Someone on one of my single mother listservs asked about the process. I wrote her a long explanation and decided to post it here as well.
I live in New York and am working with an attorney here. She works with an adoption facilitator who, upon consulting with my lawyer, decides which states to advertise in. They believe in a two week advertising blitz which is probably the biggest expense in adopting this way, but they have been doing this a long time so I trusted them on this. In July I advertised in WA, OR, MD and IL and had connected with a woman in Oregon but that fell through, so I decided to advertise again in August. This time I advertised in MO, NM, AZ and PA. I got a lot more calls the second time. What I did was put together a profile book with pictures and text explaining my life, who I am and why I wanted to adopt. So, when I connected with a birthmother on the phone I would send the book out and then connect with her in a few days to talk again. The first time around I sent out 5 books - one was returned and I think one was a scam. One of them is waiting for papers from my lawyer. The second time around I've sent out 8 books with one more week to go. Two women have already spoken to my lawyer and will be filling out paperwork this week (both are Caucasian). The way it works is the ads run for two weeks and then the phone should ring for another week after that. So I had to be available to answer the phone pretty much 24/7. I am a teacher so it made sense for me to do this in the summer. I did got plenty of crank calls and calls from people who also wanted to adopt, but I had lots of conversations with women who were looking to make an adoption plan. Honestly, I think out of the 11 legitimate books I sent out, 7 were purely Caucasian babies. This is different from working with an agency because when birthmoms come to an agency they are shown a bunch of profiles- and then your profile is competing against profiles of couples. This way, when a birthmom calls your number, you send out your book for her to read. Most don't want to make more than one phone call, so if you make a good impression and she likes your book she will go ahead with you and won't call more ads. It is more work for me, in terms of making the connection with the birthmom and nurturing a relationship with her. But once we make that connection I refer her to my attorney and then we work together to continue our relationship. In terms of race, I was willing to consider a biracial child so my attorney would have me send books to pregnant women who may have answered ads from other clients, but then I felt I was competing against other people because she would have more than one of us send books. In terms of being single, most of these women are single and have raised kids as single moms, so they seem to be okay with it. As long as you have a support system you can present it to them in your profile book . I chose this method as opposed to an agency because someone else on this list felt that it was less of a competition and I have to say I agree with her.
The books I send out are about 15 pages long and they have pictures and text which basically document my life and reasons for adopting. If you have seen any of the websites where people are advertising for adoption it is very similar to those. I think there is something personal about being able to hold the document in your hands and look at it again and again- which is what some of these women have told me that they have done. Some have also referred to specific things within my book which spoke to them. Then of course there were some who did not return my follow up phone call which I took to meant that my book did not speak to them- which was okay. In terms of the ad, I wrote it with the help of my facilitator but she did all the placing of the ads. She acquired the proper attorney letter, did all the calling and charged it all to my credit card. The ads were all placed in newspapers, many of which are also online.
Most of the birthmoms became moms at a young age, working class I would say, some were in school. All of them had other children and were in their twenties or thirties. When they have the initial conversation with my lawyer she asks them preliminary questions about the pregnancy, drugs and alcohol and race. Then she sends more extensive paperwork for them to fill out including proof of pregnancy. This is where I am now. I have two birthmoms who both have told me they want to make an adoption plan with me. So, the attorney has sent them the paperwork to fill out and once it comes back it will become a case. As for gender, I always thought I would have a girl, but the one woman who it looks like I will make a plan with is having a boy, and honestly, I just really want to be a mom so I'm happy.
As for finances- it is hard to predict how much you will spend when adopting like this. If I had connected with someone that my lawyer had passed along I would not have had to pay for advertising. As it is, I had to advertise twice so it will probably be more than I had planned on. Also, it depends on whether or not the birthmother has insurance or medicaid, how far along she is and which state she lives in. Each state has different limits on how much you can pay for her expenses. I think it can be expenses from the third trimester to up to six weeks after the birth and this includes rent and clothing, My lawyer, upon our initial consultation, told me it could cost between $15K and $30K minus advertising (which could go b/w $5k and $15K). I did do a home study and had my court approval completed before I could start advertising. But the first thing that I did was have a consultation with the attorney whose name I got off this list.
So far, I have to say this process has been a good one, but I don't have a completed adoption yet. However, I am pretty confident that I will complete an adoption through this process.
Naomi
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