Adoption - Keller,TX

H., try Gladney Center for Adoption in Ft. Worth. I personally don't have any experience with them and or adoption but have always heard great things about them. All of my friends that adopted have adopted through open adoptions with young birth mothers, but not in TX.

Bless you. What a wonderful choice to make! Don't feel guilty for having specific criteria you want to match in your search for a child. It's better to be picky and adopt than not to adopt at all! Try to be open-minded, though, as you do your research; what you learn may cause you to change your mind about some of your criteria.

To answer some of your questions...

It would be pretty tough to adopt a caucasian girl under 2 from the U.S. We found that domestic adoptions are very competitve (you have to advertise yourselves as prospective parents), and the wait is indefinite. However, if you are open to a non-caucasian child, you would definitely be able to adopt a girl under 2 with minimal or no health problems from another country. China, of course, has plenty of girls available for adoption, though the wait has become quite lengthy. It's worth the wait, though! (Our four year old daughter is from China).

You didn't explain why cacausian is important, but don't forget, it seems like everyone is adopting internationally these days (even the movie stars are doing it). If you had a child who didn't look like you, it's not like it was years ago. People are accustomed to it now (with a few exceptions) and for the most part are very accepting of it. Between just our friends and neighbors, there are a total of 12 non-caucasian adopted children, and these are NOT people we know because of adoption (obviously we know many more families through adoption circles).

In my experience through my research and with my friends who have adopted, international adoption is NOT more expensive than domestic. There are definitely countries that cost more than others (for example Korea is more than China), but I read that domestic is just as expensive. As far as cost goes, we found that the money was always there each time we needed to pay a fee or pay for travel. It wasn't as bad as we thought it would be (I really think God provided what we needed).

Because you want a healthy child who is caucasian, I feel I should mention if you choose the international route that many European children who have been placed for adoption suffer from fetal-alcohol syndrome and other drug-related problems. I'm not being prejudiced, it's just a fact. Although, our neighbors' daughter is from Russia (she's 4 now) and she is perfectly healthy. But, they are having problems with the baby boy they adopted later.

If you contact an adoption agency, they will be happy to send you literature. And of course, you can always look online. A lot of agencies have really good orientation classes as well. For international adoptions, I highly recommend Holt International http://www.holtinternational.org/ They do not have any offices in Texas, but you can work with a local cooperating agency that works with Holt.

Whatever you do, make sure you use a reputable agency. Don't try to find loopholes or shortcuts. All kinds of bad things can happen if you try to "cheat the system" (as did with two different families I know). Based on the experiences of multiple friends, I also recommend using an agency as opposed to a lawyer.

Good luck. Pray about it too! If you have any other questions, please free to send me a personal message. It's a wonderful thing. I have one adopted child and one biological child and I'm so glad I was blessed with experiencing both.

If you want some inspiration, motivation, etc. check out one of the millions of blogs online. Just type in adoption blog and you'll find great reading and photos from families who have done it or are in the process.

~A.

The odds of adopting a healthy girl under age 2 are very slim. Trust me, we tried for 2yrs both international and domestic, and we were open to many needs. We are now waiting to travel to Ukraine for a 3yr old with mild cerebral palsy. I would encourage you to research special needs adoption. Now that I know the range of needs out there, its not scary. And international special needs adoptions have reduced fees. We found our daughter at www.reecesrainbow.org They are a down syndrome ministry, but if you click 'waiting children' and then 'other angels', you will find so many little girls who have needs ranging from very minor to major, just look at their pictures, search your heart ,and research. Another to consider is HIV+ adoption. HIV is more manageable than diabetes, and with proper medication and diligance, most HIV+ kids have blood load of 0 and the live long healthy lives. reecesrainbow.org has many waiting children with HIV, many young healthy girls.

If you would like to know more, you can message me. I'm not comfortable putting fees on here, but if you message me I can give you an idea, being around the adoption world for over 2yrs now I can help.

I recommend that you talk to your local child welfare agency about becoming foster parents. Most foster parents take in kids and often have the opportunity to adopt them. It is not the reason most of them go into it but they almost always fall in love with the kids and when the kids end up not going home or with other relatives they give the foster family the first option. In these cases the state pays all the adoption fees too.

This would serve a couple of purposes because it would give you the opportunity to be approved by a state agency as a good home and good family, even if you end up not fostering it would be good as a reference to any agency you choose to go through to adopt. Secondly, it may give you the opportunity to get to know a prospective child before committing to adopt them.

Three of my grandchildren are being adopted, one by my ex and the other two, a 2 yr. old girl and 1 yr. old boy, by their foster family. We are already raising several of my grandchildren so we couldn't take any others. We are very happy with the foster family adopting these children because they are wonderful and we get to see the kids all the time. The parents have the option now to either have an open adoption or closed. It is a good thing either way, depends totally on the family's circumstances.

Your not selfish! Stick to what you want. My co-worker was an Occupational Therapist and they kept trying to give her disabled kids. She said the best advice someone gave her was this "Stick to what you want." She got exactly what she wanted 2 brothers under 4 years old and no disabilities.

Private adoptions are costlier, but you can specify. And you might have a wait. And they are mostly open - contact with birth family. It really depends on how you plan on raising your child.

State adoptions are heavily subsidized, and you can specify, but unless you're willing to go foster to adopt, you aren't likely to get that infant/toddler you want.

