My bloggy friend and #1 commenter Cat had another homestudy today. I was happy to hear that it went well, which I was not worried about. The one thing I always hear about home studies is how everyone gets all worked up about it and then it is easier than they thought. Don't get me wrong, we cleaned liked mad to get things in perfect shape but for my second one....we really were not worried. Cat said it best when she said that it is almost a disappointment when it is done because they go so smooth.
She also mentioned that they didn't ask any personal questions this time which I would agree with for us. Our caseworker didn't ask us the things like the first time on how do you plan to discipline, what do you do when you have a disagreement, how were you raised, how did you meet blah blah blah. This was just refresher stuff but nothing to deep. One thing that I have read before from many people is how different the agencies are in regards to many different areas of details. I plan to do a post on this soon and some of the things I've noticed.
BUT...here is the real reason for me getting on here to post tonight. We got matched! Ha ha! Just kidding. Won't it be exciting when I can say that again. That wasn't nice now was it??? I've had two glasses of wine so I'm still giggling about it.
Okay, seriously again. Today we got a copy of our first home study in the mail (the one that is expiring) We have never seen a copy of it and I have always wanted to ask everyone if it is something you usually get. I actually just never remembered to ask. I learned tonight from someone who is doing a private adoption that they have to send a copy of theirs to the attorney so I'm assuming that most of you do get it. I had been curious as to what it said since I had never really read one before.
Ugh. Didn't love ours. I'm not worried about it or anything because I know we were approved and everything... it's nothing like that. Honestly, I just expected it to be a little more about how great we are, what a fun and cool family we are etc. I know it is our case workers job to interview and report back honest findings but some of the things in there I thought, "did we say that???" and some of the things are not accurate.
For example- it says "Amber does not have a good relationship with her mom. She calls her "needy" and reports that she calls several times a day". Okay...I wouldn't exactly say that I don't have a good relationship with my mom...I mean, yes...she drives me nuts but I wouldn't use those words per se. Maybe I did use the word needy but is that really what I wanted??
Or regarding discipline when I was raised... "Amber didn't break the rules often and therefore was not often disciplined. When she was, her dad spanked her with an open hand on the buttocks" Um....like one time that I can remember. The question she had asked was how were you disciplined? I told her about how I would be grounded (which was included) and she asked about spankings.... I KNOW if I was talking about it I would have said only one time because I don't think it ever happened to me other than that!!!!
Matt has things where he talks about his parents divorce and his relationship with his parents growing up etc. that I wouldn't exactly say are his true feelings.
I know these things don't really matter on paper but they are bugging the heck out of me. These are the biggest examples but there are a few more things that we read and said, "really???" Some of it seems out of context and misrepresented. There are also a few typos and that really drives me nuts too.
I just put it back in the envelope and put it away. I don't want to look at it anymore.
Yah...that was a cruel joke! :P
ReplyDeleteThat's crazy that you never got to see your homestudy until now! Our agency has us read over it and sign it - we don't sign it until any concerns we might have about it are addressed.
Hope this homestudy is better!
I love you. <3
ReplyDeleteFor real, my heart was in my throat for a second when you said you were matched, and then I was disappointed when you said you were kidding. MEANIE!!!
Anyway, so funny that you mention your first home study report. We found the same thing to be true of ours (which we had done through our agency-- but didn't use them for the actual adoption). I found a lot of misconceptions/misunderstandings in ours and it irked me to no end. While in the end, you're right, it doesn't matter... it still bothers me that we were misrepresented on paper.
It's so important to us to have everything be accurate. If we had to spend HOURS writing up our autobiographies and spend HOURS getting all the required documents in order, the very least that our social worker could have and should have done, was to accurately write down what we said to him. Some of the things just bothered me because if someone in my family read it (which they wouldn't), I'd have to explain things to them and it was all from our SW not hearing/writing down what we said.
So I hear you on that. You're definitely not alone. I wish they would have given us a chance to preview it and tell them if everything was correct. And don't even get me started on the grammatical errors!!!
I'm glad you're back to blogging. Yours is one of my absolute favorites to read!! You bring me joy!
:-)
We had to sign a copy of ours to state it was accurate. They had made minor errors like they called me a physical therapist instead of an occupational therapist. I think there were a few other things that were not accurate. They also dwelled on a few things like my moms spinal cord injury. We were supposed to cross out and edit anything that wasn't accurate prior to signing. Just between you me and your 14 readers. I didn't make any edits. I signed it and sent it back. I know the judge prior to finalization at least skimmed it because she knew where I worked and knew DH was a marathon runner.
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