Moving Right Along.

Tomorrow night is adoption class #7 – out of 9. That means we’re very close to being finished with the training and even closer to the part where they trust us to get near an actual, living-breathing-screaming child. Assuming all goes according to plan.

And, finally, the plan is for us to go the foster-adopt route. I managed to put aside my emotional hysteria about the idea and now, after much consideration, it’s feeling more and more like something appropriate for us.

Foster-adopt is different from regular fostering or adoption, in a lot of ways. Our preferences (for a sibling pair, young but not infants) will be honoured, but the children who are placed with us will still be legally attached to their parents. We’ll foster them – with all the rules and guidelines that apply to fostering – until such time as their parent(s) legal rights are terminated by the courts.

Then we adopt them.

Now, there are concerns of course. The parental rights may not be terminated; sometimes judges disregard the evidence and stick with the reunification goals. And that’s a pretty big concern – but one that we’re willing to accept. It will mean our kids will not be bounced around in foster homes, and it will allow us to bond with them sooner. Attachments and all the rest.

And yes, that concern about the children being removed from us and returned to their parents still worries me. It does.

We’ll have to live by the foster rules – which means no homeschooling initially and specific requirements for other activities in the home. I’m okay with that. There will be time for the rest, later.

We’ll be paid a (very) modest stipend, to cover things like clothes and food and sports and whatever, and all dental/medical stuff will be covered by the agency. This will be helpful initially in getting them settled.

There is still a chance that we’ll go through the straight-adoption route, of course. When all is said and done, it’s quite possible that we’ll have two kids placed with us for adoption – not fostering. Everything depends on the right match.

I am SO ready to get ON WITH THIS!