Two scary forms

So in the last entry about the adoption I said I would tell you more about two additional forms we had to fill out for our home study. On the first one we had to put down our preferences of sex, age, and number of children. The easiest part for us was the sex of the child. We do not have a preference. We are open to either a boy or a girl. In Russia, there are more boys waiting to be placed than there are girls. The next questions to deal with were whether or not we were open to more than one child (aka a sibling group) and in what age range. Much discussion, thought, and prayer went into answering both of these questions. Children in Russia must be in their database for at least nine months before they are available for international adoption. So in reality the youngest our child would be is about twelve months old. Determining the upper end of the range was difficult for us. Time spent in an orphanage can/will lead to development delays. We had to decide at what age we felt confident we could accept the child’s challenges and be able to help him or her make up for those delays. There is no magical number. This decision is different for each family. So in the end this is what we came up with. Our home study reads, “Justin and Heather would like to adopt a single child from Russia, either gender, 30 months of age or younger, with no or minor correctable medical needs. They are also open to adopting a sibling group, of either gender, 36 months of age or younger, with no or minor correctable medical needs.”

The second form to tell you about is one that is several pages long, and it is a checklist. You have to go through and mark will accept, will consider, will not accept for a wide variety of medical conditions. It ranges anywhere from near and farsightedness to cleft palate, cerebral palsy, etc… This was completely agonizing. First of all Justin and I had to google several of the terms because we didn’t know what they really meant. Then we felt like we were being judgmental and shallow. We are talking about a child. How can you say you ‘won’t accept’ any child? When you give birth to a child you take all that God gives you packaged in that little bundle. With adoption, you will still be taking on all that God gives, but it is like you are putting parameters on it. It was really a very humbling process. Justin and I both finally told ourselves that we had to be realistic. What do we really think our family can handle? We know that no matter what, there will be challenges that we have not prepared for. Isn’t that the case for parenting in general though?

Learn to expect the unexpected.