One of our first activities in the process of adoption was to attend a 1 day educational seminar  in October 2019, which covered a variety of topics to help prepare us for the journey of adopting.  We heard from social workers, on some of the things we can expect as well as tips and tools available to us to help prepare us mentally in addition to preparing our home.  The most memorable moment of the day was meeting a family who had adopted 3 children from the Ukraine.  They brought their children into the room and immediately I felt my heart flutter.  The children shared some of their experiences from the orphanage and then some of the activities they did once they arrived home in Canada.  These children were so well spoken and had a joy about them that I cannot describe.  They then opened it up to questions and open discussion.  There were 2 other couples with us in the room attending the seminar.  The youngest boy leaned back in his chair, arms folded, and said, “so, how many children are you all adopting?”.  His expression was so cute, innocent, and curious. 

We left the session with so many notes and great takeaways. Things we needed to start working on to prepare our home, our hearts, and our minds.

Next step shortly after was the homestudy.  I don’t know why, but this was the part of the process I was feeling most anxious about.  I guess because my perception was that our lives would be put under a large judgement microscope and left for someone else to make the assessment.  All of my preconceived ideas and feelings turned out to be completely wrong.  We were assigned our social worker Marla and she began by asking us to complete our personal biographies in writing.  A template of about 4 pages of points that would need to be addressed when writing your autobiographies was provided.  The topics were of a wide variety talking about our families, upbringing, beliefs and plans on how would we raise children.  We spent days writing our individual bios and both found the exercise very therapeutic and interesting to put our thoughts in writing.  Ryan and I thought it would be a neat idea to write our bios individually, not discussing or sharing with each other anything we were writing until we were both finished.  Once complete, we sat down in our kitchen and read each others bio aloud.  It didn’t take long before the tears started to come.  Hearing the beautiful thoughts we each shared and how in synch we both had been was yet just another indication we were more ready now than ever for this journey.

The written exercise was then followed by 3 in person sessions with Marla.  The first 2 at her office where she ran through similar questions with us and shared stories of other couple’s experiences.  The 3rd session she came to our home to finish her assessment including a tour of our home and community.

It was about a month later we received Marla’s written homestudy assessment which was also the first time we were reading our reference letters that our family and friends had provided supporting us in our decision to adopt.  Again, we found ourselves overwhelmed with emotion.  The homestudy and beautiful words shared by all left us feeling so loved and supported.  This journey we know won’t be easy, but one thing is for sure, we are not alone.