With adoption it’s not quite like you come home from the hospital and life moves on with a new tiny life.

Yes, that’s clearly a big part of it and that’s awesome and amazing.  BUT, we do have adoption specific things that must be done in the coming months:

Step 1. Post Placement Home Visits.  These will be done at per-arranged times during the first 6 months of Baby MPB’s life.  In complete contrast to when we did our initial home study, I actually find these enjoyable.  And, now that I’m relaxed about it all, I do not clean up at all before hand as we figure our social worker can see us for who we are.  Really, it’s enjoyable because I really like our social worker and we just chat about what we’ve been up to.  Like, doctor’s appointments, visits with family and friends, mommy and baby classes, and visits to the zoo and museums.  She takes notes and plays with Baby MPB (unless he’s sleeping, in which case he just sleeps).  For us, these visits really don’t cause stress.  We just see them as a necessary part of the process.  And really, it’s kind of fun to showing Baby MPB off.

Step 2. Adoption Finalization.  This is when the courts in the USA say, yes, Mr. MPB and I are who we say we are and we are doing just fine with baby MPB.  We shouldn’t have to be present for court date, but there is a chance we will skype into the meeting and a very slim chance we could be required to fly to be there in person.  We will be required to provide a complete accounting of all the money we’ve spent to be submitted to the court.  So, while we made the decision not to know the exact dollar figure, we will have to go back and figure it out now.  As well, at this time Baby MPB’s original birth certificate will forever be sealed and a new one issued with our names on it (I find this weird and archaic).  We do not have a say in this, and I am thankful our lawyers got us an original copy of his original birth certificate so he can have it if he ever wants it.  Oh, and we have to pay yet another adoption bill at this time.  I’m sure there will be more expectations on us as we get closer to a finalization court date, but for now that’s all I know.  As for the timelines to finalization, the actual finalization will likely not happen until Baby MPB is 8-10 months old because the home visits must be done and then the court date must be set in a very busy court system which focuses on emergency/urgent foster care children (which I fully support and understand).

As far as the adoption finalization process goes, truthfully it’s not causing us any stress, it’s all in the hands of our lawyer who has been really good to us throughout this process.  Further, all birth-parents signed off on the adoption prior to his birth so we wont have any complications there.  And, we also know that it will happen, it’s just a matter of time and procedures.  So, there is really no reason to worry.

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