AUTHOR: M. DATE: 9:57:00 PM ----- BODY:

A significant and very embarassing thing happened to our little family today: a social worker laughed at us for how much processing we're doing. She was VERY gracious, and the laugh was almost entirely internal, but when we went to our first home study meeting with her today and reminded her of our timeline (not a moment before Isadora graduates in May), she asked us why we were starting so early. Hmmm. No one has ever suggested to us that we might - dare I say the word again? - PROCESS too much. This is BRAND NEW INFORMATION. So, what happened today: We did paperwork. We wrote a very large check. We set up a timeline, more or less: a couple of meetings, a break, a couple more meetings, lather, rinse, repeat until around March so our homestudy doesn't expire before someone births a munchkin she wants us to parent. We got some homework. Three videos on transracial adoption - bonus points to Leah for doing this right out of the gate. More homework: a 9-page "placement situation considerations" packet. Three copies: Isadora does one, I do one, then we do a third one that we both agree on. Quick, on a scale of 1-6, ranging from "cannot consider" to "comfortable," can you assign a number to these? - A birth mother who has delivered or who is likely to deliver a premature infant - A birth mother with juvenile diabetes - A birth parent with bipolar disorder - An unknown, not named birth father - A birth mother who did not complete high school ... And so on for 9 pages. Excellent questions. Some are no-brainers. Others may require some bending of spoons. We asked a whole bunch of questions about birth parent counseling, termination of parental rights, disrupted adoptions (rare after a child has come home, not so uncommon before bringing a child home), fetal alcohol syndrome, and open adoption. Leah didn't ask us much, I think by design, which surprised me. Many questions to come, I'm sure. And more to report when I finish chewing over some of what we talked about today.

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