Welcome Adopting Parents!

Lately I have been hearing from women who would love for me to return to creating new podcasts. I took 2011 off from the work, but hope to return this year with new shows -- and perhaps a webinar series! I currently have 46 shows available, with more than 39,000 downloads. Here's what's available.

After waiting over a year for my adoption to finalize, I’ve accepted that I will never become a mother
through my current adoption program. I’ve learned a lot hard lessons along the way. The only
redeeming feature of my journey? The chance to tell others how to avoid a similar fate. If you are
considering adoption, here is what I've learned:

For many of us, simply having sex with someone we love to produce a child is a great idea. But life being what it is today, women like us, busy with goals and options, have many more choices than we used to. We can delay child-bearing a few more years, generally into our 30s, sometimes into our early 40s. But when things don't go as easily as we would like, and we see the many options to motherhood available to us, how do we choose?

I just returned from Orlando, where hundreds of specialists in reproductive medicine gathered for their annual convention -- largely focused on helping women get pregnant with up-to-date research and technology. Here is some of what I learned, and people I talked to.

I'm very much looking forward to meeting Sarah at next week's Choice Mom event in Seattle. She's updated me on her journey a few times. And it's a great example of how life can unfold in unpredictable ways. Here is her story.

A woman recently wrote about how exhausted she is about the Trying stage. Several IUIs, an IVF, lots of money spent. She was tired, out of money, and wondered if she should give up what has been an obsession to become a mother.

This Mother's Day weekend I'm contemplating the good, the bad, and the ugly of Choice Motherhood.

As we continue our look this month into alternatives to IUIs for women, I wanted to share this story of a Choice Mom I know who is meeting her third daughter today in China.

Choice Mom Valerie offered up these questions to ask any prospective adoption agency before considering them for your single-parent adoption...

As we develop more (largely FREE!) e-books and other special guides for the Choice Mom community, I thought this would be a good place to list everything so far available. This list will grow, so keep checking back.

Back in August 2010, two wonderful colleagues talked with each other in a radio show about moving beyond the "simple" conception options to surrogacy, adoption, embryo donation, egg donation and more. Here are highlights, and a direct link to the show.

Just as a Choice Mom I know is heading to China to meet her new five-year-old daughter -- after a LONG process that started before China closed its doors to single-parent adoptions, this good news just in....

This post comes from Vera, co-editor with me of "Choice Mom Guide to Adoption," as she examines the probing questions she and her now-13-year-old twin daughters, adopted from Russia, have been asked over the years.

Writes Valerie: "I've been at a bus stop for a month now.

One of my favorite websites is CreatingaFamily.com, run by Dawn Davenport. Like me, she's developed a comprehensive resource for her community as a labor of love. Hers is specifically designed for anyone building families through adoption, egg and sperm donation, surrogacy. Here are highlights:

I learned that Adam Pertman has started writing an important blog that will address why all of us concerned about kids and family-building should pay attention to adoption issues. Here's what he says about the reason for his new blog:

Here it is! For a limited time, the special new baby for our Choice Mom community. Our Choice of ChoiceMoms.org tips from 2010, featuring everything from Organization to Building a Support Network, Q&A to Commentary.

As I begin exploring the area of embryo adoption for the Choice Mom community, I am finding partners in the area who can talk us through the wide open frontier it seems to be right now. Here are my notes from one recent conversation.

We worry about being stressed before we become single moms. Then when stress hits big-time, there's nothing to worry about anymore. We're just busy dealing. Here's Laura's story about coping with three major events in less than a week.

To be honest, I never wanted to be a single parent. After watching my mom try to work and raise a family, and being part of a family that often seemed to suffer because of work, I never wanted to raise kids by myself.

I spent part of the morning worrying about my bathmat. Actually my lack of a bathmat. I’d spilled something on it some weeks ago and couldn’t get it clean so I’d thrown it away. I’d been using a towel as a mat ever since. What would the social worker doing my home study think of that?

I submitted my application to adopt a child from Russia on or about December 29, 2004. I spent much of the next year engaged in the paper chase, trying to get documents signed, notarized, and submitted before the Russian government could changes the rules.

It took me over a year to decide to become a single mom. Once the year was over, the biggest concern for me was the financial aspect. I considered the cost of becoming a mother, being a mother, having a sick child.

There are two complete "Choosing Single Motherhood" radio shows that opened up the adoption conversation, now available on our Choice Chat podcast.

It is hard for singles to find proactive friends in the adoption world. This list will help you find the right ones. We don't recommend anyone as Choice Mom-friendly unless they are also open to the LGBT community.

The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is a great resource for information about foster care adoption. Here are some of the numbers they offered in National Adoption Month (November 2010) about the kids waiting in foster care for adoptive homes.

There are a lot of things to misunderstand about adoption. Test your knowledge here.

