Matt and Denise's Adoption Blog

10.26.2010

2010-10-26T11:14:00.000-07:00

We had our final meeting last week with our case worker- big surprise, she is leaving the adoption unit and going back to being a foster care worker. Very sad. She was very bright, optimistic, and motivated- the perfect person to be handling adoptions. Unfortunately, in the three months she was in the adoption unit, she only had one adoption. One. I am trying very hard not to be angry, but I am so dissapointed that we put our trust in this broken system. I do not think we will attempt to adopt through DSS in the future, certainly not in North Carolina. I am still deciding what I am going to do- I have considered launching a letter writing campaign, but the Cumberland County DSS has been all over the news this past year, and have been on the state's "Watch List". Plenty of people already know what a dysfunctional mess the department is in, so what really would happen with one more complaint letter? It might make me feel better, but it might make me more angry. Either way, our foster/adopt license is closed for North Carolina, and it's time to figure out plan B.

9.6.10

2010-09-06T20:33:00.000-07:00

Well, looks like once again we have to put our adoption on hold. We will be moving to San Antonio in November for Matt to start Physician Assistant school, and we will will be moving three times in the next three years, possibly to three different states, so there is no chance that we will be adopting while Matt is in training.

Thank you Cumberland County for dragging this process out so long that we were not able to adopt in the TWO YEARS that we have been licensed and waiting. I can only hope that wherever we land in three years will have a DSS that actually wants their children to find permanent homes.

7.30.10

2010-07-30T12:58:00.001-07:00

We met our new adoption worker this past week. She is very nice and it seems like she is very hard working and she's young so maybe she's not so disgruntled with the DSS system like the past two workers have been. Time will tell. Unfortunately, she does not have any different resources in identifying children available for adoption in our county. Maybe there's not a single child in Cumberland County that is waiting for a home? Unlikely. I think it is shameful of the agency to not have any type of listing- I know of four couples like us that have been waiting for almost two years to adopt and have heard nothing. So what do you do? Our new worker's advice- be a foster parent. Ok, so we already decided to do that, but that doesn't really fix the problem- the children are still unidentified sitting in their foster homes while we, the potential adoptive parents, are waiting and frustrated.

So my new strategy is to be a foster parent. It's heartwrenching and chaotic, but maybe, just maybe, one of these children will not be returned to their dysfunctional families and we will be able to adopt them. Or we could win the lottery and be able buy a baby through a private adoption agency. Right now, the latter seems more likely.

7.1.10

2010-07-01T07:04:00.000-07:00

Still nothing to report except that our new case worker has quit, and now we have to start all over again with yet another case worker. Maybe this new worker will have the appropriate connections within DSS to figure out which children are available for adoption?

In the meantime, we have decided to do foster care and on June 10 a sweet baby girl, nine weeks old, came to stay with us for awhile- initially it was only for the weekend, but now it looks like she'll be with us for a few weeks while her grandmother goes through the legal process of getting custody of her.

It has been a huge change for us to have an infant, and especially for Matt who has never cared for an infant, but Matt is doing fabulous and is in what I like to call "Baby Bootcamp" I think he'll graduate. He has taken on diaper duty, formula making, baby bathing, and night time feedings like a pro. After being married almost 10 years, it's very cool to see this new paternal side of him.

Hopefully the distraction of this new baby will keep me from going completely insane while we wait for our new case worker to contact us.

5.26.10

2010-05-26T19:05:00.000-07:00

How my day went today:

10:35 am- We got a call from a case worker saying they have a six-month old baby girl for us, and she needs to be placed today- I say absolutely, we'll take her! I'm amazed and ecstatic- I text all my friends. We call our mothers. Matt comes home early from work. Since we did not think we would get a baby (because of the long wait list) we had been planning on adopting older children, so we have nothing for a baby, and I mean nothing. We go out and spend $1,000 on baby gear- crib, mattress, changing table, car seat, high chair, diaper geanie, clothes, bibs, bottles, toys- from nothing to fully ready for a baby in a matter hours. The only thing that we did not buy was diapers and formula. We are so excited- talking about baby names and how we cannot believe after all this time, that this is the day that our lives will change. The very small voice inside my head which tells me this is too good to be true decides to keep everything in it's packages and boxes, and not open/assemble/wash anything- just in case.

