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Adoption Risks: Just Before the
Placement and After If, just before a prospective birth mother gives birth, you sense she's still uncertain, don't take the baby home. Arrange to have him/her placed in foster care until the revocation of consent period expires. Considering everything you did to get to this point, this might seem a bit crazy. But it won't be as hard as returning a child to his/her birth mother if she suddenly reverses her decision. After all the euphoria leading up to the delivery, most prospective birth mothers will gradually come down. By day three, their decision to place their child usually hits them the hardest. It's a good idea to make sure that they're not alone -- that they have someone to talk to, an adoption practitioner, friend or family member. As for preparing your home, that's something that you'll have to play by ear. You'll need to walk a fine line betwen making sure that everything is in place for the baby's arrival and yet remindubg yourself that it's ain't over until it's over.
When dealing with young children, professionals recommend that you don't introduce the new baby as "your new brother" or "your new sister" until you're sure the baby is there to stay. In the meantime, explain that you're "taking care of the baby" or "looking after him/her for a few weeks." Should the baby have to leave unexpectedly, you don't want your children to feel that one day they might have to as well. By the way, you'll be counting down the days, hours, minutes and finally seconds for the birth mother's revocation of consent period to expire, which effectively terminates her legal rights to her child. It's a moment that for you can never come too soon. Be aware that when it eventually does come, when the clock strikes midnight and you realize that she can't change her mind anymore, it will be...anticlimactic. Probably the most anticlimactic moment of your life. No balloons will descend from the ceiling. No lights will flicker. There's won't be any fanfares or triumphant Rocky-style music soaring in the background. The moments will simply pass, one after the oher, just like they do any other day. And eventually, you'll pick yourself up and head off to bed. With one big difference: In the morning, when you wake up, a new chapter of your life will begin. For all intents and purposes, you'll be a parent. Don't be surprised, if in the day and weeks after the placement, you experience your own version of postpartum depression. It's not depression really. More like a winding down, the kind you feel at the end of any long, anxiety-ridden journey. There's a good chance, too, that after all those hoops you've jumped through and back flips you performed you'll have this lingering doubt deep inside you as to whether you're even up to the job of parenting. Parenting is difficult on anyone, but as a newly adoptive parent you'll have the added pressure of having to prove -- mostly to yourself -- that you won't "screw up". You'll feel so guilty and conflicted about it that you won't dare discuss it with anyone. But just like those midnight feedings and all those diapers you'll be changing, this will pass. Remember that having a child placed with you is only onepart of the journey. You still have your whole lives ahead of you. As you'll find out, raising an adopted child is very different than raising a biological one. As for your fears as to whether your child will bond with you, they usually evaporate the moment s/he's placed in your arms. So how do you know if a child's for you? Trust us, you'll know. Your heart will tell you, even if your partner and everyone else don't. In fact, you'll be so sure that your situation was meant to be you'll wonder why you ever thought twice about it. Not only will you believe that everything you've ever done in their life led you to your child, you'll never imagine having any other. Adoption, you'll soon discover, has a way of making fatalists of us all.
Adoptive Parents | Birth Parents | Adopting in Canada | Waiting Parents Registry | Our Services | Discuss Adoption Contact Us: info@canadaadopts.com |
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Hold
off doing anything for as long as you can. Buy the necessities like diapers,
formula, clothes and a basinet, and leave everything else until later.
And don't forget to prepare your other children, if you have any. 