It's National Adoption Month. To celebrate I'm sharing adoption stories from Choice Moms, starting with Dannie who adopted from the foster care system.

There are 20 major markets where Choice Moms live. There are Choice Moms everywhere, of course, but I'm focusing on 20 communities where this website gets the most traffic from single women. I'm building resource guides for the cities listed below, with your help.

When you are feeling isolated, angry, depressed or confused about the Choice Mom path, the discussion boards have become a good place to vent and share. But sometimes we need someone who not only understands the Thinking to Being stages, but is specifically trained to talk with us about our emotions.

We hear so much about the agonizing two week-wait process for women trying to conceive. But what about the agonizing wait to hear whether you've successfully passed all the steps involved in an adoption?

I'm hearing from many Choice Moms these days who are stressed because they can't afford fertility treatments, and don't think they can afford adoption. But adoption IS affordable, especially thanks to this grant -- with a deadline of October 15!

The American Fertility Association has a good overview of states in the U.S. where gays and lesbians are welcome.

These mental health therapists have an interest in working with single women about grief, fertility, adoption, and other aspects of the Choice Mom journey. They have been recommended by Choice Moms.

Are you struggling (alone) with the weight of deciding whether to persevere with costly fertility treatments? There are mental health counselors who specialize in the fertility industry who are here to help you. This is great, detailed advice from one of them.

In National Adoption Month I want to share some of the stories of single women who have become mothers because of adoption.

Adoptive Families continues to be one of the best sources available for women on the adoption path. Here are some great articles they've just announced about helping to educate your child's classmates and teachers about adoption.

One great New York City-area resource for is the Infertility and Adoption Counseling Center, run by Joni Mantell. Here are its workshops planned for Fall 2010.

I've been hearing more lately from women (and men) who don't have the easier community acceptance that many of us have grown accustomed to in North America. Here is one woman who reached out from South Africa, looking for community.

The relationship between a single woman and her adoption attorney is vital. This person can and should be your strongest ally for finding the placement that works -- and making sure the adoption is finalized in a timely way. This advice was posted to the Choice Mom discussion board by Holly, a wonderful resource for Choice Moms who use the foster care adoption route in particular.

If you're thinking of adopting transracially, or are heading a transracial family, listen here for insight. The experts we assembled at a recent Choice Moms event included two Choice Moms who were raised in transracial families, a woman who parented a young woman from a refugee camp, a representative from Children's Home Society, and several Choice Moms who are raising a transracial family.

Some time ago a librarian wrote to me asking that I send my various books for Choice Moms and donor-conceived families to the Library of Congress for cataloging. This stemmed out of her discovery that there are very few books about donor conception available. She compiled this list, however, of everything she had found to that point.

submitted by WarnerMom
One woman's search for her child, weaving through many non-traditional options.

Dawn Davenport at Creating a Family had a great radio show about the bumps that can occur after adoption.

I admit that I'm a fan of Sandra Bullock. So when I learned that she was becoming a Choice Mom through adoption, after her divorce finalizes, and I was asked to comment by Fertility Authority, I was more than happy to send an open letter on behalf of our community. Here's some of what I said:

The new health bill signed into law March 2010 has an extra credit for adoptive families.

This is an excellent response by my colleague Dawn Davenport to someone who was concerned about the level of affection her adopted child's foster family was feeling toward him.

Thanks to the CreatingaFamily.org website for alerting me to this great Newsweek article about international adoption, from the grown child's perspective.

There are three things Choice Moms report in hindsight are their biggest regrets. What do you think they are?

This is the start of a growing list to come about the adoption process:

There are some creative and practical methods to adoption, even for today's single. Listen to this insight from single women who have adopted.

A report by Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, titled "BEYOND CULTURE CAMP: PROMOTING HEALTHY IDENTITY FORMATION IN ADOPTION," was released in November 2009. It is the most extensive examination of adult adoptive identity to date, based on reports from adults who were adopted as children.

Dawn Davenport at Creating a Family is the source I trust for up-to-date adoption information. Here is some of what she's compiled about the various costs of adoption.

I've talked with a few professional single black women who have admitted feeling almost reluctant to take this step because of the long-standing stigma about single black parenting.

If you are considering building a transracial family, ask yourself these questions (as prepared by Children's Home Society and Family Services):

A woman on the discussion board asked whether she would be capable of raising an African-American child, as a white woman. Here is one of the many great responses she got from Julia, whose child was adopted from Ethiopia, responded differently:

submitted by Choice Mom Kari
When I first learned that adoptive moms can breastfeed, as I was waiting to adopt, I presumed that these must be women who previously had biological children. Instead I found out that you can produce milk even if you have never been pregnant (men can actually produce milk too!). Breastfeeding has so many wonderful benefits, but the bonding and nutrition were the two that made me decide that I wanted to try it.