2:30 pm- The case worker calls to say that the baby's worker is still in court and she hasn't heard anything yet on when we will be getting the baby.

4:30 pm- I call the case worker because I know they start to go home at 5:00pm. She tells me she still hasn't heard anything but she'll go find the supervisor. She calls back to say the baby's worker is still in court and she hasn't heard anything.

7:00 pm- We figure since we haven't heard anything that we must not be getting this baby today, so we eat dinner, do homework, watch tv- just like every other night.

10:00 pm- We get a call from the baby's case worker- there has been a misunderstanding and the baby is staying with her current foster family. We should have never been told that she was coming to us today. She's very sorry.

So this day goes from being one of the best days of my life to one of the worst. Now I have a room full of baby stuff that all needs to be returned, and I have to tell everyone that was so excited for us today that there is no baby.

5.24.10

2010-05-24T11:12:00.000-07:00

So last week we got some incredibly frustrating and discouraging news. After waiting (not so) patiently for four weeks, I emailed our new case worker to see if she had found any profiles of children for us to review yet. Her reply: "To put it bluntly, at this time it does not appear that an appropriate system is in place that allows me to know what children are available for adoption"

So the 3,000 children in NC that are waiting for families will apparently be waiting for much longer since no one can be bothered to make a central list for the adoption workers.

What a fantastic system. What a fantastic waste of the past 18 months that we have been waiting.

5.11.09

2010-05-11T11:25:00.001-07:00

Nothing new to report- just more waiting. All our paperwork is back up to date, now we wait to be matched with children.

We do really like our new case worker though, and are feeling much more optimistic.

4.16.10

2010-04-16T11:39:00.001-07:00

Here we go again...... Thankfully our old case worker has retired and we have a new one, and we are optimistic that she will be able to get things rolling for us. Theoretically, we should be good to go because we have our license now, but DSS just loves to throw you a curve ball (hence the FOUR year process of adoption that we have been in)

Anyway, next Wednesday we have our first home visit with our new worker, and we will know where we stand, and more importantly, when we will officially begin the adoption process, this time for real!

6.9.09

2009-06-09T18:23:00.001-07:00

Today we received the official word from our case worker that our adoption will be put on hold for at least six months:

"I talked to my program manager about your situation yesterday and she decided this is not a good time to place a child in your home for adoption. It really is not fair to you or the child since Matt will not have time to bond with the child. However, we can have everything ready and in place before Matt returns and we can continue to recruit for you."

So, there you have it. I guess we'll see what happens next year.

5.15.09

2009-05-15T18:03:00.000-07:00

We cannot decide if we just got a completely incompetent case worker, or if this is the first home study that she has ever done, or if because she is retiring in six months that she just could not care less. She has apparently (after eight and half months) just realized that we will need to get back ground checks from the places we have lived in the past five years- which for us is NY and TX. Of course, she had not gotten around to requesting this information from these agencies until yesterday, and was told by TX that we need to request this background check ourselves, the request needs to be signed and notarized, and that it will take "at least 30 days from the day it is received". Considering that Matt is leaving in 60 days, we are facing the reality that this is just not going to happen before Matt leaves.

5.8.09

2009-05-07T20:56:00.000-07:00

Well, our home study is still not "complete" but we did see the final draft yesterday and were able to review it and make changes, so maybe.......

I just cannot comprehend how the fantastic State of North Carolina can justify taking so long to complete a 15 page summary of the forms we filled out and turned in EIGHT months ago!

Amazingly frustrating, but hopefully by the end of the month we will have our license.... although it may be too late since Matt will be deploying in about eight weeks.

2009-04-16T15:07:00.000-07:00

We have gotten two promising emails this week from our case worker:

From 4/13:

"I need to make another home visit to walk through your home again view your fire extinguisher, location of smoke detectors, location of medications, and cleaning supplies, and to describe the furnishings in each room for the PPA. It is not necessary for both of you to be home for this unless you would like. My goal is to have the PPA completed by the end of the week and turned in to my supervisor for any questions she has. Just let me know when!"

and then from 4/16:

"I will see you tomorrow at 2:15 pm. I am bringing a social history on an eight year old boy that I would like for you to read and consider."

So, we are obviously excited that it seems our home study may be almost completed, and also interested in reading our first history- it seems that this might actually be happening after all these months! Yeah!

