mnacotton, that was a wonderful testimony. Thank you for giving such great advice and also giving local information for an attorney. Congratulations on your daughters arrival in your life. What an incredible story! Thank you for sharing what truly was meant to be.

Crafty Mom, Here is a link to Heartland for Children. Ask for Daniel Moorey

http://www.heartlandforchildren.com/home.php

Hi, I guess that I should mention that Heartland for Children does support us at our Polk County Foster/Adoption Association. They have been very helpful. Thanks Heartland

Is anyone currently working on an adoption plan or anything adoption right now? Just wondering! We got off to a great start on this topic but since slowed way down.

Hello all! Shawn asked me to briefly tell our testimony of our 2 adopted daughters. We have a 5 year old that we adopted from Guatemala out of Sarasota, FL www.celebratechildren.org
of course it was over 4 years ago so things may have changed a bit since then, but we really enjoyed working with Sue H. She made several trips to Guatemala and emailed us updated photos every month and sent videos every time she went to visit out daughter. The process was tiresome but well worth it!!! Our daughter is beautiful, healthy, and priceless! We also adopted domestically with our youngest daughter, who is now 3. We started off with an open adoption but the birth mom later chose to have no contact. Both adoptions have their ups and downs we would never change a thing because we truly believe "what didn't kill us only made us stronger"! In all honesty, unless you are so strong, a CLOSED adoption is so much easier. At least it is for me. I felt with an open adoption that I was constantly trying to "please" the birth family and it was interferring with my parenting, disciplining and raising. It is not always the case but really pray about your decision if you are doing an open adoption and decide up front with the birth family how much contact that you are willing/able to have with them. It can become very overwhelming! I am happy to answer ANY questions you may have regarding either adoption so please feel free to ask!

We went through hell with DCF, Gulfcoast Caregivers. I am stubborn & determined, so went to all who would listen. Finally, after two years, our grandchild is officially our child. By the way, we had the caseworker from hell at Gulfcoast, no answers to phone messages, incomplete paperwork, no love or concern for the children. Thank the Lord for our very special Guardian Ad Litem. It hasn't been easy, but well worth the fight. And if a 59 & 70 year old can do it, anyone can!!

quote:

Originally posted by boxer421-Ann:
Hi To A Crafty Mom! I was wondering when someone was going to ask these questions. I have purposely said very little about the State Foster Care System because of mine and my husbands personal nightmare! I have mentioned it briefly in earlier replies throughout this forum and web site. I am really struggling with my thoughts in exactly what I should or should not say. I cannot fully unload at this time due to "Legal" reasons. If and when the time is right, hopefully our sad story will be told. Mine and my husbands desire to speak out is only because we are hoping our actions will help change procedures in a very broken system. I must say that it is NOT all completely bad. We met some precious children and some kind-hearted overworked staff. It has been over two years since we were licensed so I would direct you to "Heartland for Children". We do not have anything personal against them. Our trouble was with "DCF" and I will leave it at that! We know a lot of lucky people who did manage to adopt through foster care. Like I mentioned in an earlier posting, there is such a great, great need for other wonderful people to stand up with courage and become foster parents.
Good Luck, Ann

ja2003wow,
Thank you! I am glad you had what it took to fight and hang in there. Our crisis took 2 1/2 long years. We would like to expand our family and try this again, as CRAZY as it may be!

It's never crazy to love God's children. We need tham every bit as much as they need us. Sometimes your heart is so big that you just need to share the love. Years ago my niece at about 10 yrs. was explaining to my stepson, same age group, that he didn't need to be afraid because Aunt Judy's heart just stretches with love. I thought that she was so wise. She still is, as my one & only "daughter," she has given me so much pleasure & love. Today, we have so much in common that it's as though she had been daughter by blood, not just heart. Even 39 years ago, I had a need for a child. If you love children, it's good for your own soul.

quote:

Originally posted by boxer421-Ann:
ja2003wow,
Thank you! I am glad you had what it took to fight and hang in there. Our crisis took 2 1/2 long years. We would like to expand our family and try this again, as CRAZY as it may be!

