[jojo13551122]

Hi there-
My husband and I are new to adoption. We are deciding between Korea and Russia. I had a few questions for parents that adopted Korean children.
1)What has the been the biggest obstacle for you raising an adopted child (korean or not)?
2)If you are caucasian, what kind of adjustments did you have to make having a multiracial family? Was it easier or harder than you expected?
3)We are looking at The Cradle in Chicago, and I believe they go through Spence and Chapin. Any experience with either agency?
4) What is the current waiting time for a child under 1yr?
Thanks so much...

[racytracy]

We adopted our son in 2005 through The Cradle and CHSFS (they didn't have the Spence-Chapin relationship at that time). You can PM me for questions about that experience. We will be going through S-C for #2 (homestudy in process at The Cradle).

Frankly, the biggest obstacles have had to do with finances and paperwork--no paid maternity leave, court order required to get child on insurance, hard to get flex spending without child's social security number... bureaucratic BS like that. But I am also a form-o-phobe who dislikes process, so that could be a "me" issue.

My husband is Korean, so a bio child would not be the same race as I am. I live in Chicago, where diversity is part of life. Occasionally, I do get comments (my favorite so far? "Is your little girl from China?" I have a boy). As my son gets older and understands more and more, these comments are starting to grate on me. Sometimes I just don't feel like being the ambassador for international adoptions. And I don't like people pointing out to my kid that he's different or doesn't belong to me or simply intruding on my personal time/space.

Last I spoke with S-C, it was spring and they had yet to receive any referrals following the implementation of the changes. They estimated 6 months, but I'm assuming that timeline is up for grabs.

Good luck with your choice,
Tracy

[Max'smom]

HI,

1)What has the been the biggest obstacle for you raising an adopted child (korean or not)?

The biggest obstacles have nothing to do with our adoption: getting up in the middle of the night when our son is sick; finding appropriate daycare after returning to work full time; balancing the various responsibilities I have while finding the time to enjoy my son and husband.

2)If you are caucasian, what kind of adjustments did you have to make having a multiracial family? Was it easier or harder than you expected?

We haven't had to make any adjustments. We live in an area where there are a lot of transracially adopted kids.

3)We are looking at The Cradle in Chicago, and I believe they go through Spence and Chapin. Any experience with either agency?

No.

4) What is the current waiting time for a child under 1yr?

This varies by agency. Some agencies appear to have a short wait, but that is in part due to the fact that they don't allow you to start your adoption paperwork until you have been on a waiting list for a while.

A final point: although the decision is in part dependent on how comfortable a person is with racial differences, in deciding between Korea and Russia, we went with Korea mainly for reasons having nothing to do with race. Our main reasons were:
a) Korean children who have are waiting to be placed for adoption are taken care of in a family setting, not in an institution, thus they don't face postinstitutional issues
b) typically, alcohol consumption during pregnancy is not documented well in Russia; at least with the main Korean adoption agency we used, if a birth mother drank during pregnancy, this is noted in records andher child is treated as a special needs child. Put differently, our biggest fear was FAS and we wanted to avoid that; we indicated we were not comfortable with this special need and were matched with our son, whose birthmother did not consume alcohol and our son has excellent health.
c) medical care and records are excellent in Korea, in some ways superior to the US.

[Amymomamie]

On a side note regarding alcohol exposure during fetal development - you may be hard pressed to find a birth parent from Korea who hasn't had anything to drink during her pregnancy.

Our agency (we are in IL also but not with The Cradle - our son placed through Eastern) advised us that the women placing children for adoption are typically working class younger unwed women. Smoking is very common as is alcohol consumption (typically Soju) but the degree of consumption can vary widely. Because Korea does not have the same taboo's about drinking and smoking during pregnancy that the US has, I wouldn't get your heart set on accepting a referral only if the birth mother didn't drink at all. What you do want to be concerned with is how much did they drink and at what point during the pregnancy. So I respectfully disagree that children born to women who drank during their pregnancy would be labeled "special needs". There is the possibility, however, that if a particular birth mother consumed greater amounts of alcohol during her pregnancy and the affects on the child are not completely known at the time of birth (i.e. no strongly visible signs of FAS), there is a possibility of the child having a Fetal Alcohol spectrum disorder and thus being labeled as special needs. I would just hate to label any child exposed to alcohol in utero as special needs.

There are some well known physicians that specialize in adoptive medicine who can review your referral and help you make a decision about accepting a referral where alcohol consumption is involved.

[Max'smom]

Hi,
I agree with Amymomamie that women in Korea smoke and drink--and I didn't mean to imply that they didn't. But at least with Holt, any children that were exposed to significant amounts of alcohol in utero would be Waiting Children. This is a key difference between Korea and Russia: FAS is not a recognized disorder in Russia and significant alcohol abuse may or may not be noted on medical records. A chief complaint people have when considering a referal from Russia is that the medical system there is not reliable and typically presents long laundry lists of medical diagnoses (many of which are seemingly added without a medical reason), but fails to address the pervasive issue among birthmothers in Russia of serious alcohol abuse.