2nd homestudy

I am sitting here this morning recounting the interview I had with the social worker and am not too happy. The very first thing she asks me to do is describe Brian. No problem. He's nice, generous, always putting others first, hard working, and the list goes on. Then she asks me to describe myself. I don't know why, maybe it was because it was after 8pm and my brain had already shut down for the night, but I couldn't think of anything. I often think about how great Brian is, but I guess I never have given much thought to who I am. After about 10 seconds of twirling my fingers I came up with it. "I guess I'm introverted." Wow. Brilliant Anna. Of course now I think of all the things I should have said...Christian, trustworthy, dependable, nice, down to earth, responsible, etc. I guess the important thing is that when it counts, I'm introverted. Oh brother. After this, I was asked to describe my childhood and my family. Finally, I was asked what my greatest source of frustration is. I giggled. "Do I have to answer this?" yes. "Well, I guess that would be my children." She laughed. So that concludes home study 2 and 3 and #4 will be on Monday. This should be our last one. Here's to hoping I am able to redeem myself a little. The good news - I have not been told I need therapy. Todays goal will be ordering certified copies of birth certificates and marriage certificate.

1st homestudy

We survived! We had our 1st homestudy today and it went really well. Our social worker was really nice. We were asked about our motivation to adopt, how we came to choose Rwanda, why international, discussed risks with adoption and how we would handle them, developmental delays, attachment disorders, what our expectations are, how much our children understand about the process and what their thoughts are, etc. The one question that surprised me the most was what our thoughts are on our son's birth parents and if we'd be willing to let him track them down one day. While both Brian and I would be happy for our son to one day explore where he came from and search for his birth parents, I feel sad that he most likely will have no success. It is illegal in Rwanda to place your child up for adoption, so there will most likely be no information on them. I too would have liked to meet the mom and give her a hug. What a huge gift she is giving to us and I could only imagine how hard that would have been to walk away from her child. It is also likely that she may not be living. The other thing that I found interesting about that question was that I had previously given thought to our son's birth mother, but had never given any thought to his father. hmmm. I wonder if this is a mom to mom thing. I would definitely welcome any information on his birth father, but am much more focused on his birth mom. oh well. All in all the process took about 2 hrs and ended with a tour of the house. As ridiculous as this sounds, I was more nervous about the cleanliness of the house than I was about the interrogations. I've got to admit, I was a little bummed when she didn't look in the pantry or laundry room that I scrubbed from top to bottom. Oh well, I am glad to have a clean house, at least for the time being.