Step 1 Done ✔

One of the most tedious and time consuming parts of adopting is the home study.  This is the very first step when you decide to adopt.  The home study can also make you feel very vulnerable as it takes a real look into every aspect of your life both current and past.  The questionnaire you answer before even meeting with your social worker is like taking a final exam and all the questions are in essay form.  Questions range from where did you grow up, what is your relationship like with your mother, father, siblings, tell a memory from your childhood, what was school like for you, what is your strengths, weaknesses, how about your spouse's, why do you want to adopt and on and on.  Once you get past this part you meet with the social worker at your house.  You give them a tour of the house, meet your family and ask some more questions.  Next are the individual meetings, one with each parent and then one with the kids for a total of 4 meetings.  In between the meetings you are getting documents together to submit to the social worker so they can write the home study report.  The documents include physicals for the parents including lab tests, wellness letters for the kids, local police clearances, state clearances for any place you have lived, employment letters, financial statements, copies of birth and marriage certificates, copies of life and health insurance policies.  Luckily many of these documents are also needed for your dossier so you are killing two birds with one stone.  We will talk about the dossier in a later post. 

This morning Trey turned in our home study packet!!! Our end of this process is complete.  Now we wait.  Our social worker stated she will complete the home study report within 10 days of receiving all our documents.  I can't say that she has everything she needs since she mailed out and will be receiving our state clearances.  We have one for Michigan of course but also had to do one for Arizona for the 4 months we lived there back in 2005.  On our end though everything is complete.  There is not much we can do now but wait for the report to be completed.