The Post AEP questionnaire and appointment

At our last class, we were given another questionnaire to complete and forward to the intake coordinator. This one is not about the children we are interested in but about us, our relationship, our childhood and our personalities. Feeling energized following class, we completed the 10 page questionnaire as soon as we got home.

I get nervous about the wording of some questionnaires. I took one once where the questions were about alcohol use, worded in the double negative and none of the options applied to me. I think I answered them with "I do not share my alcohol abuse with my family" because I do not consume alcohol so there is no abuse hence nothing to share with my family. The results were interpreted as I am in denial about my alcohol abuse. So, when I come to questions about my childhood and I tick off one of the choices as "sad", I feel like I have to add to it that  my grandfather with whom I was very close died and I was very sad about it for a long time. But there is no option for additional comments so I fret somewhat that they will think I was depressed as a child or something - which is far from the truth but then to not tick it off and say everything was all sunshine and lollipops they might think I was delusional because I remember that some of the social workers said that they were always weary of applicants whose lives seem perfect. Same thing with the questions about what is the subject of the major disagreements between my husband and myself. We don't have any major disagreements so what the hell am I supposed to say? We have disagreements but not major ones so how do you respond to this? Who knew multiple choice would be so stressful... in the end I come to the conclusion that I need to rethink the final exams I give my students.

Because we are scheduled to leave the province in three days, I sent them over to the intake coordinator the next day. I am hopeful we will hear back about the mandatory post-AEP appointment by the time we return in 10 days. I am FLOORED when I receive an email response in less than five minutes asking us to come in the next day. Having dutifully checked our adoption process schedule flow chart, I knew that generally the follow up appointments are two to three weeks following the end of classes. Here we are within two days.

During the meeting, we review our initial questionnaire regarding the children we are "interested" in having join our family to see if anything has changed. It is checklist of various ethnicities, challenges, disabilities, illnesses, conditions, exposures, blah blah blah which we would be willing to consider. I joke that it is like an online dating application or shopping and that perhaps one day there will be an "add to basket" option. As soon as it comes out of my mouth, I panic a little and immediately remember that, during class, one of the social workers remarked that the adoption team had already begun discussing the prospective adoptive parents during meetings... and my sense of humour is not always "appreciated" and worry that this comment will be added to - what my overactive imagination perceives to be - section in my file marked "inappropriate comments: evidence of insensitivity." I mean, it is the government and that in and of itself is intimidating... not helpful to someone who uses humour to mask nervousness.

All in all, I think the interview went well. I certainly did not see her write "NO" at the top of our file - and I was watching for it - before we left and she DID say that they were interested in moving forward with us as soon as possible knowing that my teaching schedule makes it easier to complete the home study over the summer. She may or may not have said "top of the list" when speaking about scheduling the home study.

Our bouquet of balloons carried us back to our car...

Yippee Skippee! We have finished step 6!

Yay! We are finished Step 6. 50 hours of adoption education. While I feel like I have been able to add some valuable tools to our parenting toolbox, it still seems a little like stockpiling a bunch of tools we are not sure we will need for a project we have still not been given.

On our drive home from each class, we have to remind ourselves that we are being presented with worst case scenarios and that our children will not necessarily have ALL of the challenges we have learned about in the last month. While I worried that I would end this program full of doubt and maybe reconsider our decision to adopt through MCFD, I find that I am eager to move forward and, actually, feel refreshed. After leaving so many classes feeling like I was dragging my popped balloon bouquet behind me, I actually feel like I left the last class with my balloon bouquet fully inflated and a little light on my feet.

While I recognize that we did not make any lifelong friends during our education program - and we have still not joined a church - I am glad to have made some connections within the adoption community and look forward to catching up with these families at AFABC events in the future. We are having a harder time saying good-bye to the social worker who taught the course; we have become attached to her. She laughs at my jokes - surely this is a sign she "gets" us as a couple. Unlike choosing your ObGyn or midwife, we are not able to "shop around" for a social worker but we keep our fingers crossed that we will be able to continue our journey working with this woman who is like a beautiful bouquet of colourful balloons on a sunny day.

