Jocelyn

Welcome Baby Grayson! So happy for you Ryan & Becky!!! Jocelyn 1st-N-10 and BGE&s

So happy for you John & Airi and glad that this little girl found her way to you! Jocelyn 1st-N-10 and BGE&s

HAHA, love it!

Woo Hoo, go againers!!

My understanding of the homework is that it should be done throughout your journey up until placement of your child. This way you are learning and talking about adoption topics throughout your "pregnancy", so the homework is not necessarily something that should be done all at once or prior to orientation.

I believe there was a medical form that we got in the packet they give you at the end of orientation and it had some different tests on there than what our home study agency had us do, so you may want to call and ask Brianna about the requirements. Jocelyn 1st-N-10 and BGE&s

Great pictures, thank you for sharing!

A very sensitive topic. I don't agree, though, with adding a law that would require a match on religion in order to foster or adopt a child. Whatever happened to separation of church and state? (a very grayed line these days for sure!) I do agree that foster and adoptive parents should be aware of the child's background including culture and religion and make sure that the child gets the opportunity to follow/learn about those traditions/practices/religion. Unfortunately, where you live could restrict you on actually attending certain events if they just aren't available. In the small town I grew up in we had about every Christian church possible, but there was no Jewish Temples or Islamic Mosques, so it would have been difficult under this law to keep up with that child attending worship for those religions. Adoptions/foster care is not limited to big cities where almost all different types of religions are present, so to me this law could also alienate people living in small towns. I also was thinking if you have to match on religion then what's next? Match on skin color and/or ethnic background to make sure that child is even closer to their heritage? I think the better answer is to try and teach the adoptive and foster parents that it is important for the child to not lose their heritage including their birth family's religion; and encourage them to gets books, movies, or attend services whenever they can so the child can learn from that. I also think a parent should try to explore more than one religion with their kids to matter if they are adopted or not and then let the child decide which route to go when they are old enough to do so.

Congrats on being accepted to orientation, it's such a great weekend that you will enjoy! A lot of people blog under the Joyous Journeys and Birthparent Blogs sections, so check those out too (if you haven't already). I know it took me a little bit to navigate the forum and get used to it, so another thing you can use is clicking the View New Content in the upper right hand corner and that will help point out the topics where there is more recent postings. There is so much info out here I know I haven't even explored a lot of the other topics, but I like keeping up with the day to day posts using that feature.

I agree with the writer of this article that I don't think the celebrities adopting black children are doing it to be trendy. I do think it has a lot to do with where you live, what experiences you have with people outside of your race, etc. Maybe because people idolize celebrities so much it will open their eyes to a need that is out there (referring to the trend where more black children are waiting than other races)?

Welcome tropicalsmootie, I bet there is a story behind your forum name! We're also looking forward to getting to know you.

I like Katherine Heigl but after reading this story I'm not sure about that anymore. I understand that celebs have other forces around them (mainly the photographers looking for any way to make a buck) but still, you should be so happy to have another child that you would want to be with them. I would NEVER be able to fly on the same plane as my child and have them sit in a completely different row with someone else (except if the child was with my husband and we didn't have a choice). Good luck even getting that baby out of my hands a lot during the flight. I'm always happy to hear about adoptions especially when you know a child is going into a better living situation, but to me it seems like the celebs have an easier time doing this. Maybe my perception is wrong but from other people that I've talked to the international adoptions take quite a lot of time, and yet you hear about celebrities adopting all the time. Maybe they have waited years for that child but I'm not reading about long waits for them, so makes me feel like they don't have to play by the same rules as the rest of us.

Wow, they say things come in 3s and I think that was true this week! Congrats Shawn & Jennifer and welcome to the world Baby Harrison!!

Congratulations on the newly formed family. Joshua will be greatly loved by all!

Congratulations Josh, Kara, and Julia on the addition of these two little boys to your family. We are so happy and excited for you as you start this new adventure!

Thinking of you and Jim and all your family as you say goodbye to Lib.

I just have to "plug" Skype again especially after our experience last weekend. We Skype about one a month with Landon's birthmom Kayla and her mom Kim. But it's way less often with his birthfather's mom Gina, at maybe 3 times since he was born. Last weekend when we were in SA for orientation we spent Friday with Gina and Landon clung to us and didn't warm up to Gina right away. This is how he has been around new people the last few months. However, later that day we went to Kayla and Kim's house, and he was completely different and let them pick him up right away and even gave them hugs. I know that Skype is a big reason for this because their voices and faces were so familiar. I know not everyone has a computer or a camera to do this, but if you do I really recommend it.

Wonderful news, congrats to the newest family!

What an amazing story, Tina. It helps demonstrate how important it is for those of us who are adoptive parents to keep up with our promises and maintain an open adoption if that's what all parties agreed to. I never like to hear that adoptive parents go back on their promises of sending updates/photos. Yes, at times you may not want to put in the effort or wish that things were different and that you didn't have that responsibility. But I think you have to realize that adoption is not just about you, it's about the children and what is best for them. "Protecting" a child from a relationship with their birthfamily when you can't even predict what that relationship will entail or be like is not the answer. No one said that would be easy but now it puts that boy in a difficult place with both his adoptive parents and birthmom. I very much hope that she is able to make that connection with her son and find peace with this!

Scott and I were just talking about how we thought single mothers would possibly relate more to girls so they'd maybe be prone to parent if they have a girl even after creating an adoption plan. That is probably a bad assumption to make and I know that there would be other factors involved as well, but something we speculated about. But I didn't realize more adoptive couples sought out girls. The article talks about maybe the need to have a caregiver in the family for later in life. In my extended family we seem to talk about another factor, in if there is anyone to carry on the family name which typically would fall on the shoulders of the boys. Scott has two sisters that are married and their kids have their husbands last name, so Scott was the only one to carry on the Hillman last name. For that reason we liked the fact that we adopted a boy to carry on the name, but we still would have been open to either gender regardless. Another thing we've talked about is how Hillman will move on because of Landon but the gene pool has now changed because of that fact too. Actually we are ok with the gene pool being different since it's a genetic defect that ultimately led to our infertility. I don't know if we are the only ones that talk about this type of thing but just wanted to share some of the conversations we've had on gender and how having boys or girls can affect the family tree and genetics in the generations to come.

Melissa, the agency she went with encouraged open adoption but it seemed that maybe she wasn't as ready for that yet as the adoptive parents were. I'm glad that the note from the adoptive parents let her know that they are there for her whenever she wants to come around. So I think there's hope that it will be open but things can change (which I think we all know how that goes, as you go through the ever evolving relationship with your child's family). I didn't read the additional comments below but after what you read I'm glad that I didn't. I know I'm guilty of judging people and making comments when I shouldn't from time to time but our experience with adoption has made me take a step back to re-think things before making those judgments. I wish people would take that from stories like this, to realize that there are many definitions of a mother or of family, for that matter, and we can each learn from other's experiences to make us more well rounded, caring people.

This was an interesting story. I'm glad she shared her feelings and thought process in choosing adoption. Articles like this help breakdown some stereotypes about who birthmothers are and show everyone that each situation is unique. And I'm angry at her now ex-husband for treating her that way. I don't understand why people can hurt the ones they supposedly love like that.

Congrats James & Christy and welcome to your special baby girl who already has such a great extended family who loves her!

Congrats Sara & Andrew and welcome Baby Gavin!

What a tragedy this is. Sounds like Abby's biological mother was not around either so you wonder what this little girl had been through in her short life. I know depression can really weigh on you and cause you to think irrationally but its just sad that the grandmother went as far as thinking no one could take care of Abby so she had to take her life too.