Response to A Reader: Adoption, The Financial Side

This entry is a dedicated response to one of my readers who asked me to respond about "the journey of adoption in terms of the process and costs." The comment was posted on It's A Boy! 

Beyond the response below, I would encourage you to contact several different adoption agencies in your area and find the best fit for you. 

Adoption costs are determined by many different factors, just to name a few:

• Type of agency (church subsidized, private, foster, international).
• Gender and race of the adopted child.
• Single or multiple child placement.
• Adoptive parents annual income.
• How many lawyers are needed. In our case we actually needed two lawyer offices, because the birth family was in a different state than where we reside.
• Medical expenses.
• Birthparent needs.

The process varies as well. I hate to use the phrase "it depends" however, it really does.

I hope this helps in answering your question. Good luck and God bless!

Overalls After All!

This will be my first Mother's Day. To make it even more awesome, we received our sons amended birth certificate in the mail this week.

I've no doubt that he will struggle with the idea that someone else gave birth to him for us. But he is absolutely ours and for right here and right now, receiving his birth certificate with our names on it completely rocks! 

While I was thinking about this being my first Mother's Day, I remembered buying overalls many years ago. I bought them because I was newly married and excited about the potential to be a mom. I really think that pregnant women look so darn cute in overalls.

My husband and I decided to be married at least a year before trying to have children. However, before that year was done, my husband was deployed with the military. Shortly after he had returned from his deployment I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

After I left the doctors office, I came home and sat fully dressed in an empty bathtub and cried until I couldn't cry anymore. It was a very ugly cry. I still tear up when I think about it. 

I wasn't lamenting the diagnoses, instead I was absolutely crushed because it was at this time that I knew I wouldn't never physically carry a child inside of me.  

The decision to adopt rather than try to carry a child was an overwhelmingly spiritual decision for the benefit of my health. Both my husband and I felt that we shouldn't gamble with how my body would handle pre and post pregnancy.

We do not judge others with how they would have handled the situation. But in our circumstance, the decision was definitely the right move.

So I put my overalls on. I stood and looked at myself in the mirror and then I went outside and pulled some weeds. I wore those darn overalls landscaping our yard. I used the overalls until they were completely worn out. Then I got rid of them.

Just the other day I was getting my son dressed and pulled out some little blue overalls for him that someone gave us. I dressed him up in them and boy did he ever look cute! It was then that I realized I never lost my dream. I got to carry my child wearing overalls.

 

He's Ours!

At the sound of a Judges pen writing across a paper, it's done.  

Today, it became official! Our son is now legally ours. Um, so why have you not clapped, cried or done a back-flip yet? 

Excuse me? What was that? Yep, the world just stopped a second and the angels in heaven sang. Yes, you did hear that and feel that correctly. You are not going insane.

Heartfelt Gratitude

I've no idea how to express the joy I feel lately. All I know is that my husband and I are very blessed. Dear family, friends, co-workers and strangers who pray for us and have been so generous - thank you! 


Here's a little video I would like to share. God bless you all! We have been recipients of the grandest blessing that either of us have ever received.

It's A Boy!

Now I understand the meaning of what happened in my May 30 blog post...

My husband and I have been trying to adopt a child for a number of years. We've worked with three different agencies. It been pretty unsuccessful and downright frustrating. 

So when we received yet another call saying that a birth-mom delivered on the east coast a few days before and that the agency was requesting permission to show our profile to yet another set of birthparents, we said "sure". 

See, that's how it goes. Then you're not selected,  birthparents decide to parent rather than place the child, or you are in the top two and eventually become the "runner up". The most recent call was on the evening of July 1. 

After the call with the most recent case worker, we finished our movie and then went to bed knowing that on Monday, we would be informed we didn't make the cut. 

Honestly, we had mentally and emotionally given up on adoption. This was going to be the end. We were done and needed to move on with life.

