I am thinking it may be good our homestudy has been delayed, as we have not discussed with our social worker yet the special needs we are open to, and will need to do that at the final home visit to get that written into our homestudy. Maybe some things happen for a reason..... If we would have had this back 3 weeks ago I had not even thought to ask our agency for the paperwork I filled out on special needs to forward to our social worker. (2 agencies , one for homestudy, one for international aspect) SO, yesterday this all hit me (duh!) and I wrote a bunch of emails and got that all situated. BUT I found out this from our social worker: in order for her to approve us for these special needs requests, I need to let her know how we would manage them, what resources we have checked out in the area the addresses the needs, and all the research we have done on the need and experience we have with each issue. GULP! I have done very little research, and have very little experience. Jack was a premie, so I have that to go on, but not much else....
So my question for you all - anyone know of any great books on this subject Barnes might have? I can power read this weekend..... Or websites?
And by "resources" do you think she means I need to call some local doctors or have some names ready?? I have talked to our pediatrician, but I am not sure if she means specialists? I am really relieved to have a few days to figure this out......
We have a fairly big list of special needs we are open to, so I do have alot of research I need to do this weekend.
If our little Leah has some of these needs, it may have all fallen thru for her to be with us if I looked like I was totally unprepared to handle them at our meeting........
So now I can stop organizing for awhile and start researching!!
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About Me
- Elisabeth
- We are waiting to adopt our fourth child from the U.S.A. I am a momma to three other awesome children and wife to the love of my life. My boys are homegrown and my daughter is adopted from S. Korea . We cannot wait to meet our next baby!
I'm so happy to hear you're open to special needs! rainbowkids.com is an excellent resource for special needs. I also have a whole folder of bookmarks in my browser that, if I can figure out how, I will email to you. Otherwise, I would just google search the heck out of things. If your SW is worth her salt, she'll be pleased to hear you have a willingness to research and find resources that you'll need. Another great resource is your state-funded early intervention program. Ours is called First Steps, and each state has a diff. version. They've been invaluable for us. Also, lots of general international adoption books have a section on special needs. I also think just having a plan in place is good to be able to show your SW. For ex., you would start with your ped. and your international adoption specialist, ask them for resources, and go from there.
ReplyDeletePlease, PLEASE email me if you want more help with this! (littlelizajane(at)gmail(dot)com)
thanks Elizabeth - i was not sure if I should call my ped because i have no idea how to figure out who our international adoption specialist is? i will email you!
ReplyDeleteI can probably share some ideas with you on this too involving specialty medical care, early intervention, international adoption clinics, etc... You can email me if you want: myseoulsearching@gmail.com
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