There are countless resources available to transracial adoptive parents of today. We can read books all about transracial adoption. We can read articles in magazines, newspapers and online. Heck, we can read entire magazines dedicated to adoption. We can read blogs (both personal and educational). We can get pre-adoption education and post-adoption services. We can listen to the voices of adult adoptees. The resources are bottomless if we take the time to look for them.

But I have come to find through years of experience that some of the very best experience lies not in the pages of books or words of magazine articles, but in the advice of other transracial adoptive parents.

It was another adoptive parent that alerted me to the fact that there were unscrupulous people working in adoptions and I had to proceed with choosing an agency and program with care. (This was during our first adoption where I was naive enough to believe that everyone working in adoption was in it for the kids).

It was another adoptive parent that told me what I absolutely needed to bring on my first adoption trip and what I could leave behind.

It was another adoptive parent that taught me how to handle rude comments and prying questions from strangers when we brought home our first daughter and were taken off guard by people's boldness.

It was other adoptive parents that prepared me for the challenges of being a parent through adoption and gave advice on how to get my new child to sleep, eat and let me take a shower alone.

Parents know the good stuff. They know the tricks of the trade. They know how to get a homestudy and dossier done in record time and they know tricks to help survive the wait. They know what to do, how to react, what to say, where to go, how you feel, what is normal, how to prepare and how to handle the ins and outs of adoption.

Through the internet, adoptive parents have forums, email groups and other places that they come together to share advice and support.

So, I thought I would use this blog to be a way to connect adoptive parents. I know that there are lots of transracial adoptive parents that read this blog, and I know that many have lots of questions, and that just as many have wonderful advice to share.

I am writing up a list of questions and a list of topics that adoptive parents can answer or give advice on. Your responses can be as long or as short as you like. I will compile all of the responses by topic, throw in my two cents and make some fun and educational blog posts about them.

Since no two adoption experiences are the same, compiling advice and experiences from a bunch of parents is a great way to help out others.

If you would like to participate by answering questions about your adoption experience (any aspect of the process) and/or your experience parenting a child through transracial adoption, please email me at erinh@adoptionblogs.com

Some of the blog topics I am planning on are: making the decision to adopt, how you chose a program, how you chose an agency, what the homestudy process was like, what the paperwork was like, how you handled the wait, what your emotions were like when you got your referral, how you got your referral (referral stories), what your experience was with your adoption trip (or escort), packing advice, travel advice, what was hardest about parenting your new child, what was harder than you expected, what was easier than you expected, how you raised money to pay for your adoption and plenty of others.

I would love to get lots of you to participate. These posts will be coming soon.



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