For the love of Pre-School

Ahhhhhh.......
Friday, 2 1/2 hours of a quiet house, a cup of coffee and blogging. WHeeeeeeee!!!!!
I've been wondering if I am the only one who's ventured into adoption and found it so frustrating and archaic. Here's my theory, in case you wanted to hear it. I think the adoption is very similar to being pregnant. There's this thing - a need to have a kid, then there's 2 general options pregnancy or adoption usually. With pregnancy this alien literally takes over your body, everything. There's not much you can do about it, so most women make the best of it and say things like "oh, it's been rough but it'll all be worth it when I see our baby" and of course it is, it always is. But in pregnancy you really have no choice in the matter so it IS best to make the best of it. Then there's labor and delivery, things that you'd think would be burned into every woman's mind moment by moment. Well, after the baby is born there's a huge endorphin rush, which is basically nature's memory eraser. Quite convenient for mother nature I must say, otherwise a woman would tell other women the blow by blow of the pregnancy and birth and no one in their right mind would ever get pregnant again! (I think mother nature didn't give me the right dosage of endorphins after A's birth, cause I was scarred let me tell ya)
Now on to option #2 which we're in the midst of now. Adoption, it's similar in that there's the need for a child, you have little control and you're consumed. Only this consumption is one of the mind, not the body. And the control is not in mother natures hands, it's in the hands of people, people that you have never met, people who are being paid, people who don't always have your best interests in mind, but people who you've hopefully researched the heck out of and one's you're willing to try to trust. So, you'd think there would be just a ton of info out there on all of these people who do adoptions, right? Tons! There's no pregnancy involved so we're in our 'right' minds, our hormones aren't out of whack, we're getting a baby without all of the 'icky' pregnancy stuff getting in the way of our reasoning. WRONG. My theory is that parents, myself included, are so incredibly scared that anything they do or say will either mess with their adoption process, adding bumps and time, or even worse that they'll be sued or worse lose out on a referral because of it. So I believe many wait, wait until it's 'safe' to tell. But by then they've brought their baby home, and there go those endorphins, and what could possibly be awful about an experience that brought you this beautiful child?
So I am going to 'out' the adoption world as I see it, because I want other's to know that it's painful, it's awful at times, often like pregnancy. BUT there's a BIG difference, WE all can DO something about the way parents are treated. Hold agencies accountable for what they tell us when we sign on. Expect excellent customer service! We are paying for it! The more complacent parents are, the more complacent the agencies will be and they won't drop prices for the difference. I cannot say this enough, kids need parents that are NOT emotionally and financially in shambles! And adoption should not be limited to upper middle class or the rich. Adoptions subsidies shouldn't be limited to waiting children, special needs children, or families making under 35 thousand a year.
I don't think I'm the only one that thinks a system that operates so slowly, so invasively, and so callously isn't good for families. I don't know why it's so expensive. Why does it cost $500 to apply? Why did my homestudy cost $3000? WE did ALL of the work!!!!!!! We wrote the damn thing, all she did was take excerpts out of it and slap her official signature on it (I'm willing to bet that's how the reports we send back to VN will go too). Oh and she asked us the same exact questions from the self-study for 4 hours. Why does a 16 hour class on 2 topics last 16 hours? And why does it cost $1500?
Don't even get me started again on the celebrity adoption thing. Ugh. I can't believe that Madonna is nuts enough to actually believe that the reason people are upset is because Daniel is black!! OMG!! NO!! I'm mad because she got preferential treatment and she won't ADMIT to it!!!!!! Give me one average, middle income family who frickin' picked out their child for themselves from a video or photos and then got to bring him/her home within weeks, and I'll shoot flying monkeys out of my butt. Do some research Madge, Angelina, Meg, Sharon. Then get back to me.

Gotta go get the munch-man...
Peace