Looking to parent someone else's offspring

[Bakari]

If you happen to know someone, or know someone who knows someone, who is pregnant, not ready to be a parent, and doesn't believe in abortion, send 'em my way!
Especially (but not only) if they are hoping their child is raised with MMM like principals!

I've always wanted to have one DNA matching baby, and also to adopt.
My wife is pregnant now, due in April, and we are hoping to find our second child within a year or so of then, so that the adopted child has the opportunity (rarely available to adopted children) to breastfeed.  It would also be nice for the two siblings to be close enough in age that they have well established it in their minds that they are siblings before they are old enough to even understand what "adopted" means.
We are a mixed race couple, so we are hoping to find a mixed race baby (so when they get older, they can choose to disclose or not to friends or whoever), and our first is going to be a boy, so we are hoping to adopt a girl so we have one of each.

We have done our homestudy, and we are signed up with a facilitator, but I'm branching out in the search, (agencies, and especially multiple agencies, are really expensive!!!), hence this post here.
If someone is frugal minded, and pregnant, consider how incredibly expensive children are!  We might even be able to help out with some basic living expenses during the pregnancy...

More about us here:
http://www.bakariandrachel-adopt.com
http://www.everlastingadoptions.com/waiting-families/profile/rachelandbakari.html
http://www.americaadopts.com/adoption-profiles/rachel-and-bakari/
https://www.parentfinder.com/Bakari-and-Rachel

[Livethedream]

My wife and I have looked in this and even did some of the initial steps. We realized it wasn’t the right time and still plan on it for the future.

We are in California as well. The program we found is free. Just need some basic stuff like first aid, a home visit, background check etc. Look into Fost Adopt “foster adopt”. They are foster kids who have a very low chance of being sent back to their parents and they are trying to find permanent homes.

We felt it was a pretty easy process, it might take a week, or a year, depends on what you are hoping for. You can pick she range, gender, ethnicity, and what level of medical/abuse/ other needs you are willing to facilitate.

There should be plenty of options in the Bay Area like this, you shouldn’t need to spend more then $300 to go this route. The child will also come with their own medical insurance and living stipend. I forget how much $$ it was, went up as they got older. Maybe like 700 for little kids. Our plan was to put it into some type of trust for them.

If your connected to a church, or know someone who is, ask them to contact their pastor and let them know what you are trying to do, there is probably a 100% chance someone attending has adopted and would be willing to give you some advice on options.

Good luck in your journey.

[vivian]

We adopted our children at birth. I have to say that unless you go the foster to adopt route as livethedream mentions, it is not a cheap process. And then with fostering you need to be emotionally ready to say goodbye to the kid.

I did breastfeed, so it is possible even if the baby doesn’t come in your time frame. I heard it is easier if your body has already done it.

As I said, it is not cheap. Unfortunately there is a spiral of adoption agencies/lawyers advertising the world to women, so that even women who aren’t interested in being financially supported find it hard to turn down. The religiously oriented organization we initially signed up with and that did our home study has said they find it hard to “compete” as many women they begin to work with, move to an agency that promises them more. Adoption laws need to change.

As for age gap, my oldest was 3.5 and six when we adopted our younger children. His love for them was immediate, even at 6 when he had more understanding of adoption.


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[Bakari]

Thanks to both of your for the feedback.
We are hoping for a newborn, or no more than a few months. 
I know it is very important and much needed for older kids to be adopted, and that is something we are considering doing someday, after our first kids are older and independent, but we don't feel prepared for the level of commitment needed to give a kid who had to be removed from home needs.  Its one thing if a woman gets pregnant unexpectedly, but for CPS to take a kid, something had to have gone very wrong.
We know all about the costs.  We've paid most of them already. 
Our homestudy is complete, and we've paid the facilitator their advertising fees as well as several other (much cheaper) online advertising places.
What's left will be a few thousand in court and lawyer fees.

Vivian, If you don't mind, would you be willing to share what steps you needed to trigger lactation after a break?  Was it enough to do it exclusively eventually?  If so, how long did that take?  Were there any (artificial) hormones involved in the process?

[blikeafox]

I have a friend who induced lactation. She did supplement and then switched to formula eventually, but I think others are more successful. There is a lot of info online if you search for inducing lactation or adoption and breastfeeding.

[vivian]

For my first, I did not take hormones, just started pumping and putting him to breast when he arrived. I also used the supplemental feeding tube, so when he nursed, he got formula at same time. For my second I followed the induce lactation protocol. Easily found on the Internet. I forget exactly the name, Goldfarb-Newman or something like that? I took medication in advance. I still had to supplement with formula. I didn’t nurse with my third because inducing lactation is more work, and figured I didn’t have the time with three kids. I also never felt I was getting out of it what I wanted.




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[Bakari]

I had known that was a possibility, though I didn't realize it was at all common.

Still hoping not need any of that information or advice, as long as we find our 2nd child in the next year or two it'll be easy and automatic.

Unfortunately there is a spiral of adoption agencies/lawyers advertising the world to women, so that even women who aren’t interested in being financially supported find it hard to turn down. The religiously oriented organization we initially signed up with and that did our home study has said they find it hard to “compete” as many women they begin to work with, move to an agency that promises them more. Adoption laws need to change.

One thing I've wondered about, when in the process of contacting an agency does a birth mother find out what the financial limits of a particular waiting family are?
It seems like it would violate the "no baby selling" principal of living expense support being a "gift" if she knows up front which family will pay more and can use that as a criteria of who to pick.

[K-ice]

Wishing you the best on your journey.

[vivian]

In my experience, before she signs away her rights, the birthmother is in charge. I’m sure it doesn’t feel that way to her because obviously she wouldn’t be choosing adoption if she felt she had good options. But the way I think it works for private infant adoption is the caseworker gets to know the woman’s needs, and may suggest various things based upon what the state allows and the philosophy of the agency (ie some agencies see this as their business and some see it as part of their social service mission). So, the birthmother is only presented with families that can meet her needs.

There are very much parts of the process that made us feel icky. We always tried to make decisions knowing that someday we will have to tell our kid about this part of the process as a way to help us make ethical decisions.

The adoption laws need to change. While I took advantage of the tax credit, it needs to go away because of the number of people who would tell me to wave away the cost because of the credit. Infant adoption needs to be made harder, foster care adoption needs to be made easier.


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