Adoption Update, Alternately Titled: Just Humiliate Me And Get It Over With

Our second adoption (fourth child) keeps moving along. We finished our visits with the social worker today, so here's a little update of all that's going on.



What's Been Done

We've collected official documents, filled out scads of forms, and had our backgrounds checked approximately 472 times. Hubs and I each met separately with our social worker in her office to play what could easily be called, "The Newlywed Game."

The social worker then came to the house where she got to see the two of us interacting together, all the while wrestling three howler monkeys. We're just thankful she didn't come at bedtime, where she would have seen a whole new side of our parenting skills. And by that I mean, "the sweet bedtime prayers and stories."

And since that two hour show wasn't entertaining enough, our social worker had to come back for more. Recently she visited us again--to inspect our home, and to interview the kids.

!!!

I'll just give you a few snippets from that visit and let you imagine the rest.

* * * * * * * * * *

Social worker to seven-year-old: "Which would you rather have, a brother or a sister?"

Seven-year-old: "Another sister, so my current sister doesn't bother me so much."

* * * * * * * * * *

Social worker to seven-year-old: "What does your two-year-old sister like?"

Seven-year-old: "She likes attention. But Mom never has enough time to give it to her."

* * * * * * * * * *

Meanwhile, both boys (ages 7 and 4) headed to the coat closet to hide play "spaceship." My two-year-old girl took that opportunity to put on her own little show. She ran to get her doll, and quickly came back to her "stage" and started whacking her doll's face on the table.

I said, "Like mother, like daughter."

No one laughed.

And I wondered, once again, who had run off with my Filter.

* * * * * * * * * *

Eventually, my four-year-old exited the closet with a toy broom in hand. He soon got bored with sweeping the floor, so he moved to the couch. First, he took the cushions off. YES. THE CUSHIONS. The cushions that I was certain the social worker would not lift up and look under. Once he got that part of the couch cleaned, he got down on the floor and stuck his broom under the couch. OH YES HE DID. And he pulled out so many items that I eventually lost count.

But I'm sure the social worker has that exact number of items burnt to her brain. Seeing as, my son proudly displayed each treasure to us all.

* * * * * * * * * *

WELCOME TO MY WORLD, PEOPLE.


What We're Waiting On

From here, our social worker will write a long-winded report about our family, which will then be checked, revised, mocked, checked, laughed at, and finalized.


What Comes Next

About a month from now, we'll be handed the files of EVERY child available for adoption in our state. I'm guessing that number is in the hundreds. Maybe more. New kids are added to that list each week, and their bios will be e-mailed to us each Friday.

From there, it's just a matter of us finding a child we "like," and "applying" to be his/her (or their!) parents. Since we're requesting a child younger than three, we'll be applying with about fifty other families each time.

With each child, a committee narrows the pool down to three potential adoptive families, and then that committee spends a lot of time choosing the best of those three from there.

It's certain that we'll apply for a child and be "rejected" on more than one occasion.

SO YES. YOU CAN PRAY FOR US.

And I have no doubt I'll be sharing the turmoil of it all here and on twitter. Make sure to subscribe to the e-mail updates if you aren't a "tweeter" (yet), or simply add that feed to your reader.


Thanks for asking for an update. Even though none of you did.