Our meeting was scheduled for 4:30. We arrived about 4:20 and didn't get called back until about 4:50 by the adoption supervisor. It was nervous idle conversation in the waiting room and Matt started to get a little annoyed with the wait. No one bothered to tell us anything about no one coming for us. I started to wonder if they had forgotten about us! I knew we were the last appointment of the day (actually, the last of two days!) so I figured they were just running behind.
Finally, a door opened and here came a cute little couple (total competition) and the lady called us back. She apologized for the delay and I offered if she needed to take a break/ use the rest room etc. since she was obviously going straight into ours. She declined and we followed her into her office.
After several interruptions by people trying to leave for the end of the day, we were able to get started. Her name was M and she was very nice. She is the adoption supervisor. She started by asking if we had any questions from our informational meeting (we didn't) and she was looking over our profile. She liked that we were from Iowa (she was from *.*.) and I also slipped it in a little later that Matt was a PO there. She shared with us that her cousin (her dad and his dad are brothers) was a Sargent there. (one of the guys who helped hubby with the hiring process). Good start..
She outlined the process for how they select families again. They have about 18 interviews and only 6 spots. ( We can't remember the exact number now that she told us). She said that was the bad news, but I told her it was actually good news because it was more spots than I thought. For some reason I was thinking they had only 2 spots. After the interviews, if they don't see any red flags, they sort all of the families into demographic groups. She also told us a little later in the interview that this time around they are looking for families that are more on the East side of the state (we are so far east we are west) and for families with children! Yea! Two points for us!
The categories they sort into are:
*Age (all of us were mid 30s she said)
*Race (all of us are Caucasian she said)
*Location (they serve the whole state and look for families to be spread all over the state- lucky for us, our area is currently low in adoptive parents)
*# of children ( some birth parents look for a family with children already, some with no children...lucky again, she said they are looking for ones with children)
*both parents working (some want to place their child with a stay at home mom)
The discussion was very laid back and comfortable. We had some laughs,. we all shared some stories, and I felt at ease.
Even though these were on the application sheet, she asked us for more details on how we go to where we are, our thoughts on open adoption, and what scenarios we were open to considering.
M told us that she would be in meetings tomorrow and Thursday they would begin to sort the family profiles into groups. She said she did not want to guarantee that we would be accepted into the program but that she liked our answers and thought we had a good understanding of openness and fit the demographics well. She has another meeting on Friday morning but that she will begin making calls on Friday afternoon. She asked what number she should call and since Matt has to work, we told her to call my cell.
Cross your fingers that we make it in- I'll be back on Friday to let you know!
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| Enjoying dinner together after the interview so we could talk things over. |
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