[Kedu]

I've been lurking on here for a while while DH and I have been going through MAAP classes to adopt from foster care in Massachusetts. Classes are done and we have our first home visit on Wednesday. Woohoo! I am so excited, but nervous as heck. I shouldn't be so nervous since it's the same social worker who did our pre-MAAP visit. It's just that he said it will last for about 2 hours and I can't imagine talking to someone for that long. I'd feel differently if DH were going to be there, but it's an individual visit with just me. Any tips from those who've done it already?

[c.a]

boy or girl? What age?

[Boulderbabe]

Don't clean your oven. :-)

(Although, I must say, it is the one and only time my oven has ever been cleaned!!)

[snc2007]

I wasn't nervous at all which is really odd b/c I am nervous by nature! The sw didn't inspect our house at all. We just sat at the kitchen table and had tea and talked for a while. On a later visit she went over a safety checklist: childproofing, smoke alarms, fire extinguisher and things like that. It wasn't bad at all. Relax and good luck!

[basimah]

I was sooo nervous that I was shaking. I'm sure my worker felt me since we were sitting side by side on the sofa. I kept asking him if he was chilly because that's why I thought I was shaking...lol. But we just went over the 10 or so questions on the form and that took about an hour so 2 hours really isn't very long at all.

[c.a]

I think I misunderstood - are you doing a homestudy interview visit with the CW or a visit with a potential child placement?

[Perfect7]

Our cw interviewed me and dh seperately,too. It was because she once did a homestudy and the dh pulled her off to the side and said he really wasn't okay with adoption! It was painless. She asked about my childhood, how we shared responsibilities, my parenting style, how my marriage was, my strengths and weaknesses. I must say I was nervous, but it was pretty painless. Don't clean your closets out either! She never checked those.

[HappyHopefulMommy]

It depends what the worker is doing for this visit. My DH and I had our interviews at one visit and then she came back for another visit to do the home inspection. Both were pretty easy. The interview was just a list of questions, but we kept getting off track and talking about all sorts of stuff. For the home inspection she just walked through the house, made sure we had medicines and cleaners locked up, a fire extinguisher and that was about it. Good luck - don't be too nervous.

[Kedu]

Originally Posted by c.a

I think I misunderstood - are you doing a homestudy interview visit with the CW or a visit with a potential child placement?

It's a homestudy interview visit with our social worker. I wish we were at the point of a potential child placement.

So I won't clean out my closets or my oven, but I am running around cleaning the rest of the house tonight. It's not in bad shape, but I'm paranoid. I'll try to relax tomorrow.

DH just scheduled his meeting for next week. Yay!

[HopingforAlex]

Good Luck! We cleaned for a week straight, reorgainzed rooms, drawers, medicine, cleaning supplies, etc... She sat at our kitchen table, walked to the kids room and left.

She was not our case worker, just a home inspection person, though it was the first time according to her that she had ever done that

We had a 3 hour telephone interview with our case worker (very rural area).. and going in I though the same thing "how can we talk for three hours???" but it went by very quickly and short of a few potty breaks it was over before I knew it!

Please let us know how it goes!

[Kedu]

It's done and it wasn't bad at all. I spent a lot of time on our profile questionnaire before we turned it in to DCF and he said that helped make things go more quickly. He didn't have a ton of questions because our profile was so detailed. He asked a little bit about our support network and about whether we were still trying to get pregnant (we're not) and how that might affect a placement (it won't). At the end we talked about age, gender, special needs, and legal risk. The other stuff DH and I have mostly worked out, but we need to spend some time thinking about legal risk vs. legally free and what we can deal with.

Our sw didn't do the home inspection during this visit which was a bummer because my house was so clean. Hopefully he'll do it next week after DH's interview.