It’s been about three or four years
now since I first started searching through profiles of Waiting Children in the
U.S. foster care system as part of our family’s attempts to domestically adopt
another child. Although I’m not sure of
the exact number of children we’ve actually inquired about, I can easily
recount some of my frustrations from the process:
10) Hearing back from the
caseworker after making an inquiry only to be told “That child (or children) has already been placed.” Then
why is their profile still online with no mention of that fact?!
9) Most
of the times you can tell (but not always) if a child is in a wheelchair from
their profile picture or because “moderate to severe physical disability” is
part of the search criteria or information. We do
NOT have a wheelchair friendly-home so at this point in time inquiring
after any children in wheelchairs is out of the question.
8) Age Preferences- Our family really likes babies, toddlers, and preschoolers. In fact, I sort of feel like “pre-school age”
is my specialty. However, the majority of Waiting Children under
three years old can be considered “medically fragile” due to conditions such
as Shaken Baby Syndrome, Cerebral Palsy, or various Birth Defects. I admit that
such extensive medical needs such as changing colostomy bags and g- tubes or
suctioning out little lungs and airways so they don’t aspirate seem a little
overwhelming to me. No judgmental or hateful comments,
please . . . unless you’re perfect!
With age being a big factor,
we’ve learned to broaden our horizons a bit about what age of child we would
consider adopting or would be a good fit for our family which leads me to my
next frustration . . .
7) Falling in love with a profile or at least
thinking “Hey- this could work” only to learn or read in the fine print “This child must be the youngest in the
family.” Shoot- that’s not gonna work!
6) Being
drawn to a child from another state only to learn that they must remain in or
near their home state (in order to keep in contact with relatives or
siblings). If they are from a
neighboring state, then things could be worked out but if they live on the
other side of the country, then not so much.
5) I did have the experience a couple of years
ago of being particularly drawn to a sibling group from a neighboring
state. When I inquired about them (I was
pretty persistent and there were many inquiries) the caseworker finally got
back to me and gave me a lot of good, useful information but it also dashed any
of my hopes of adopting these kids.
Useful information #1 the
caseworker shared with me: These
children had already been adopted but were coming from a disruptive placement. As soon as she said “disruptive placement” I
admit the first question out of my mouth was more-or less “What’s wrong with
the kids?” She proceeded to tell me that
the adoption disrupted because their former foster/adoptive parents had
sexually abused them; hence ALL of the children in the home had to be
removed. That made me very upset and
angry.
Why do people like that get to adopt or foster- isn’t that why Background
Checks and Interviews and References are a part of the screening process in the
first place?
The second useful piece of information the caseworker shared with me was this: Because of the circumstances of the disrupted adoption, these children needed to remain in their home state so that their new adoptive family could be monitored very closely. Very understandable.
4) ICWA cases
Most of the time (but not
necessarily always) you can tell right away from a child’s profile picture or
from the information listed under Ethnicity/Race that a child is Native
American*. Sometimes I’ll come
across a picture of some beautiful golden skinned children and I immediately
think “They’re Native American- don’t even get your hopes up high!” I envision all of the drama and turmoil
surrounding the Baby Veronica Case and sure enough, after reading further
through their profile information and narratives I am told “Only families with proof of belonging to a federally recognized Native
American tribe will be considered” which automatically rules our family
out.
*A few times, however, I have
come across a child or children with skin as white as can be and you would
never know they are American Indian until reading: “This child belongs to the
_______ Tribe; only Native American families should inquire.”
3) “Sugarcoating”
behavioral or emotional problems of the children. The same caseworker who gave me more info
about the sibling group I mentioned in #5 also told me something very straight
forward which I had actually suspected but I greatly appreciated her
truthfulness in confirming the truth to me.
She said that from her experience many times on adoption websites the
children’s issues are “sugarcoated” or minimalized. This topic came up because I knew that the
children I was inquiring about had some behavioral and emotional difficulties
but I wanted to know more details about the extents and specifics of their
issues.
I don’t know about you, but if I
read, for instance, that a little girl likes playing with Barbies or listening
to Justin Beiber I might think, “Well, yes, that’s nice- BUT . . .
if they’re leaving out important details such as the fact that she’s
sexually reactive or has major reactive attachment disorder than I don’t care
how much she likes playing with Barbies or listening to Justin Beiber, I
need to be armed with as much information as possible so that I can be prepared
to meet her needs and effectively parent her- even if that means knowing
the unpleasant facts.”
2) Inquiring about a child only to receive word
(by phone or e-mail) “Your family has
not been selected for this child.” Or even worse . . .
1) Never hearing back from a caseworker at all. In my humble opinion, at least a “Thank you for inquiring” would be nice to hear even if there is no intention of placing the child in my home.
As I mentioned in Reasons #9, #8, #7, # 6 and #4, oftentimes it can be disappointing to learn all the facts about a child’s background when doing so makes you realize that the child wouldn’t be a good fit for your family after all and you want nothing more than to adopt a child. However, it’s better for everyone involved (prospective adoptive parents, caseworkers and adoption professionals, and especially the child) to have as much information up front as possible.
