JC congratulations on taking the first step...research 101.
As an adoptive mother I have experienced both sides of the table. My husband and I felt the same way your husband did. We felt like we were throwing our money out the window and we felt that the agencies took advantage of potential birth moms. We pay them tons of money and the adoptive mom barely got a dime. So...our journey of a private adoption began. Along the way we met people who were professional scam artists, a birthmom who promised to place her baby with three different families and a whole lot of other scenarios.
At last we had the baby of our dreams a beautiful baby girl, in our state (TX), in a private adoption a birth family has six months to change their minds. Would you care to guess what happened? Our birth family changed their mind and we were crushed. I couldn't even consider adoption for two years.
Our next step was to go with a non profit agency in GA they claimed to have a great success rate and any money we gave them would roll over if the birth mom changed her mind. They said "the average wait was 9-18 months" boy did we get excited. Long story short we gave them 25K up front, wrote our birth mother letter and left it up to them and their expertise. Here it is three years later and no baby from them, not even a legitimate lead. Due to the power of the Internet we found out that about 100 of their clients had been waiting for three years or more and the agency said they would never have more than 150 clients. To date they have 350 waiting families, go figure...
We also went through a facilitator who claimed that she had several babies in foster care and needed some families to adopt them. She connected us with a birth mom from AZ. The birth mom was three months pregnant but the facilitator claimed she was seven months along. The facilitator would not allow us to have a one on one conversation with the birth mom nor could we get a phone number until we paid a $4000.00 finders fee. When we insisted on a phone conversation that included the birth mom the facilitator told us the birth mom was so uncomfortable with the whole situation she ( the facilitator) was going to answer most of the questions. We thought that was a logical explanation.
After the call we mailed a cashiers check to the facilitator. After it cleared the bank she gave us the birth moms full name and phone number. After speaking to the birth mom we found out that she was 3 months pregnant even though her proof of pregnancy letter said 7 months, the facilitator changed it and…the birth mom had told the facilitator that she didn’t think she could place the baby. The facilitator threatened the young girl by saying she would get a bill for all of the phone counseling she had done with her if she didn’t get on the call with us. We stayed in touch with the young girl and she did end up parenting, she called us when the baby was 4 and wanted to place her with us. We had her for Christmas and we visited her a lot, since we were already expecting our daughter that little girl was placed with the family who adopted her older sister.
We finally got smart and found Adoption.com and placed our Dear Birth Mother letter on ParentProfiles.com within 18 hours our birth mom found us and we were matched. No middlemen no one to mislead either one of us. Here is the catch…in order to place your letter on Adoption.com you must have your Homestudy and background check approved by your home state. In our case we were with the “agency” and we had an attorney. Our attorney also had a great connection with an adoption agency that he helped form. We had a choice to do a private adoption or do an identified (you already know the birth family) adoption via the agency. Granted going through the agency was more expensive however in TX in an agency adoption the birth family cannot reclaim the baby once they have signed the termination papers.
In our case we built an incredible relationship with our birth mom and we stayed in touch with one of the counselors from the agency. The birth mom never met with the agency until 6 weeks before the baby was born. It was a mutual agreement because we wanted to nurture our relationship and we both wanted the piece of mind knowing that if the placement didn’t take place it wasn’t because of a third parties influence. Our investment at Adoption.com was less then $2000.00, 8 months later we had a baby in our home and we were able to enjoy the entire pregnancy not to mention the bond we share with our wonderful birth mom. We love her more than words can ever express.
Our journey took 8 years, as I said earlier we learned a lot along the way, we learned how to look and listen for red flags and we even had two instances where we walked away because the birth family was very money motivated. In one situation we paid rent and utilities and found out that the family never intended to place. Our daughter’s birth mom just wanted a secure, happy and healthy environment for her child. She didn’t even want postpartum expenses paid. We had to force her to accept the money from our agency to help cover her rent and car payment.
I must say that not all birth families are money motivated, there are cases where the family is really in a pinch and they need money for rent, car payment etc, sometimes the birth mother is not able to work due to complications or she is unable to work because there are other children to care for. You may want to find out what the laws are in your state regarding birth family expenses and you and your husband need to decide if you are willing to take that on. In our state it is against the law to directly give any money to a birth family, you can give the money to the attorney or agency and they can pay the rent etc. In TX the money is considered a donation. If the birth family changes their mind you cannot try to reclaim your money or any expenses that you may have paid regarding the adoption.
Another great source is:
theadoptionguide.com
Unfortunately when we started our journey this guide was not available, we were shocked to see our agency on the list with “lots of complaints”. Ayyy vey…
Everyone’s experiences are different and everyone has to decide what they can handle emotionally, financially and even spiritually because the journey has lots of ups and downs. I must say that even though we lost a child in an open adoption, open adoption was the best choice for us. We have always wanted our child and future children to know the wonderful family who helped make our dreams come true.
Feel free to PM or send me an e-mail off line at:
Luv2daydream2002@yahoo.com
M