July 2 came and after the lunch hour we received the news that we were actually selected! Oh my holy freakin' cow! The news wasn't followed by a "just kidding", rather it was followed by a "can you get out here tomorrow?" 

Well we couldn't. We had to get money wired to them, we had to arrange travel, we had to gather start-up baby stuff, dog sitter, communicate with our employers, etcetera. On top of all this, we were in a major holiday week. The best we could do was fly out on Wednesday.

July 3...A busy blur orchestrated by divine intervention to make things run as smoothly as possible, as in better than clockwork. However, it was indeed a blur, busy, exhausting and I have no idea how we did it all. Actually we didn't do it all, THANK YOU to all our friends and family. THANK YOU!

Our first family photo in a hotel lobby.
Diana, Josh, & Jacobson.

July 4...We were on the morning flight to a major east coast city, we selected an airport a little ways away for the benefit of a direct return flight with a babe in arms. 

After we landed, we jumped in a rental car for a two hour drive to a smaller east coast city. We drove right to the hotel of our social worker who had temporary custody of our little one since leaving the hospital. 

We met our social worker and the notary in the hotel lobby. We all signed transfer of custody paperwork and by around seven that night we were parents. Whew! 

We then drove to our hotel and checked-in. We were starving though, so we went to dinner and invited the social worker who had taken care of our son until we could get there. This was the best Fourth of July celebration ever!

Jacobson Ethan (7 days old)

The next few days were hurry up and wait kind of days. Hospital visits, baby registry stuff, texts and calls with family and friends, calls with area attorney's and attorneys back at home, adoption agency collaboration, diapers, spit-up, bottles, awesome hotel staff to help us sanitize bottles for reuse... we met a lot of really neat people during this time. But the neatest of all were the birthparents.

On July 5 we had dinner with the birthparents at their hotel and it was simply awesome. They went into this delivery knowing that they were giving birth to another person's child. 

Yes, this was emotionally and mentally tough for them to do, but in their own words over dinner, "...after meeting you, we now know we found the right family for our son. We have no doubts about placing him with you two." This was incredibly humbling to hear. 

It was also this night that we learned about the emergency circumstance of Jacob's birth. Both he and birth-mom almost didn't make it. 

The placenta and uterus detached and they were rushed to the Emergency Room where an emergency C-section was performed. Little Jacob even had to be resuscitated; a miracle baby all around in many ways. 

By evening's end we had interviewed the birthparents on camera and taken pictures. It was at this time that the birthparents requested that for sake of providing closure for their other children, could we arrange to meet them before we left town. We agreed and settled on meeting July 10.

July 9...We were informed that the ICPC was clear and we could fly home; the ICPC (Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children) is the legal do-hicky that says it's okay to take this kid of ours across state lines and back home. So we rearranged our flights from a July 14 return to a July 10 return!

July 10...We met the immediate birth family in a local park. We only had thirty minutes with them before we had to leave to drive to the airport. 

Our time with the birth family was precious. We were able to get pictures of each of Jacob's half siblings holding him. We got pictures of his birth parents holding him. We did see that the kids truly needed this closure. 

I know this opportunity is rare and unique with regards to adoption. The reason the birthparents placed Jacob with us is dynamic, hefty, and full on intricate details. Suffice it to say, there were many reasons, and all in all, this is a better situation for this little life. We have been blessed again. 

I mentioned earlier that I now know what the feeling was behind my May 30 blog post. During our interaction with the birthparents, we learned that Jacob had been promised elsewhere in a private adoption setting. 

During the last week of May the birthparents found that if they continued with the intended adoptive couple, that Jacob would be in a potentially abusive situation. Because of that, they decided to discontinue placement and to go with an agency. 

The agency that they selected was the third and final agency we ended up working with. It's amazing the divine orchestration that took place to bring us our son. We are thankful for the courage of Jacob's birth parents. They made a miracle happen in our lives.

It's so wonderful to be home now. It's been an absolute whirlwind and so completely worth it. Welcome Jacob! Welcome to our home, our family and our hearts. We love you!