Tips
Your Adoption Adventure
Congratulations on your decision to enrich your family through adoption! Many children of all ages and walks of life are waiting for loving parents and hoping for warm, nurturing homes.
Your goal—and the goal of adoption agencies, lawyers and facilitators—is to find a good match child for both you and your child, a process that will take some time. The First30Days is here to help guide you through the ins and outs of this exciting journey with information, inspiration and steps that will help you find an incredible child to wrap in your loving embrace.
You will ask yourself many questions during this first 30 days. You may feel elation about the promise of a loving child. You may even feel a little fearful of what lies ahead, as your life will forever change during these next few months. Take comfort in the knowledge that those before you felt just as excited … and overwhelmed.
Be honest and open about your own fears and hopes for the adoption process. Rely on your intuition and do what feels right for your situation. It’s common to worry whether you’ll be a good parent, whether your child will love you back or whether you can cope with the journey you’re about to embark upon. Just remember to take it one day at a time!
In the next 30 days, you can expect to learn about:
- The types of adoption available, their costs and the typical time it takes to complete the process.
- How to decide the type of child you want to adopt.
- How to talk with your family and friends about your decision.
- How to select an agency, lawyer or facilitator.
- The support systems in place for adoptive parents.
DID YOU KNOW? There are more than 127,000 adoptions completed in the United States each year? Yours may be next!
All great tips and always important to arm yourself with information first. One important tip too, that I can tell people from my almost 40 years of experience in the field, is that the agency or adoption resource you choose must be a good fit for you. Make sure you read between the lines and do not fall for glitzy marketing, get your questions answered fully and honestly and make sure that you feel compatible with your resource so you can build a relationship. Agencies have different styles, as well as different options, policies and procedures. It is a very personal choice and you need to be comfortable before starting this life-changing venture. You will not dot every single i or cross every single t but you must have a good comfort level before beginning.