[goin'batty]

Tere,

My best advice to you would be to be very honest with YOURSELF about what you can and will be able to deal with and stick to it. We all want a child very badly, but you can't rush into this blindly. We all have situations that we cannot deal with and to make yourself think that you can handle anything, when you really can't would be an awful thing to do to yourself and family, including your new child. It's hard but you must step back and evaluate your situation objectively. The right child will find you. It sounds hokey, but it's true.

Last year, my SW called us and said that a baby boy who was a month old was in the hospital with a mild case of encephalitis. He would maybe have a mild learning disability but would be a normal boy, would we be interested. Wow, we were so excited. We rushed over to the hospital, held him for hours and fed him and really thought he was adorable. However, we had discussed before hand what we were capable of dealing with and a baby with a severe handicap was something we couldn't handle. So, I made an appointment with his doctor who dropped a bombshell on us. He had contracted herpes encephalitis, had stopped breathing twice, had brain damage to both lobes and brain stem, they didn't know if he could hear or see or if he would ever be able to do those things. They didn't know if he would be a functioning person. I was crushed, but thank goodness I had researched everything and new in advance that I couldn't handle a situation like that. I cried a lot but I knew that we weren't the right family.

Now, I am matched with a young woman who is due at the end of March. We've been matched with her since she was 2 months pregnant, and it hasn't always been easy. I know that you said that the bmom didn't seem to communicate well with you, and frankly that would be of some concern to me if she keeps doing it. At the begining of our match, the bmom didn't keep us informed very well. I told her how that upset me and she has made an effort to do better. I'm going to say something that might not go over well with a lot of people and it's not meant to be disrespectful or apply to every birthmom, but some of these young ladies aren't real responsible and sometimes they aren't use to having someone else in their life who wants to know what's going on. I would just try to talk to her and tell her that you:

1. want to know when her appointment is. If she doesn't want you to go after all, try to be okay with that. However, you do have a right to know the health of the baby. I would ask her to have the medical reports faxed to your lawyer or ask her to sign a consent to talk to her doctor.

2. Ask to meet her if you want to.

3. Tell her how you feel about not knowing what's going on and that you would like to be able to talk more to her. Ask her if it would be okay if you called once a week or so just to see how she's doing. I would spend a lot of time just getting to know each other. Your conversations don't have to revolve just around the baby.

4. Do talk about what you all want from this adoption. Talk about who's going to be present at the birth, etc. Talk about how much contact will be involved after placement.

Don't leave the responsibility of communication with just her. The bmom that we are matched with never calls us or emails us first, however, she loves to talk to us. I think she's afraid that she might be bugging us.

Finally, I wanted to tell you that in Ohio, you do have to be careful about paying bmom expenses. I thought I should mention this to you since you seem to not have a good working relationship with your lawyer. You don't have a lot of time til march, some of the homestudy stuff can take awhile to complete, I would really urge you to contact another lawyer or agency to get the ball rolling.

If it's important to you, let her know it. Remember, this person is going to be in your life forever, even if she isn't really physically there. Make sure that this is a situation you can live with.

Hope I'm helping and not just rambling!
L