Ahhh... It has been a long road, but we are now (pretty much!) done with our Home Study. I feel like this was a race with three legs to it. The first leg was attending a 2.5-day training in late August, 2013. We learned so much about adoption at that training that it really was a valuable experience. Being able to meet adoptive parents and a birth mother and hear their stories was incredibly helpful. After the training I was motivated to begin the second leg of the race, the MOUNTAIN of paperwork.
Numerous times through this process I have been told by people that they wish all parents had to go through the rigorous vetting it takes for approval as adoptive parents. In some ways I certainly agree with them. There are many people who fall into parenthood accidentally or irresponsibly and could benefit by putting more thought into the decision. Society would probably benefit if those who are irresponsible were vetted out of becoming parents, as well. After going through this process, though, I think there would be much fewer children in the world (even to responsible, loving parents!) if everyone had to go through this. It is a lot of work! Much of it was easy enough, just time consuming. Some of it was thought provoking and helpful for reflection. But mostly... it was a LOT of work.
Leg three of our journey has been the Home Study process. This consisted of four visits, two at our home and two at the agency. The first two visits were more comfortable, getting-to-know-you visits. They asked about how we grew up, our relationships with our families, and our journey through infertility. This really was more comfortable and less intimidating.
The third visit was quite uncomfortable. Imagine filling out a survey while being stared at in silence. Ben was completing his survey next to me and also being stared at. I should state now, that the point of this visit was to ensure that we were good people and have a stable, loving marriage. Once the surveys were complete I was sent into another room to wait while they questioned Ben. About 25-30 minutes later, he came to trade places and said under his breath to get ready because it was "intense." And it was! I was asked about drugs, alcohol, my sex life, if I have ever been molested, when the last time was that I had viewed pornography, and so much more. What an uncomfortable experience! I was relieved when it was over.
At our fourth Home Study visit we dealt with some follow-up and clarifications from the previous visit and then discussed the type of child we are open to. This was also tough. We have decided that we are open to a child of any race. We are more concerned about the health of the child, and are quite picky there. This is about the only area we have some control over and it is important to us. We had not realized, when making this list, that some of the conditions we are not open to we will not know about until the birth. And some of them we may not know about till much later. This was tough to hear. Thankfully, our caseworker shared that over 90% of the children they work with are born healthy. This was good to hear. She also emphasized that God is the one who is really in charge here. He will bring us the child we are mean to parent. That was reassuring, too.
Okay, so we are done with our photo book, birth parent letter, professional photos, photo pages, and Home Study visits. We will have a few revisions to make in the profile letter and photo book, and then we will be placed on the website. At that point a new wait begins. Thankfully, this one will have a wonderfully happy ending.