We are moving forward cautiously optimistic and even made the first move to forwarding a profile description of a sibling group to our social worker. While we logically understand that it is a long shot, it is hard not to start talking and planning about changes needed to be made to our home and our schedules to welcome new children into our family.

Is this the beginning of our "gestation" period? Only 11 more steps to go until the adoption journey will be complete...

AEP Panelists... The saving grace

We are thankfully more than halfway through the Adoption Education Program. It continues to be a daunting process... while I appreciate that the program's goal is to prepare us for the realities of adopting children who have had challenging starts in life, it would be nice to have at least some focus on the joys and fun involved in being a family. It is challenging to not leave the sessions feeling completely discouraged and somewhat deflated. My balloons remain deflated... like I am trying to fill them back up with helium to get them back in the sky without cluing in that they have large holes in them.

After sessions which include panelists, I leave feeling like these parents pat me on the arm, tell me they too tried to reflate popped balloons and hand me new ones. It is not like I do not understand or appreciate the value in these educational components because I do. But there is nothing like good old practical experience shared with you by humorous people to put everything into perspective.

Unlike the theoretical approach, there is no doom and gloom from the panelists. It is all very matter of fact and all the challenges - of which there are many - seem to be less daunting. All these parents seem to embrace an "It is what it is" approach to parenting children who have challenges. Knowing the children of one of the panelists finally allows me to put a face to some of these kids and makes it slightly less abstract. I know them! I see their challenges but they are great kids! And I leave these sessions thinking... WE CAN totally do this! And it will be great and there will be sunshine and lollipops!

So much better than the days where I leave thinking... there is NO WAY we are cut out for this! Or these kids are totally going hate us and count down the days they can kick us to the curb when they turn 18...

On another note, all the panelists... and I mean ALL OF THEM... mention the support that they receive from their church communities. I wonder if anyone who does not belong to a religious organization adopts through the ministry. And, again, I ask myself if we should be joining a church... there might be something to this.

10 hours of AEP down... and what feels like 400 left to go

Having now completed our first two classes: one three hour evening session and one eight hour day session, I can honestly say that I have turned into a terrible student... and I think I annoy my husband.

I am not exactly sure what I was expecting from an adoption education program but, I have to be honest, it is sort of gloom and doom. Maybe, without realizing it, I expected it to be more like prenatal classes where it is "Yay! We are all growing our family... and there is just a little prep work to do." It decidedly is NOT... more like "Sooo... you want to adopt... well, here is EXACTLY what you are in for..." I would be lying if I did not say it is a little daunting. And listening to someone read from your textbook and watching outdated American videos hardly makes for an engaging learning experience. I learned today that I can doodle and still listen at the same time... and that my husband "poo poos" this sort of classroom behaviour.

Our schoolmates are diverse and I am surprised to see so many prospective adoptive parents who already have their adoptive children in the home taking the course. Those of us who do not have children all seem to be interested in older children as part of sibling groups - hence not having to wait several months to get into the program.There is only one couple out of nearly 20 people who do not currently have children; this was a surprise!

It is interesting to see couples in "school" together - we all seem to have one thing in common - one of us is definitely more vocal than the other. As a high school teacher, it is amusing to see the similarities in interactions of students of all types. As break time rolls around, there are awkward introductions and small talk as people size each other up. Groups quickly form as we break for lunch. Through comments - "we all sat and prayed at the restaurant" - and introductions it is pretty clear that nearly all of the other couples in our class actively participate in a religious organization, and we realize that - aside from all being adoptive parents - we have very little in common with these people. Logically, I know that this is no big deal but as the person going through an evaluation process, I can't help but feel like we "should" make friends or there will be some sort of negative notation in our file. Maybe we should join a church...

An entire day learning about attachment, grief and loss is.... truth be told, hard to describe. Nothing fun or happy or joyous about it. This session was like a mean lady came along and popped all my beautiful balloons which were filled with my ideas about adopting children. A necessary evil is the best way to describe it. At the end of the day, there is a reason these kids are looking for forever families... grief and loss is a part of the package... it is just hard to remember that there will also be days with sunshine and lollipops when you are left holding a handful of burst balloons... at least I hope so.