I adopted my son as a newborn in 2003. I used Heart of Adoptions out of Tampa with Jennie Tate.

I was on the waiting list for 3 years before I finally got my son. He was well worth the wait.

I am a single mom and never knew single people could adopt until I heard about a former Buccaneers coach (He was with the Bucs at the time) adopting a little boy.

I got in touch with Coach Joe and he was very supportive and helpful. He is now with the Houston Texans.

But, because of him, I looked into adoption. I even gave my son the middle name of Nathan

Nathan was baby #7 to his birth mother. Baby #6 was adopted by a lady in Tampa, so we do have contact with them.

Not sure what (or how much) to tell my son. His birth mother was in jail at the time of his birth and the birth father may possible be the 1st cousin of the birth mother.

Ooop, my previous post should have said middle name of Joseph

NathansMommy, thank you very much in giving us some background in your situation.

I was a single mom for a long while, Just my son Ethan and I. I contacted a family attorney that use to practice in Lake Wales that was referring me to a place in Tampa. I at that time considered adopting because I didn't want Ethan to be an only child, I was man-less and wasn't going to be in a relationship just to have a sperm donor.

At the time Ethan begged for a sibling, I bet he wishes he would have been more careful what he wished for. He has a house full now!

I was told to consider an interracial child to receive a baby or child faster. I told them a child of mixed race or another race - African American would be fine with me.


I don't know if it is the same now, it has been almost 10 years ago that I looked into this, but the Lake Wales attorney told me that I would have to take special classes to have a child not of my race and it was harder to be approved. Is this still the case? Does anyone know?


A mixed race child would probably look more like my son Ethan than any of his real siblings. All my kids are like see through white and Ethan is DARK! I think all of us being so white makes him look even darker, lol. People ask me all the time if he is of mixed race. If any of you are wondering, he is not. Me and his dad, my ex-husband, are both white. Ex hubby does have a bit of a darker/olive type complexion and we both have curly hair giving Ethan extreme curl. - just in case you all were curious

quote:

I was told to consider an interracial child to receive a baby or child faster. I told them a child of mixed race or another race - African American would be fine with me.

I don't know if it is the same now, it has been almost 10 years ago that I looked into this, but the Lake Wales attorney told me that I would have to take special classes to have a child not of my race and it was harder to be approved. Is this still the case? Does anyone know?

When I was adopting my sone (5 years ago). I was told that I could get a mixed race or African American child in a matter of weeks. I had to wait for 3 years on my son.

I was open to adopting a child of any race, but exposing the child to certain members of my family would have been terrible.

As a single mom, I couldn't cut off my entire support system so I opted to wait.

Here is our story.....of adopting through the State Foster Care System. This is a condensed version (there is much more to this story, but I will give highlights only).

My husband and I decided to go through the State to straight adopt (not foster to adopt) as we know there are too many children in the state foster care system - literally thousands in the state of Florida.

First, we ended up going out of our county (Polk) to take the MAPP Classes as 'classes were not available' in a reasonable time frame (when I first contacted the local agency, it ended up to be 6 months before the next class actually became available).

Getting a home study through the county was also going to be a long process too since we did not take classes with them (approximately 3 - 4 months). We then sought out a Christian agency in our state who does home studies for a reasonable fee. Everything for our home study was approved / completed within 3 weeks!

Then we contacted our local agency -- again -- as they said they had lots of children within the age range (we were trying to adopt older children). Then we waited... and waited... and waited. Nothing. So we decided to do internet searches on other agencies throughout the state of Florida.

I'll just have to say that the system is broke - period. Agencies that do not call back, case workers who do not call back, phone numbers that are no longer working, names of case workers who no longer work for the state, websites that are not maintained (children already placed or adopted are still showing available), etc., etc. We ended up faxing our home study 36 times to various agencies (some at the same agency as they do not share) inquiring about different children. Again we waited..and waited...and waited...you get the picture.

