Last night’s PIP class was on TRAUMA. We identified types of trauma that the kids deal with throughout their lives and especially how they came into the system.

Quite frankly, it was a deep and meaningful class full of emotions. On our drive home, we discussed how we wish we had taken this class before our last one to better understand the process.

The teachers spent about 20 minutes discussing the differences between fostering and adoption and may have changed the minds of some of our classmates. They hammered the fact of very very few children under age 8 being available and most being over age 12. Again, they pushed the fact that we, as adoptive parents, are the very last in a long line of potential parent figures. See the diagram at the very bottom.

There is absolutely no sugar coating with this agency.

And I love that. <3<3 

I was asked the other day what the timeline would be for a child to be in our home. Well, if the home study process (which began last week) really does take 6 months, then it can be as few as 6 months and as long as.. well.. never.

Hubby and I were discussing potential children on Monday. I asked what happens if our best match is a 15-year-old. He said fine. I asked would it be a boy or girl. He asked if it would be a teen mom which then led to a whole conversation about teen mom + infant making us basically instant grandparents at 41 and 46. Honestly, I would not have a problem with that as long as she stayed in school and went back after giving birth. We would figure out how to take care of the baby around our work and school schedules as well as help her with her homework.

But, I digress. We have no idea who we will match with or how many pregnant teen moms there are in the system. I kinda want to email our case worker now to ask..

Back to trauma, they also made sure to tell us children can heal over time. They can overcome their traumas within reason and accept love as it’s meant to be given without abuse and neglect. Also, we were told to not expect a scholarly child or one that acts their chronological age. It is entirely possible that a 15-year-old child will act 10-12 years old or even younger.

Other effects of trauma are sleep problems, moodiness, trouble learning, misperceptions of danger, trouble trusting anyone, unsafe feelings, physical illness, and trouble adapting to change.

5 more classes to go. We have a list of all the paperwork and assignments due for each class including our individual life stories, journaling assignments, fingerprints, background checks, physicals, and so much more.

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For those not reading on the blog itself, please check it out as there is a new blog design! I’ve moved from an owl family to a penguin family and they’re so darn sweet! And this time they all match – same colors as we will be a family unit no matter what we look like.

To the many friends (and fangirls!) I have made since our last attempt at adoption from foster care, there are literally hundreds of posts detailing, venting, and reviewing that time in our life. I welcome you to skim it if you are interested, but be forewarned that it will likely both make you cry and piss you off and will certainly tug at your heartstrings. I mean, I’m a good writer.. 😉 But seriously, it was 3-4 years from sheer joy to pure heartbreak and every emotion in between. Clearly, it did not result in a child in our home..

For this go around, I will have a different tag so as not to confuse the two. Miami was simply “adoption” since I literally never expected it would fall apart. Everything for our Palm Beach adoption process will be tagged as “PB-adopt.”

Last night, September 19th, we had our first PIP (Partners in Parenting) class. Like PRIDE before, this is a 7 week class during which we will learn about children in care, our roles, our goals, and so much more. In this class, there are a total of 26 students, us included.

Here is what we know so far…

• CHS in Palm Beach is strictly an adoption only agency. To foster, parents must go through a different agency entirely. I have never heard of this before! In Miami, all agencies did both.
• We broke out into groups to do strengths/ needs for specific scenarios.
• We were later all given cards – half as foster/ adoptive kids and half as foster/ adoptive parents – and had to find our match.. or not. Not everyone had a match. Deep.
• Our 2 teachers (who split the class based on our home’s location) are responsible for completing our home studies. We will not be assigned to another case worker or languish in the system waiting on anyone. We have 7 weeks to get to know each other, build our books/ profiles, then go from there for the home visit and finalization.
• We should have our home studies in hand within 6 months. I am not being optimistic or getting my hopes up. (I know, I know.. you’ve heard this before.)

The Matching Process

• WE are responsible for finding our child via the multitude of Heart Galleries, online profile listings, and state and national adoption websites.
• Once we find a child we are interested in learning more about, we send the ID and their name to our case worker. She will then reach out to their case worker and see if we are a match.
• If so, we move forward with learning about them by reviewing their profiles and asking any questions we have about behaviors, education, whatever.
• From there, if both case workers feel we are still a good match, a meeting is arranged.
• Blah blah blah.. we have visits of all lengths and locations. If all goes well, we do sleepovers as well.
• Eventually the child moves in for a minimum of 90 days before finalization.
• And then… finalization! We are parents!

Yes, this is extremely generalized. I know this. You know this. Everyone knows this.

Every week we will have an in-class quiz (group shouting out the answers type thing) and homework to complete which all builds up to completing our official signed home study document. Homework seems to be repeats of last time like our life stories, feelings on certain situations, photos of ourselves, Lola, and our home, and other stuff about who we are.

I am already enjoying this class and the teachers. It is great, in my opinion, to get to know our case worker throughout the entire class as opposed to a random assignment. They will be much more vested in our finding our perfect match this way.

…Until next week…