4.10.09

2009-04-10T20:19:00.000-07:00

Nothing to report, but we did receive a few emails this week from our case worker asking us questions, so she has now begun our home study report.....

3.17.09

2009-03-17T15:58:00.001-07:00

The latest email from our caseworker today (the PPA is our home study report):

"I will begin working on your PPA soon. I understand that Matt may be deploying this summer. Please keep in mind that once the PPA is completed and approved there are no guarantees that a child will be placed in your home by the time he deploys. I wish I could be more encouraging to you but I cannot. All I can say is to be patient and I will complete the PPA asap."

3.3.09

2009-03-03T20:44:00.000-08:00

Our most recent email from our caseworker on 2/20/09:

"Thanks for checking in. Your home study has not been completed. I will contact you once it is because you will need to review it. I just ask that you be patient because I have other cases that have to be dealt with first."

So, obviously what we were told would take one month is now going into month FIVE, with no real end in sight.

2/5/09

2009-02-05T06:54:00.000-08:00

Over the past month we have worked with our case worker on our references, and after 3 months, she finally was convinced that our former neighbors were not going to send in a letter, and allowed us to submit more names from some of our other friends, and we heard back from her today....

"Yes, I have received the reference from the Tanners. I am hoping that I can begin working on your home study this month. I have a backlog of work that needs to done so please be patient with me."....

This is the most frustrating part- it just seems to be one delay after another- our entire adoption future lies in the hands of one overworked case worker, and there is absolutely nothing we can do but sit here and wait....

01/21/09

2009-01-21T18:49:00.000-08:00

No news......still waiting to hear something.....

1/5/09

2009-01-05T15:51:00.000-08:00

Well, the new year has not brought us any good news. I emailed our case worker today to check on the status of things (she had told us in November that our home study should be complete in December) and I found out that two of our references have not turned in their letters. (This goes back to one of my very first posts where I explained how DSS wanted a reference from a neighbor that lived "within sight of our house" well, one of the two references are one of those ex-neighbors of ours. Not surprising with the Army, they have now moved and we do not have their phone number so we cannot call them to see why they did not send in their reference letter) So, in her exact words, "I do not begin to complete the home study until I have all 4 references".

Basically, what we thought would be done by the end of December has not even been started yet. Once she gets all four of the required reference letters, THEN she will START the home study report which takes 4-6 weeks. Couldn't she have told us this six weeks ago!?!?!?

12/20/08

2008-12-20T22:00:00.000-08:00

Just a quick update- I managed to get a letter from my doctor stating that she made a mistake on my physical form, and that I do not have a stress disorder. (I consider that my Christmas miracle for this year) and another letter from another doctor describing my treatment plan for my TB and stating, again, that I am not contagious. (Am I seriously the first person that has tested positive for TB at DSS?- I've had to submit three separate notes now all saying that I am not sick or contagious)

These two magic letters will be delivered to our case worker on Monday, and then we will wait and see what the next delay will be.

12/14/08

2008-12-14T09:37:00.000-08:00

No news, just another possibly fatal delay..... One of the things we needed to do for the adoption was get a physical. No problem. Except, that for some reason, my new family doctor listed on my physical form that I have a "stress disorder". Unfortunately, I did not see this until I left her office. She never told me that I have a stress disorder, and I would argue that the only source of stress in my life is this adoption process, but other than that my life is great- I have no stress, much less a stress disorder. What I do have is a sleep disorder (I have had insomnia for years). I think she meant to write sleep disorder because that is what we discussed at my appointment. It was the only thing we discussed- she gave me samples of Ambien to try. BUT, since she wrote stress disorder, now it has become a huge thing for my case worker. I understand that they would want to be cautious with someone with a stress disorder, obviously, but what upsets me so much is that I think the doctor wrote the wrong thing. Because I have worked with doctors for years, I know that they are real people who make honest mistakes just like everyone else. For anyone else, it is no big deal to have something like that written in your medical record. Unless of course you are trying to adopt through DSS and then you are screwed. So what has to happen now is that DSS has to request my medical records, then my case worker has to speak with my doctor to discuss my diagnosis and the treatment of my stress disorder. And, of course, the fact that I have denied having this disorder does not look good to my case worker, since doctor's know everything and are always right, and me, a potential child abuser with a diagnosed stress disorder could not possibly be telling the truth when I say my doctor made a mistake. First TB, and now a stress disorder. It just keeps getting better and better.