Through our internet searching, we did find that Duval County (Jacksonville area) has a very high rate of adoptions of foster children -- approximately 40 per month. We placed a call to them (you can find information on them through www.heartgalleryjax.com) after finding a couple of children we wanted to inquiry about and actually got a call back that same day. We were then matched with a child within a short period of time (10 days). Then once matched, the next weekend we got to meet the child.

The adoption of our 11 year old boy will be finalized in mid-June. It will be 1 year since we started the process in June -- so to all who want to adopt foster children -- please have patience.

It was after our new son was placed with us (March 14th) that we started to hear from other agencies (approximately 5 months after we first inquired about children from them). We were actually matched with 6 other children, but then we had to turn them down at this time(we did not even know we were a candidate since no one ever contacted us). So remember if you do not hear back, it does not mean you are not considered once you fax the home study. It would have been nice to be contacted... but don't expect it.

The next nightmare was trying to transfer the Medicaid from one county to another for our child -- it took 7 weeks and around 40 hours total of phone call time, a lot of tears of frustration. We probably spoke to over 30 people in trying to get that straightened out. But the good news is, that headache is now over too (temporarily) -- we will need to change the type of Medicaid when the adoption is finalized.....

-----------

We are planning to go through this 'nightmare' again in about 6 - 9 months after our son's adoption is finalized as we want another older child as a sibling for our son. Call us crazy.... but in the end, we will be blessed once again.

--EE

mnacotton....your situation sounds similar to ours. We adopted Hayley in Tallahassee through Children's Home Society. From start of process to placement was roughly 9 months for us. My social worker called me (the third call during that time) and said she had a situation. I asked what it was and her reply was "A baby girl was born and I think she can go home tomorrow." Ummmmm....can you say completely speechless?! She was jaundiced at birth, and had been receiving treatment, so the birth parents' time to change their minds was up. From the time we got the call to the time we walked out of the hospital with her was about 20 hours. Talk about whirlwind!!! We rallied all our friends and had people scrounging up hand-me-downs, moving & assembling furniture, and me out shopping for a carseat within 2 hours of the call. It was crazy, but sooooo worth it!

Does anyone know if there is an adoptive parents group meeting in the area? I want to meet all kinds of moms and kids, but don't want to NOT find some with stories/situations/experiences/etc. that are close to mine.

Another wonderful attorney is Catherine Combee, Bartow. And when dealing with DCf/Heartland, go directly to the top-Marcie Biddleman.She is nice, helpful, seems to have heart. She will make sure that you are on track & in contact with right people & departments.

quote:

Originally posted by mnacotton:
I am glad to see everyone discussing adoption. I am a mother of two adopted children. My son will be three and my daughter will be one in April. My son's adoption is a semi-open adoption. We went through a private attorney. The only warning I have is to do your homework. Just because the attorney says they can do an adoption doesn't mean they really know what to do! Stay up on the laws. Luckily it all worked out for us. We had to delay our finalization to get more documentation/information to the judge. His birthmother gets pictures and letters. Know before you decide on the type of adoption what exactly you can handle! I began getting letters from her family to "our son" and "our cousin". Made me very uncomfortable. Our daughter's adoption is closed per her birthmother's request. We are happy with this situation. We got as much information as we could from our attorney. The attorney I highly recommend is Jim Joiner from Winter Haven. He has two grown adopted children of his own. He has been through the process and was very straight forward about the situation and cost of the adoption. We actually had to say no to the initial adoption situation due to cost - birthmother fees. Our daughter's adoption was nothing short of a miracle from God. The adoptive parents had to back out the day after she was born and there was no where for her to go. They called on Friday morning and we took her home Friday afternoon. It was a whirlwind! I wouldn't change it for anything. My biggest suggestion is do your homework before deciding on who will handle this life changing event for you!