Adoption Frustration Update

Since my trip to the doctor last week, Jessie and I have been more aggressive about looking into foster care and adoption-okay, I have. Jessie is just there to listen and help make the decisions. I do all the research. I met with a woman this past Wednesday to find out more about foster care and to see if we would even qualify to be foster/adoptive parents with my whole "medical background." (Although I am off my medication and feel better, I was never released from therapy. I just quit going after I started volunteering at the Center.) I thought I made it clear to her that we were just looking at getting information now to see if it would be a possibility in the future-2/3 years from now. Or even possibly getting on the waiting list to adopt, because I know it will take awhile. Without going into all the specifics, I thought the "interview" went well...for the most part. I didn't think I did anything wrong, which I am generally very critical of myself, so it is amazing for me to not think I did anything wrong...Anyway, aside from a few comments she made such as, "We are NOT an adoption agency." and "You are the youngest person we have had come in...a little too young, if you ask me." (Something along those lines of we are so young...) I still thought we had a chance.

The next morning I got the call that we got rejected-BECAUSE OUR AGE! She thought we needed to wait a few more years because we are so young. So we got rejected. Then she called back later and changed it to..."Call us back in a few months because we are undergoing a lot of changes in rules and funding. Maybe we can do something then." I ended up emailing her afterward to clarify that currently we were only interested in getting on the adoption list, and that is only because it may take a few years. Sam could not handle us fostering now, and we won't be able to adopt without sitting on a list, so if we get on it now, by time we adopt, she will be old enough to accept that too. But young enough to enjoy having a sibling. She emailed back and said that she would send in my medical release forms to the Women's Center where I took my Recovery Counseling and to the Counseling Center I went to-and we would go from there. Fingers Crossed. Jessie and I are still talking about exactly what we want to do, but I want to know what our options are before we go stressing over a decision. I am hoping to have an answer in the next week.

Small Rant: I am so frustrated with our age getting in the way of everything. It doesn't matter what we do to prove ourselves, people still look at us the same way! We aren't even teenagers anymore. We are in our 20s. I thought things would get easier, but they aren't because nobody wants to give us a chance. Lucky for us, we caught a break on the house. (They didn't base that off age. What a shocker.) And they didn't base Jessie's job off his age either. But when it comes to the whole adoption or baby thing, people look at us like we are crazy. When I try to talk to clients at the Center who are older than me, encouraging them to keep their baby or at least make an adoption plan, they look at me like, "What do you know? You are just a kid." Even in the "Homeschool Community" I have found that it is going to be very hard for me to make friends and have people actually believe me that she is learning and that I am interested in her well being and not just think I am lazy and just want to be able to say, "We Homeschool." I don't mean to sound conceited or anything, but I am a dang good Mom and I know it. I won't even go into that right now. The point is, and I know you all know how I feel-just because my age is way down here, doesn't mean I am immature and a bad Mom. The End-Before I just keep going...