Met with the PAP's today and it was a HUGE success!

CarolinaGirl2014

I wanted to thank all of you for your words of wisdom and tips on my questions and wording of questions! Today was the first meeting with the PAP's (and director of the agency) and I fell even more in love with them, and vise versa.  We have so much in common and the questions I was most anxious about resolved absolutely perfectly! They are overjoyed I want to breastfeed and pump, and are even open to me bringing the breast milk to them, which they brought up! We're both on the same page with an open adoption with very succinct, predetermined visitation and update guidelines that we come to an agreement to all together. I feel like they understood my desires for the hospital and were thrilled about how involved I want them in the birth. Anyway, I feel like I'm rambling but I'm so happy that things have worked themselves out. I know most of you are AP's and PAP's so I wanted to encourage you that miracles and matches happen every day. I know the paperwork and medical exams and letter and albums can be a bit overwhelming but they make a difference. When I found my family's profile I cried because I knew they were "it," and felt so relieved to have some hope in my situation. 

I'd also love some more advice from those of you who have been through the process now that the choosing process is over. What were some things you wish you knew regarding arrangements, pregnancy, birth, and after?

C

Dr.Loretta

Congrats on it going so well. That must be a weight lifted for sure.

I'm not sure I can give much feedback, as an AP and since we weren't matched until DD was already born. We were matched in part because both sides were open to the same # of visits/year.

 

maryoosa

Hi C,

I'm so glad your meeting went well!

The parent we were matched with was very generous by including us in her pregnancy- now that we are five weeks post-placement I think that the person we were matched with was absolutely fantastic and there isn't anything at all she could have done differently. What we most appreciated about our relationship with her was really getting to know her- we invited her to our house on multiple occasions, and she invited us to hers. We all spent hours hanging out. This isn't always possible, and this isn't always the best way to approach things.

The things that I wish I had known more about have far more to do with agency-related issues than anything else. I wish I knew exactly how ignorant of open adoption the hospital was, I wish we had better models for how to successfully have frequent visits, and I wish that we had a better idea of how hard the birth parent would be grieving and how that would look (we knew she'd be grieving, but watching someone you've gotten to know well, vs. watching someone grieve from afar are very different things). Of course NONE of these issues are things that our son's parent should have been concerned with. These are all things that WE as the adoptive family and our agency should have been dealing with.

sgb721

I don't have any advice but I did want to say congratulations on the match!!