Ohio adoptions
Most counties in Ohio are fairly good at getting back to you. Hamilton is the worst I have dealt with the entire country! When you call, you get an answering machine and cannot talk with the social worker directly. Of all the times I've left messages on the machine, I've only had one return call. That person (not a social worker) told me that the child I was interested in was not available - even though I called two days after the child was posted online!
The worst part of dealing with Hamilton County is their sublime "submit your homestudy to us and we'll let you know when we find a child for you" attitude. This old-fashioned, governmental attitude of "get in line" just doesn't work anymore! With the internet tools available, families can choose to find another county to work with... which is what I highly recommend you do!
Our social worker has also given us the "wait until finalization" thing before attempting to adopt again. The reason is that some children go through mourning and acting out again after the finalization occurs. This is standard adoption text book stuff - you read about it in all the books.
But, with our children, we've made it very clear that going to court is just a technicality. We explain it like this:
Let's say a person steals a car. They go to court and the judge sends them to jail. Is the person a criminal? (kids answer yes)
Okay, now say that person steals a car but the judge lets them off because a police man did something wrong when arresting them. Is that person a criminal? (kids answer yes)
So, if it doesn't take a judge to make a person a criminal, it also doesn't take a judge to make us your parents and this a family!
It might be worth another thread asking folks if they had any behavior differences in their children after finalization. We could then use the information passed along as 'evidence' one way or the other with our social workers. What do you think?
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