International adoption is very expensive, very long and most kids will have special needs(i have many friends who have done it). Domestic adoptions take A VERY LONG TIME if you are picky.....I have couple of friends who did "foster to adopt" which is free, it only took a year, but there is a VERY high risk that the child can be taken away at the very last moment. MY friends were blessed that it did not happen to them. Their kids did have minor special needs and ended up being "mixed" even though they were told that they were caucasian(they did not care though).

Both of our children were adopted domestically. We have a 5 yr old girl adopted through Hope Cottage in Dallas (she was adopted at birth) and a 3 yr old boy adopted through Inheritance Adoptions in Wichita Falls. For our daughter we waited about 3 yrs from the first orientation til placement. We were not specific in our requests other than caucasian or caucasian/hispanic. There are also other questions on most forms asking about whether or not you would be willing to take special needs. Hope Cottage is expensive and most likely because of the size of the agency, the number of waiting couples and because it is located in Dallas. When our daughter was born she was 5 wks early and stayed in the NICU for 17 days. She is a very happy and healthy little girl.

For our son we waited about a year from start to finish. He is healthy--no issues. Our adoption for him costs about half of what our daughter's was. It is a much smaller agency and located in Wichita Falls. Of the two agencies, our experiences were both amazing, but at Inheritance it just seemed to be a little more personal.

One thing I don't think I saw mentioned was that you need to educate yourselved on open vs closed adoptions. MOST adoption agencies are open adoptions. I would highly recommend you do some reading on adoptions. Our daughter's adoption is VERY open. We have regular contact with her birthmother's family. Her birthgrandparents are called grandma and pop-pop. They are family to us and they also treat our son like their own grandson. This level of openness did not happen automatically. The level of trust grew over time and I am so glad that we have the relationship that we do. Our son's adoption is open but his birthmother has not expressed an interest in meeting him or us at this time. However, we are very willing to meet her.

So, aside from the money, gender and health concerns there is a lot to learn about. You also need to talk with your children about all of this. There are some great resources out there. You can also contact agencies to get information to find out their costs, requirements, average wait times, etc.

Feel free to send me a personal note and I will share our costs with you or any other information you want. I can talk about it forever!

I don't think your desires are too "out there" and I don't believe you would have too wait too long. My husband and I adopted a baby boy at the beginning of this summer and we were race/gender/age specific. We wanted a caucasian infant boy. We were pretty flexible on birth mother medical history, smoking, and drug-use. We started filling out paperwork in Jan 2010, completed our home study on May 15, and were matched with a birthmom on Jun 16. We have a semi-open adoption because she knows our first names and we met her when we flew out to AZ to pick up our son.

We used a consultant, who basically acts as a broker between you and several agencies/attorneys. It was awesome because we didn't have to find and vet agencies ourselves. She has been doing adoptions for 10 years and has contacts all throughout the US and works with adoptive families all over the States. We were signed up with six agencies in UT, OK, KS, and FL. And the consultant had such a great reputation that we actually ended up with a birthmom situation from an attorney that we hadn't even been signed up with; it was a case that just got sent to her and she forwarded to us. Our friends are the ones that referred us to her and they signed up with their agencies on Feb 1, 2010 , were matched with a birthmom on Mar 6, and flew to UT to pick up there daughter on Mar 23. We talked to 11 of the 33 references this lady provided and they all were matched with birthmoms and brought their children home within 1-5 months of their homestudy being complete.

If you're really serious about adoption I encourage you to look into a consultant vs. individual agencies/attorneys. Also, don't compromise what you want. The right consultant will be non-judgmental and understand that you have to do what is best for you and your family and what you can reasonably deal with. Good luck!

Most of this information you can get by doing a web search. That's what I did when I was first looking into adoption. There are tax credits for adoption, so I know that sometimes the majority of it can be covered. That's what a friend of mine who adopted told me. International adoptions are much more expensive than domestic adoptions because of all the travel and logistics involved. Some countries require you to come and stay in country for several weeks. It just depends on the agency and the country. Not all countries even allow adoptions to the U.S, and some countries are very particular who they will adopt to (with age restrictions, for example). Some employers offer reimbursement for part of the adoption (you'd have to check with your H.R. dept to see if that is one of your benefits). I know some of the agencies I looked into online had their fees posted.

We've adopted two wonderful boys through domestic open adoption. Our first son, X, is 3 1/2 now - it was 9 months from the day we entered the agency until he was placed in our arms by his birthmom in the hospital. He has no birth defects and is healthy as an ox. In fact, he looks a lot like my husband and I - I think with open domestic adoption the birthparents look for something familiar (but I'm just guessing). Our second son, L, is also adopted through domestic open adoption and our wait time was only 6 months - again, we were at the hospital when he was born. He's also very healthy, no birth defects. (In fact, according to my mother-in-law, both boys are gorgeous and brilliant! Although, she may be a little biased.)

It wasn't really expensive - there is a federal tax credit for adoption and some companies have an adoption benefit (my husband's company offered a $3000 tax free benefit!). There are some survey results on adoption costs here: http://www.theadoptionguide.com/cost/articles/how-much-do.... You'll see that a majority of newborn domestic adoptions cost less than $20k - ours both did (also less paperwork than international because you're only dealing with one country and maybe one-two states).

We were a bit freaked out by the thought of an "open" adoption, but its turned out to be fantastic in both instances. Neither birthmom has any entitlement issues; they both wanted what was best for their sons. We email and share pictures, a few visits but nothing intrusive (just like keeping in touch/visiting distant relatives).

We worked with an agency that specializes in open adoption called the Independent Adoption Center (http://www.adoptionhelp.org/).

Good luck!