How big can a family be?

When our daughter came into our lives she did not come alone. Along with her we gained her biological families as well. There is a provision for ongoing contact not just with the birth parents but also with any birth relatives who request contact. With our daughter the adoption order included birth grandparents on both sides as well as her birth parents siblings. Not only did we have to get to know our daughter but we needed to find some commonality with all these people we'd never met and yet we shared such a bond with. We first met J's birth parents over the days we were in Melbourne meeting our new daughter. They presented as a lovely pair of young people who had an extremely mature attitude towards an unenviable situation. They assuaged my fears by telling me they wished only to be our daughter's friend, never to usurp our roles as Mum and Dad.

Waiting...

Once you're accepted into the Adoption program there is no way of knowing how long you will wait to be selected as the new parents of a child or even if you will be selected.

At that time in Victoria the process from the other side of the adoption was that a birth parent can indicate their interest in relinquishing their child but could not sign any consent forms for a period of two weeks after the birth. They then had a grace period of 28 days which could be extended before final consent was given

Open your hearts, and everything else for DHS

I wrote a letter. I got a reply. DHS accepted our "expression of interest" and we got to go to a "training session" where they did their best to put us off the idea of adoption. We got to hear from an adoptee who was anything but happy and content with their life. We got to hear from a Birth mother with similar angst. We heard all the bad stuff then we got to hear about the rules and regulations. You have to married for a minimum of two years, you have to be under the age of 26 as at Jan 31st in the year of application and no more than 40 at the same date if applying for a second or subsequent child.

Fitting everyone in

This is where open adoption can get convoluted... My daughter's birth-father has a serious girlfriend. My daughter hopes they'll marry. She asked me the other day what that would make the girlfriend when/if they do marry. "My step birth-mother?" she asked. Now me - I'm still trying to figure out what she could refer to my son's birth-mother as and I have no clue what to suggest for either. I need more terms of reference so I can sort out our family tree lol

Got any ideas please do tell me :)