11/24/08

2008-11-24T17:00:00.000-08:00

Well, not much really to report. Matt and I had our individual meetings with our case worker this past week, and we have 99% of our paperwork done. It would have been 100% but when I had my TB skin test, I tested positive! So I had to go to the Health Department and then I had to have a chest x-ray to prove that I do not have an active TB infection (and I will thoroughly enjoy going back to the Health Department each month for the next nine months that I will be on high dose antibiotics to kill all the TB bacteria lurking in my lungs, but that's another story) So, now I am waiting for my doctor to sign off on my physical paperwork and THEN we will have all of our paperwork completed. Finally! Then we wait until our case worker finishes writing up our home study report, which she says she "hopes" to have completed by the end of the year. These next few months are going to be rough.

11/12/08

2008-11-12T18:11:00.000-08:00

Well, after what feels like a blitz of training, we are now officially "trained" to be parents, at least according to the State of North Carolina. On Saturday we spent seven hours becoming certified in CPR and first aid, on Monday night we had two hours of training on medication administration and then earlier tonight we had two hours worth of training on universal precautions and blood borne pathogens. Add that to the 30 hours of parenting classes, and apparently now we are good to go. Also on Monday morning we had the first half of our official home study visit. Now our social worker just needs to meet with both Matt and I separately, I really don't know why- maybe to make sure that I am not coercing Matt? But after our individual meetings, then she will start compiling our home study report. We still need to have physicals, TB tests and get the cats their rabies shots (which we are doing on Saturday) and THEN all we have to do is wait. We were told that the home study report takes about one month to compile, then we have to be approved by a committee for adoption (basically a formality at this point) and then they will start looking for children that will be a good fit in our home. So we are expecting to be officially licensed by Christmas. As far as when they will find children for us, we have no idea. It could be one month it could be two years. Only God knows.

Now I just have to say this to all our family and friends who are reading- please don't keep asking us what is happening with the adoption. It's just the same as asking a woman who is two months pregnant when she is having the baby, every time you talk to her. We started this blog so that we do not have to keep saying, over and over, that nothing is happening, we are still waiting. We will keep this blog updated, so if nothing has been updated then nothing is happening. The only family member that is allowed to ask is Donna because she does not have a computer. No one else is allowed to ask. Ever. I know that you are all excited and are just being supportive, and we appreciate that, but I need all my patience (which is not a lot to begin with) to be nice to my social worker and I have none to spare. Trust me, when the time comes, everyone will know :)

10/30/08

2008-10-30T18:53:00.000-07:00

Tonight we had our last adoption class. THANK GOD! Now the biggest part is behind us, but it was also the most tangible part because now starts the waiting. Then more paperwork. Then more waiting. We have our "home study visit" scheduled for Monday, November 10th which is basically the most important part of the entire process. Our home study is a giant report that basically tells everything there is about us. This report is how they decide if a child (or children) will be right for us. It all comes down to this one report. It takes about a month after the home study visit to finalize the report. So, we still have a few things to do on our list to prepare for the home study, and my goal is to have everything on our list done by the 10th. We'll see if we can make it happen. I'm am trying my hardest to be the first one in our class to get everything submitted because there are six other couples, all with the same case worker, who are now our competition. So, we'll see who gets to the finish line, that is, becoming a licensed foster home, first.

10/24/08

2008-10-24T20:12:00.000-07:00

One more week down.....we just had our second home visit by our social worker which went well. Next week we have two meetings- on Tuesday night there is a special "Panel Discussion" where there will be a panel of people related to foster/adopt like a social worker, a foster parent, an adoptive parent, a lawyer, a psychologist and a teen that is in foster care. It sounds like it will be very interesting. both our Mom's are coming from SC to attend the meeting, so it will be nice to have them involved as well. Then next Thursday is the last of our exhausting ten week classes! Thank God!

Adoption Scrapbook

2008-10-19T17:34:00.000-07:00

So, here is our Adoption Scrapbook. Sorry about the advertising, but the site hosts the files for free....

