with an interest in adoption, their first move is to set her up with counseling. They work with her to come up with both parenting and adoption plans. That means that even if she says she is serious about adoption, they stress that the decision is not truly made until she meets her baby at birth. If she decides to parent even after planning to place, she won’t have to scramble for parenting resources; she’ll have a plan in place for her and her baby. Once the woman has talked through her options and is “serious” (I don’t know how they determine this), they show her profiles. She’s encouraged to pick and meet as many families as possible. They also strongly encourage mothers to spend time with their babies after birth before making the final decision. They sound very mother-centered.
We’re of course looking at other agencies but this is the one we like so far. If anyone has experience with them please let me know! I don’t want to just take their word.
I feel simultaneously sad and relieved about our decision. On the one hand, it is consistent with how we feel about adoption and will also free us up to concentrate on some other things for a while. On the other hand, we’ve already been waiting a year and it is absolutely breaking my heart that we will now probably wait another year or longer. One adoption professional from Iowa said that people are waiting a long time right now. We’ll see. But that the room we set aside here for our baby is going to stay empty is so hard. I can’t bring myself to dismantle the crib yet or put the clothes in boxes.
We won’t have a baby the same age as my sisters-in-law’s babies, and we won’t get to baptize our baby at St. Benedict’s. We will be far away from grandparents when he or she arrives. Our narrative has been shattered and it is heartbreaking.
But I still think we’ll be parents someday. Just not in the way we had envisioned. And isn’t that always the way?
Our agency is a division of LSS. They weren’t when we adopted Apple, but the staff chose to merge with a LSS agency about 10 years ago. The staff was wonderful when we were adopting Apple, and was very ethical in my opinion. Seperate counsel for birth parents and adoptive parents, outside counsel, outside attorneys. The local LSS organizes adoption info nights in November. They do a great job of trying to show the complexities of adoption. They feature search and reunion groups, adoptive families, birth parents- those content with their adoptions and those who regret- same with adult adoptees. LSS also were the first place that I heard about adoptive parents closing adoptions- they always have at least one birth mom speak about the pain it causes her.
I adore the two women we worked with then(they retired), and I really feel good about the two women who have taken their places. If they are any indication of the organization nation wide, I would say you are making a good choice.
i’m so happy for you guys 😉
For so many of us, parenting doesn’t come about in the way that we grew up thinking it would. I didn’t get pregnant when I thought I would, I didn’t adopt when I thought I would. All through the process you’re forming “wouldn’t it be wonderful if…” scenarios but the truth is, when you have your child in your family you see how wonderful that scenario is. I too watched wonderful “what ifs” go by and it hurt, but I wouldn’t change my current reality for any of those past ideals. When parenthood happens for you, I bet it will rock the moon.
Kohana’s response is beautiful, and I believe it’s really true. You will be parents, it won’t happen in the way you expect, and it won’t be just like you thought it would (parenting surprises me every day). But it will be good.
Hi there — MamaMarta’s friend in Iowa again — we have friends in SW Iowa who adopted through the Lutheran Agency you’re looking at — they were very very happy with it and have a wonderful four year old and a healthy open adoption…
For what it’s worth. Also – have you looked in the “Broadway” neighborhood of IC? It’s a bit more affordable and has a large population of African-Americans…just a thought.
congratulations and breathe — all of this and exams and FEBRUARY is too much!
wishing you peace, sster. i’m saddened that its been a rough road thus far. best wishes from me.
We just had an amazine adoption experience this week and I can highly, highly recommend the agency we used. I’m looking for your e-mail address on your site, but I don’t see it. The are ethical, kind, amazing to their birthmoms, and have given us an incredible level of service. E-mail me for more info.
What an incredible amount of emotional work–and with exams to boot! We too left our first agency after experiencing unethical and incompetent staff, disregard of a birthmother, and a failed adoption. Congratulations to you and Attic Man for leaving the agency now, rather than waiting. I regret that we stayed with our first agency as long as we did.
On a happier note: I know that Attic Man is Catholic, but there is the most wonderful Episcopal church in the IC area that you might want to visit. The small congregation at New Song Episcopal church includes blended families, multiracial families, families formed through adoption, singles, students, retirees, LGBT families….pretty much everyone. I am certainly not impartial, since our wedding was held there over seven years ago (not their first same-sex wedding) and the recently retired priest is one of my heroes.
What clarity. Your heads are still on straight. I hope the path starts to feel easier – it sounds like you have a good one.
we adopted through lfs and can not say enough good things about them! i feel really good about their ethics and love, love, love their commitment to pregnancy counseling that is not at all birthmother counseling. we have a wonderful relationship with our son’s birth mama. she is our dear friend and family. and she says the same thing about us. i would love to tell you more about our experiences if you would like that but can’t find your email address. shoot me an email if you would like. good luck on your exams!
That sounds like a good plan to me (with my limited knowledge of how these things work). What I am so impressed with is how thoughtful you continue be despite what has happened so far. I am certain you and Attic Man will make great parents, just from how you have handled the process of becoming parents.
Wow – that is a big change indeed. I identify with what you wrote about the created narrative being shattered – especially after you’ve created and re-created the narrative over and over again in response to shifting life events and situations you find yourself in. As women, we must re-author ourselves across the lifespan, but it is so exhausting. Add to it that many of us will re-author as infertile, adoptive, foster, divorced, re-married, multiracial – ahhhh, the list is often endless. The little flame that keeps hope alive in my heart is looking behind me to see that the most wonderful things God has worked in my life have been when I least expected them, and when it was absolutely nothing like the narrative I had created. What’s so beautiful about God’s creations is how they far exceed our human limits of invention. I can’t wait to see what Iowa holds for you and Attic Man.
Yes, that is the way: we don’t always get to live the stories we expected to, and that narrative shift can be so painful. I’m ever impressed with your ability to step back and reflect so thoughtfully. And sorry this path has been so much more difficult than you’d expected. And thinking of you as you move into this new script.
Lutheran did our home study and we like them a lot.
We have a foster license through them and they do have lots of support for all kinds of family situations, they are not exclusively about adoption.
We have had two teensy bites with them as far as possible babies go, but it looks like our agency in Chicago will probably be where our next baby comes from.
They (LSS) did tell us the wait for a baby was something more than two years, on average–but that’s here, not necessarily in Iowa.