Adoption Journey: Assessment #1

We had our first home assessment last Tuesday, and  again we were a little over-prepared for what was needed. Nothing like working ourselves into a frenzy. We cleaned the house better than it's ever been cleaned. We borrowed Jason's parents new water vacuum, which is amazing! Seriously, it's like magic. It doesn't have a filter but the water sucks everything up. It was pretty great, and made our house smell so fresh. They had given us a checklist of what our house needed in order to pass, and we were a little worried because we hadn't done everything on the list, but she didn't really seem to care, hooray! She started of by taking a (super) quick tour of the house, she didn't even really go in any rooms, just sort of poked her head in them. Which was kind of frustrating because we did a fair few changes to things because they were on the checklist, and she didn't even look at them or notice them. She missed our laundry room all together haha. Then we sat at the table and went over some more paperwork (our insurance stuff, the dogs immunizations, police checks, etc) then we got to talking. She went over the rest of the house checklist, and all we have to do to pass completely is make sure the pulls for the blinds aren't hanging down, install the floors in the kitchen & dining room, and do up a fire escape plan and post it. (Which seems rather silly since we're wanting a baby - I don't know too many babies that can read. But it's the same rules whether you're getting a baby or a 10 year old) We also have to make sure we have baby gates installed at the top and bottom of our stairs by the time of placement. (As well as get all the other baby stuff we may need - crib, car seat, stroller, etc) Another thing we need to have by the end of our assessments is who we would want to have as guardians of our children...which is tough. Especially since we don't have any idea what sort of issues the child may posses, and that has a bearing on who we'd want to have as their guardians.
    Then we talked a bit about our personalities, and how we'd describe each other, which is always fun to hear, how your spouse views you.

(my shy & quiet husband hanging from a tree)

My favourite question of the day, (in regards to our infertility) "why did you choose to adopt, versus remaining childless?" Remaining childless wasn't even an option for me, like I said before, I feel like it's my purpose to be a mother. Jason responded with, "I dunno, I just really want a munchkin I guess." Hahaha, I died a little trying to suppress the laughter. She asked us when we planned on telling the child they were adopted, and I resisted the urge to say we'd make that their 16th birthday present, because not everyone loves our sarcasm...and we fully intend on telling them from the very beginning. She asked us about how we'll deal with questions the child may have about their past, and their family. I told her it was rather hard to answer this far out, everything is situational and needs to be age appropriate, so how are we supposed to know now, what we'll say to them then. Then she told us we would have to tell them everything about their past...even if they were sexually abused, and don't remember, because it's easier for them to hear it from us, rather than read it in their file when they're able to. Which I understand, but holy cow, not really a conversation I'm looking forward to having (not that we may need to), and which age would you drop a bombshell like that on someone?
   We went over the nine pages of what type of child we be okay with getting. They literally cover everything under the sun that could potentially affect the child (or does affect them). We were pretty open to all things, and it's hard to rate a lot of them because we want a baby, and things like mood disorder, or autism, or schizophrenia aren't going to present themselves until later. We both preferred going over the list with her, because she helped clarify a number of them. We're being pretty open to getting a call on anything, there were only a few things we said we would say no to, because we'd take more info on pretty much any baby they called us about haha.  She asked us about our priorities and our values, and our interests, and it's hard to not sound corny or lame when you're spouting them off. Then we booked our next two assessments (she likes to combine the interviews into one so there are actually only 3 woot!), and before we knew it the assessment was over! We think it went well, she never stopped the meeting and said, "well, you're not really what we're looking for" so we take that as a pass. Plus she booked the final assessment with us, so she had to have at least kind of liked us.
  In case you're wondering how Kai behaved...she supervised the whole time...

(You can read about our fertility struggles and our decision to adopt: part 1, part 2, and part 3)