10/17/08

2008-10-17T19:35:00.000-07:00

Well, today was a good day, and a definite step in the right direction. Today we had our first home visit with our adoption social worker. The visit went really well- I think we were both nervous and didn't know what really to expect. While Matt was gone in the field for the previous week, I had been obsessively cleaning the house, which I'm not sure was completely necessary, but it made me feel better. Anyway, what we found out is that after our classes are finished (two weeks) then we begin the process of actually becoming licensed. This process takes a minimum of six weeks. We explained to our case worker that we are very motivated to get through this so that we can possibly have our future children living with us for a few months before Matt deploys again. If not, we will have to wait, again, until he comes home and then possibly have to start all over again. She seemed understanding and assured us that she will do all that she can. She did pay me a nice compliment when I showed her our adoption scrapbook that we made for our future children- she said it was the nicest parent book that she had ever seen! (I agree, but then I have only ever seen one other scrapbook). So, with just three more classes to go, then we have to:
1. Become certified in CPR and first aid
2. Attend training on administering medication
3. Attend training on universal precautions
4. Have a physical
5. Have a negative TB test
6. Get our cats their rabies shots (we're huge slackers, but in our defense, our cats never even sniff outside air, so their risk of contracting rabies is less than ours!)
7. Update our adoption scrapbook (it was done 2 years ago- a lot has happened in our family the last 2 years)
8. Have a fire inspection of our home
9. Safety inspection of our home (we need to lock up all our medications)
10. We need to purchase bunk beds and mattresses, sheets, pillows, blankets, etc.
11. We need to make a chart showing our house rules and chores and the consequences and/or rewards
12. Have 2-3 more home visits- luckily our case worker lives right down the road from us, so she is a little more willing to come during the evening, and possibly on a Saturday.

THEN, once all those things are done, then the minimum six week clock starts. So, we had hopes of having our children here before Christmas, but it looks like we should be shooting for Easter instead. Which is fine by me because by the end of March I will have worked at my job for a year and will qualify for FMLA and can take up to twelve weeks off when the kids come.

10/2/08

2008-10-02T18:31:00.000-07:00

Week 5 down- we're halfway done with the classes! No news at all to report because our case worker has not been at the meetings for the past two weeks. So, apparently the great speech we were given about how the "early bird gets the worm" in regards to the mountain of paperwork we needed to complete really meant nothing. I spent my entire weekend in Atlanta, and Matt spent his "bachelor" weekend without me, working on our surveys to get them turned in right away, only for nothing to happen for two weeks. Sigh. The foster parents in our class have already had their first home visits, but not the few of us who are adopting. The worst thing is that you are completely at the case workers mercy- you don't want to complain because you don't want to seem difficult. Anyway, hopefully next week we will have something to report.....

9/24/08

2008-09-24T19:56:00.000-07:00

Well, September 3rd started our ten week adoption course through the state of North Carolina. Since this is the THIRD time we have had to go through these classes (this is our third attempt at adoption- the first two times in TX were interrupted by a year long deployment and then a move to NC) we are finding them redundant and frustrating. But, we must do this to accomplish our goal. So, each week, we do our homework, show up on time and try our best to interact with the DSS staff and the other people in our class (not always easy). Compared to the two previous classes, this class is very unorganized and way too big for the "activities" that we have to do.

Today Denise got her fingerprints done at the Police Department, and hopefully Matt will be able to get his done during his lunch break tomorrow. We also completed our SEVENTEEN page personal surveys answering all kinds of questions, sometimes more than once, about ourselves. It took us each about five hours to finish that survey, and it's just the beginning of all the required paperwork for this process.

We found ourselves very frustrated with one of the reference requirements- from a "neighbor that lives within site of your house". Sounds simple enough, but only if you happen to know your neighbors, which we don't. Denise has not actually met any of the neighbors yet, and Matt has introduced himself to the neighbor on the left of us, who seems very nice, and has had three conversations with the neighbor on the right, the last of which was very uncomfortable after we discovered that his dog was being neglected and was starved to the point that his ribs and hips were showing and Matt threatened to call the police if he didn't feed his dog. Is this the type of neighbor we want to use as a referral? We don't think so. So, we are bucking the system and giving them the name of our previous neighbors when we lived on post who actually knew us and with whom we were actually friends. We'll see how that goes. We would not find it too surprising if they said that we had to have a reference from one of the people that live next to us. From what we have seen so far with the State of North Carolina, they would rather have a piece of paper that says yes, I live next door to these people (because that's what the requirement is) than an honest reference in which someone truly knows who we are, specifically, whether or not we would make good parents. But again, we must endure all this with a smile because if we don't, we will not be parents.