F & Q's

**THE MOST COMMON QUESTIONS WE GET ASKED**


WHY DOMESTIC ADOPTION?
We are firm believers that there is no wrong way to grow your family through adoption. We hope that through prayer and time God would show us the path for our family and He sure has! We have prayed about each route to adoption. Foster to adopt, International and Domestic. We believe after taking steps down each way that the Lord has made our path clear for us to adopt domestically. We desire to have a semi-open or open adoption. This is made available through domestic adoption. We believe it will be in the best interest of our four children to bond from infancy with their sister.

ARE YOU ADOPTING A NEWBORN?
Yes! The way domestic adoption works is that we will be matched with an expectant mother.
WHAT IS A ‘HOME STUDY’?
A home study is required for every adoption, whether it is an international or a domestic adoption.. W This study is a basic overview of your life – including criminal background checks, your finances and lots of endless questions about your personal relationships, how you parent and discipline. They get all up in your business about every aspect of your life!  It is used by the courts to assess if our home and life is a stable environment for a child. A home study is often the lengthiest step when preparing to adopt. We used Child and Parent Services for our Home Study. They did a fantastic job! We have a wonderful social worker that is conducted all of our interviews and walked us through the Home Study process. She will also be the social worker to come to our home after we have brought baby home!

WHAT AGENCY ARE YOU USING?
We are taking a unique route to domestic adoption. Instead of using one agency we are using a consultant agency, Christian Adoption Consultants. They work with quality agencies all over the US. We will have greater exposure to expectant mother’s by working with multiple agencies, instead of just one. We hope that this allows our wait to be on the shorter side.  Our  baby could be born anywhere in the US.



IS THERE A RISK?
The biggest “risk” is a failed placement. A failed placement means that we could be matched with an expectant mother, meaning she chose us, and we are getting to know her as she prepares for delivery, but then after delivery (or even before that) she decided to parent the baby. Although we know this would be very difficult, we know that these type of things happen, and we also know that we will support that mother’s decision. If there is a failed placement, we would go back to being a “waiting family”.
WHEN WILL THE BABY BE HOME?
Well it is really hard to know the answer.  The typical wait from “waiting family” is 6-12 months.  Once our family profile book is done and sent to the agencies we will be a “waiting family”. When you are a waiting family, you are presented potential “situations”. These “situations” show us information about the expectant mother, information about their medical history, her birth expenses, agency fees, how far along she is, what state they are in, etc. At that point, we can decide to present our adoption profile to them (an adoption profile is a book that you make all about you that tells the expectant mother what you a like. It’s like your personal letter to her). If we decided to present our profile, the expectant mother will have a few profile books to look through and she will then pick who she wants parent her baby. This process is very unknown. We could match with an expectant mom right away or it could take a while. We are trusting that this will all happen in God’s perfect timing!