Month: September 2014

My experience with adoption and bonding: Fast, real, forever

On By alliegardnerIn Uncategorized7 Comments

IMG_1763When we were waiting to be matched with a birthmother, I read a lot of blog posts and articles about adoption. A common concern of hopeful adoptive parents seemed to be whether or not they would be able to love their adopted child like they would a biological child. A lot of people wondered whether they could/would feel a bond with an adopted child. That thought never crossed my mind, though. I was worried, instead, about the reverse.

What if we gave him or her all of our love and he just didn’t care back? What if our baby looked at us like we were total strangers and never warmed up to us? What if he was just so distraught because he suffered the “primal wound” of being separated from his biological mother that no matter how much love I gave him he never healed?

Unrequited love was the secret worry I had.

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Post-placement visits, paperwork… and lots of love

On By alliegardnerIn Our Adoption Story20 Comments

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People who don’t understand adoption assume that once you bring the baby home, the adoption is complete. But domestic adoption doesn’t work that way. Depending on where the adoptive parents or birth parents live, and those particular state’s laws, adoptive parents only have what is called “legal-risk placement” of the baby for the first six months. Essentially, the baby is not officially or legally part of your family yet, but rather, is “placed” with you pending legalities and more paperwork. Just when you think you’re done with filling out forms, there are more!

Because Miles was born in Texas, his birthmother was able to voluntarily and irrevocably relinquish her rights 48 hours after he was born. So, thankfully, we haven’t had to worry about her changing her mind about the adoption. (I don’t think I could have handled that particular stress for six months.) But the agency we worked with then became the legal guardian of Miles–not us–and said agency then “placed” him with us for six months until the required amount of time and post-placement visits with social workers have been completed and we can finalize the adoption.

I guess it’s like a trial period, designed to ensure that we aren’t totally inept at this parenthood thing. The time when birth parents can officially relinquish rights varies from state to state, but to my knowledge most states have the 6-month waiting period before finalization.

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