Blogger Therapy

I just wanted to get something off of my chest. Dana and I have decided, after 6 years of trying more or less intensively to get pregnant, to adopt a child. If you have ever had to make a similar decision, then you know how horrible and painful infertility is, and how hard the decision to adopt can be. Even though adoption is a wonderful thing, it is still a very hard choice to be forced to make, and one that is usually made only after all the other options have failed.

Dana always says that she wants little kids who look like I looked as a boy, with curly blonde hair and rosy cheeks. With adoption, we have a chance to be parents, but it comes at the cost of never seeing a little version of yourself running around. It is a high price, and is particularly hard for Dana to pay.

But the dream of parenthood is stronger than the regret, so we are proceeding this year with our adoption plans. However, we have already run into our first hurdle. You might think that, since I work for an adoption agency, we would have an advantage over other adopting parents, but you would be wrong.

It turns out that Colorado has a fairly strict conflict of interest law that prohibits us from adopting through an agency for which either of us works. I have tried several different interpretations of the statute, and have asked just about everyone I can think to ask, but I have not been able to find a legal way of staying with LDSFS and adopting through them. It looks like we may have to adopt through a private agency, which is the height of irony.

I help people in the adoption process every day, but I am not allowed to help my own family grow. Get outta here. I understand the reason behind conflict of interest laws, but this one seems extraneous in the extreme. It is not like I am going to go pay someone to give us their baby, or force someone to pick us. We would just be another normal adoptive couple on the books, like everyone else. It just seems like we should be able to sign some kind of affidavit that we have not used undue influence in the process. Grrrrr.

Anyway, we now are looking at adopting through a private agency. The only problem is that a private agency is going to charge us 2 to 4 times more than LDSFS would. Of course we are willing to pay whatever in order to become parents, but a higher fee means a longer time saving up the money, which means more waiting before we can be parents. Which of course just aggravates the already-extant frustration of infertility.

Other people have babies left and right, without wanting them or being capable of raising them, and those children are paid for by Medicaid or other social funds. We, who are both desiring and capable, also have to save up a large sum of money before we can even hope to be parents. Fair doesn't even come into it.