[atra1781]

DH and I thought for sure that we would do a domestic infant adoption. It is just way too much money and I think we'd be way in over our heads financially. DH is not convinced yet that foster to adopt is right for us. We would be interested in an infant or a very young child. I am meeting with an agency on Thursday night for an information session. Unfortunately, DH cannot make it due to his work schedule. So, I am in need of hearing some of your experiences with foster to adopt. DH (and me too to some extent) is worried that we will get so very attached to a child that will just be returned to his/her birthparents and our hearts will be broken. We are worried that it will be difficult to bond with a child for fear of losing the child. Please help... our emotions are all over the map.

[mommytoEli]

watching children go home is very hard. when we did it, i was conflicted...on one hand, i was so glad a family was getting back together....but at the same time, we had bonded with the baby so much that it made it difficult. people will tell you not to get so attached because they are not your children while you are fostering....you can tell that to your brain, but your heart is not such a good listener. it is easy to get emotionally wrapped up in these children....it really is. in the end, i'm glad i took the chance, because fostercare added to my family four times. each of those children were worth the struggles and the heartache. even when they are naughty....they are amazing. at the same time...i don't know if i can do it again. it is difficult. my best advice is to become friends with other families in your area that are fostering or adopting through foster care. everything is easier if you have someone to walk along side of you who gets what you are going through.

[HappyHopefulMommy]

We are working strictly with a fost/adopt agency. We too wanted to grow our family. I was not real interested in fostering, to foster. We wanted to grow our family. Our agency is private, but has access to all the county kids in the system. But our agency has like a 3% reunification rate - they are wanting to place kids in adoptive homes. This is one of the reasons we went with them. There are families that are placed with babies, but often they wait 9 - 12 months. We waited 6 months and were placed with a sib set of 3, then 4 months later added theur younger brother. TPR was done earlier in the year. You could ask to only be placed with kids are legally free for adoption (TPR already done). I would look into a private agency that works with the county. (I know they are not available everywhere though) Good luck! Oh - we have only paid a few hundred dollars to be certified, like for fingerprints, and a class fee and dmv printouts (very basic stuff).

[shy_bear]

Our youngest who is now 18mths was placed with us when he was 24hrs old. We were doing f/a. We had done two domestic adoptions, but just couldn't imagine spending the money again. F/a was a 100X harder than domestic and we had a very easy straightforward case. Bmom delivered, told the hospital she did not want to parent, and did not name a father. After that she called DHS one time and was never heard from again, BUT as a worrier everytime the phone rang I was in a panic that they were calling to say someone came forward. It is a long road of what if's even in an easy case. His BP's were TPR'd when he was 7 mths old and we finalized at 9mths. Knowing what I know we are still going to do it again; I am going to try to not be such a control freak this time around!!

[elizabeth_ann]

Dh and I are in the about to be homestudied/have all our paperwork and references in stage of f/a. Before we decided that this route was right for us (we don't have any little ones yet), we considered international and domestic infant adoption. We actually paid a pretty hefty deposit to an international adoption agency - one that is *very* highly recommended and which our friends have used with great success.
After the stock market bottomed out, we realized that a) pulling that much cash out of stocks would be a really, really stupid idea, and b) we had a *lot* of unknowns in international adoption. So we investigated domestic adoption ... turns out that, in our state (SC), a lot - though NOT ALL - of domestic adoption is basically thinnly veiled baby buying. We're known as the domestic adoption capital of the US for a reason - very, very lax laws.
So we started looking at f/a. We called the agency and went over to pick up paperwork ... the head of our region talked to us for an hour and a half. She was amazing. Our so-called awesome international agency didn't spend half the time or half the energy on answering our questions and helping us decide.
The support we're getting, plus the support we'll have afterwards, is amazing. These things vary from state to state and even county to county, but ours is spectacular. We feel much more confident about adopting from foster care than we do about our other options. I talked to our social worker today for half an hour ... and I *know* she had more to do than answer a prospective mom's questions .
Plus (I might get jumped on for this, but ...), Dh and I have "fostered" for animal rescues before, and in a teeny, tiny, this-is-a-bad-metaphor-but-I'm-going-with-it way, we have given up (not kids, which would be exponentially different) animals that we really loved. We talked a lot about it, and we're ready, no matter how hard it is, to have children RU'd with birth families.
Basically, we had to decide what was best for us and what our comfort levels are. We *will* get deeply attached and grieve if our fcs return to their bios. But we'll also know that we gave children a home so that their families had a chance to heal when they needed it the most.
Plus ... we think God wants us to be foster-adoptive parents. That probably helps most .
Keep us updated! Sorry this is so long ...

[atra1781]

Thank you all for your replies. Elizabeth_ann--- I can understand where you are coming from. I was sitting at this agency on Tuesday thinking "I feel like I am buying a baby and the person with the highest bid will win".... although, I think it was just the specific agency we went to.... I hope anyways. I hope this isn't a trend. We told them our adoption budget and it didn't really seem like they wanted to help us because we weren't willing to spend $25,000+ on an adoption. I was so frustrated. Not to mention the story the attorney gave us about the African American triplets they placed and joking with the couple that adopted them that they just wanted "slaves" (the adoptive family lived on a farm). WHOA!!!!! Totally racist and inappropriate to be saying to a family that just walked into your office.

[crystalp]

We have been licensed foster/adopt parents for 4 months now, and we are also going this route because we can't afford to spend $$$ on a domestic infant adoption. We haven't gotten a placement yet (fingers crossed that we will soon!), but we have talked about the guard your heart vs fall in love thing dealing with R/U, and this is what we decided: We are going to love each child that we get in our home completely whether they look like they are going toward adoption or not because they deserve nothing less. I thought about it and just had a flash of "what if it was my child?" If it was my child, I would want them to be loved and cared for as much as possible. So that is what we are going to do. Yes, it is going to hurt like you-know-what when they leave, but they deserve nothing less than all the love that we can give them. And, hey, what if they do stay? I don't want to hold back and miss out.