“Working with RG Adoption Consulting, I was confident that the people I was being connected with, had been vetted, so that it didn’t feel like the whole industry was the wild west.”
Shoshana, Massachusetts
I began working with RG Adoption Consulting 2 years ago in July of 2022. I am a single woman who really wanted to be a parent and I have had a lot of adoption models in my life so it seemed like a natural fit. I came to RGAC after I had already completed my home study and was working on my profile. The agency I was already working with was supportive of me using a consultant during my journey.
Over the last 2 years, I got a few situations, presented, and none of the cases were the right match for various reasons. Then in August of 2023, I was matched with a baby due in January of the new year. This ended up being a longer wait as the baby’s due date was later confirmed to be at the end of March. The placement unfortunately fell through and I was heartbroken, but I knew I wanted to go active again.
Becca told me about a situation in late June that just felt perfect for me. Within 48 hours I got the call that I was chosen to be his mother. He was a preemie and had spent weeks in the hospital with no mommy, but he sounded perfect for me. One of the things that I think was hard on me was the fact that when my second match eventually happened, I was just getting to a place of being able to move on at work and in my life from the fact I wasn’t on maternity leave and I was still grieving the loss of the previous placement. Becoming a parent has been a whirlwind and it still hasn’t completely hit me.
I think the most helpful thing throughout my journey was to try to put my emotions aside with each situation I asked to be presented to. I worked on the assumption that there could be dozens of families interested in a situation and that my not being chosen had nothing to do with me personally and everything to do with the birth parent probably never actually seeing my profile. I would kind of approach situations thinking, “Well, I don’t even know if they even got as far as rejecting me. they may have just gotten to a few people higher in the pile and decided on one of those before I was even seen.” Obviously that was frustrating, but it didn’t leave me with the same sense of direct rejection that I think it would have had if I thought they had seen my profile.
Working with RGAC, they had such a clear understanding of the industry and I trusted them throughout my adoption journey. I was able to express, “this is what I want out of a lawyer or agency that I would feel comfortable working with.” By working with people who listened to me about these things, it made me feel much more comfortable in the process.
My son was born prematurely and has some challenges ahead. His adoption is semi-open and while I wish to share his story, for now, I want to remain private. People ask very real and legitimate questions about why my son is on oxygen and details regarding his birth, however, I want to keep his story sacred for him. Becoming a mom happened so quickly and it’s finally starting to hit that I’m a parent!