By doing just that - pounding the books, internet, and talking to anyone we could about the various avenues of Domestic Adoption - we were able to find exactly what we were looking for in the adoption process.
The first avenue that we explored was adopting by becoming Foster Parents.
What is a Foster Care?
This excerpt is from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services:
"Foster care is a temporary living arrangement for abused, neglected, and dependent children who need a safe place to live when their parents or another relative cannot take care of them. Often their families face issues such as illness, alcohol or drug addiction, or homelessness.
When the county Department of Social Services ( DSS) believes a child is not safe, and a judge agrees, DSS takes custody of that child and finds a foster home for him or her. Length of stay in foster care varies from a few days to much longer.
Foster families are recruited, trained, and licensed to care for abused and neglected children temporarily, while their parents work with social work professionals to resolve their family issues. Relatives may be licensed as foster parents.
The foster family, DSS and the birth family work together to return children to their own homes as quickly as possible. In cases where the child becomes free for adoption, foster parents may be considered as adoptive parents."
To become a Foster Parent you go through the required background checks, receive training (in NC I believe it was 30 hours of training that was required), and go through a licensing process.
Each agency is different, but all agencies assist Foster Parents with financial compensation for the living expenses of the child they are fostering. (For example the NC DSS website shows $475 a month for a Foster Child who is an infant up to 5 years old.)
The primary goal of the Foster Care system is to reunite that child with his/her biological family.
The DSS (Division of Social Services) may remove a child from a home because of concerns over drug abuse, violence, or other factors negatively impacting the environment they are being raised in. While that child is in Foster Care, efforts will be made to help that family resolve its issues so that they can be reunited. If the situation is not resolved and it is determined that it is not in the best interest of the child to be with his/her parent(s) then they may be placed for adoption.
At that time, the Foster Parent(s) may be considered for becoming Adoptive Parents if they wish to pursue that. Because the child is already in 'the system' and you are not working with an adoption agency, the actual costs surrounding the adoption are very low compared to the other avenues. Each state is different with finalization costs (court fees for paperwork, etc), and each private lawyer has his/her own pricing structure, but from our research we were coming up with an average of about $4,000-7,000 to complete the adoption.
Those were the facts we weighed in to our decision on whether or not Fostering was the right approach for us. It just so happens that we have a cousin who is not only on the Cumberland County police force, but also happens to work with child abuse and sex offenders. (I apologize because as I write this I am having a complete "brain fart" with the official titles and department names....) Naturally this was someone we spoke to about the Foster Care system, and in speaking about this we were able to have a better idea of what to weigh in emotionally on this decision.
We just want to reiterate that we are sharing our Adoption Story as just that - our story. So as we get into the reasoning behind our decisions we just want to remind anyone considering adoption that we are not recommending one avenue over another, or saying one avenue is less risky or "better." We simply want to help by offering the facts we discovered, then comment on our personal feelings separately. What we are most comfortable with will most likely vary from your personal needs, so we are not "advertising" or "selling", just simply sharing our story.
As we considered Fostering there were a lot of "pros" to this avenue. The cost, the "feel good" factor in helping a child in need, and the ability to have a newborn...
#1 for us was that we want to adopt a newborn/infant. We will never get to experience pregnancy, and -while some of our friends may think we're a bit crazy for actually looking forward to this - we don't want to miss out on the sleepless nights, diaper blow-outs, and other 'fun' associated with parenting.
In talking to our cousin we voiced our concern over missing out on that because we assumed we'd more likely be fostering a toddler or preschooler - we didn't think many newborns/infants would be in the Foster System. (guess we were still a bit naive) We were a little surprised to learn that, actually, there was a big need for Foster Parents who were willing to commit to taking in a newborn/infant. Because caring for them is so time-consuming it's apparently hard to find families who are able offer that.
There's also the big "risk factor" in falling in love with the sweet little one you are Fostering. How can you not grow attached to a baby you are raising? Remember, the goal of the Foster Care program is to reunite children with their parent(s)...so after a few days, or even months, of caring for that baby you most likely will one day have to hand that little one back over. Parents know this reality, and so apparently more are likely to help with older children.
That, right there, is why we couldn't do it. In being honest with ourselves we knew that we wanted a family much too much to be able to keep a cool head and not get heart broken every time a baby we fostered was able to go back to his/her biological family. It takes an incredibly strong person to be able to offer the love and commitment needed to Foster a child, knowing that most likely the end result will not be them being able to adopt. We have not ruled this out for the future. Maybe someday after we have adopted our little one(s) we would be able to emotionally commit to opening our home and love up to children in need. Foster Parenting is an incredibly selfless, wonderful gift to offer a child in need. We loved the thought of being able to help a child, and financially it was a great fit if/when the opportunity to adopt presented itself, but we knew the emotional side of it would be far too hard on us.
So we began researching Adoption Agencies....
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