Wednesday, September 29

Next step

We are on to the second part of the application process. The part where they want to know every detail of our lives. I've already typed over 5 pages of information about myself and am still not done. Things that are included in this application:

We have to do:
fingerprints
doctor visits with blood work and a TB and HIV test
employment verification

Questions we BOTH have to answer separately:
why did we decide to adopt
why from Ethiopia
how our extended family feels
how we are preparing our family
how will we integrate the culture into our own family
what fears do we have
how do we feel about birth parents
how our parent's martial relationship was while growing up
how are we like our parents
how are we different from our parents
what rewarding, happy memories do we have of our family as a child
what do we feel was missing in our childhood
what leisure-time activities do we enjoy doing with self, spouse, friends
who was the most influential person in our life, what qualities to they possess
what have been the most fulfilling accomplishments in my life
things we like about our spouse
how to we resolve conflict in marriage
what roles to we play in marital relationship
a health, behavior, and personality synopsis of each child we have (including physical description)
what is our definition of a good parent
what ways would we bring up a child as we were raised
what types of discipline to we think is most effective for our child
what types of discipline did our parents use and how effect were they
how will we spend quality time with our children
what are your childcare plans
and believe it or not there are more!

Questions we answer together:
description of home including square feet, age of home, smoke detectors, fire extinguishers, etc
how utilities are furnished
do we anticipate moving
describe neighborhood and community
location of nearest hospital and medical facilities
location of school
how would community receive child of another ethnic or racial background
do we have will/inheritance
listed guardians for children
health insurance companies we use
and a full financial statement
and of course some more questions

And then several friends have to do a short answer reference sheet as well.

All is good. The agency says this part of the process will take at least 7 weeks at most 4 months. After that we do the home study.

4 comments:

adventure knitter said...

wow! quite a process. now, I thought I had heard that you have to both be 30 in order to adopt overseas...and since I'm not 30 yet, I know you aren't! did I hear wrong from someone??

becca said...

it depends on the country-some countries you do have to be older, some only 25

Mo said...

I want a copy of the answers:)

Jen said...

Wow! You could write a book to answer all those questions...