The inaugural post!

Here it is………drum roll please…..the inaugural post!  I’ve thought for a long time about blogging and mostly whether I had anything at all relevant or mildly interesting to add to all the blogs already out there in cyberspace.  After some soul searching, I decided to plough ahead.  As I see it, this blog will primarily focus on one of my favorite things (other than my children of course!) – adoption. 

I adopted my older child from Cambodia in 2002, when she was just about nine months old.  At first, the adoption proceeded along smoothly; that is until the US government decided to shut down all adoptions from Cambodia to the US.  This proved to be a bit of a problem for me as I was just about a month away from finalizing my daughter’s adoption when this “issue” arose.  Although everything worked out well in the end, I endured several scary and frustrating months.  And, my daughter spent a few extra months in an orphanage instead of being at home with her family.

I adopted my second child from China in 2008.  Unfortunately, this adoption also had plenty of drama thanks to the massive and unexpected slowdown in adoption referrals from China.  Although this adoption took much longer than originally anticipated, the end result was worth infinitely more than the seemingly never-ending wait. 

Ever since I first embarked upon my adoption journey over ten years ago, numerous people have approached me to ask about adoption.  Who knew there were so many folks out there considering adoption? 

When I first seriously entertained the idea of adoption, I started to research my options.  I usually approach a research project “full steam ahead” and, of course, my adoption research project was no different!  I was shocked to find, however, that there was no comprehensive and reliable source of adoption information.  Rather, I found myself visiting numerous websites and basically hopscotching all over the place trying to figure out answers to basic and simple questions like which countries will allow a single woman to adopt? 

The second time around, I again conducted a fair amount of research before proceeding.  As before, I found a highly disjointed system.  It was not easy to figure out how to move ahead and I’d already been through the process once before.  Since that time, I have met with numerous families and individuals to talk about the adoption process.  Each and every time without exception, I met with highly motivated prospective parents who were confused about how to move forward and who did not know where to turn for reliable information about adoption. 

I guess this is a very long introduction to my blog which I hope will become a reliable, useful, and comprehensive source of adoption information for all those people out there who hope to build their families through adoption.