International Adoptions: Ethiopia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Haiti, Ukraine

For families living in Colorado A Love Beyond Borders (LBB) offers the necessary home study and post adoption services that will help you satisfy the Colorado state adoption laws and prepare you for a domestic or international adoption. These services include adoptive homestudy (also referred to as family assessment), pre-adoption education, and post adoption services and validation of foreign adoption.

The Homestudy or Family Assessment:

A Colorado statute requires all Colorado adoptive families preparing to adopt to have a current approved family assessment/homestudy from a licensed child placement agency such as A Love Beyond Borders. We are licensed to do domestic and international homestudy's. LBB is full service and can provide the homestudy and child placement for an international adoption or kinship adoption (domestic), or can provide only the homestudy and post adoption services if you choose to work with a licensed agency outside of Colorado. We collaborate with licensed agencies throughout the US and have probably collaborated previously with your out of state placement agency.

What exactly is an adoption homestudy?

The adoption home study is a detailed written report of your family compiled and prepared by a social worker. LBB hires experienced social workers and case workers with significant professional experience in adoption and family therapy. All are adoptive parents and seek to make the homestudy experience a pleasant, collaborative learning experience for you.

The homestudy can take one to three or more months in Colorado to finish depending on several factors, mainly determined by the adoptive family. The adoption home study requires the prospective adoptive family to gather different documents, answer several questions, and explore their reasons for adopting. Through a series of visits and interviews the social worker can get a complete picture of who you are and what life is like in your family. The adoption home study is a part of the decision making process for both the prospective family and the workers. Not only can the adoption home study help the worker place a child into your home who would best fit into your family, but help the family and the worker decide if now is a good time for your family to adopt.

LBB views the family assessment process as an important educational experience in which you build a relationship with a professional adoption worker who is trained in the issues of adoption. You will discuss your childhood and life experiences, your marital relationship, your personal strengths and weaknesses, and your dreams for the future, among other topics. It is helpful to think of the process as a cooperative effort between you and your adoption worker in which you will openly and honestly assess who you are, what you want, and your ability to successfully adopt – and whether adoption is a good idea for you at this time.

Entering into the family assessment process does not guarantee that your family assessment will be approved.

Please be reassured that in most cases where there is a decision not to continue it is usually the family who makes the decision after exploring adoption with their adoption worker. But if at any time during the family assessment your adoption worker believes that the agency will not be able to recommend you for approval for an adoptive placement, her concerns will be discussed with you.

If there are issues that need closer assessment than is normally included in the adoption process, the agency may ask you, at your expense, to supplement the family assessment with an independent psychological or marital evaluation with an agency-referred professional.

When the interviews are completed and the required documents submitted, your adoption worker prepares a written family assessment and submits it to the Placement Supervisor. The Placement Supervisor will review your family assessment with the supporting documents, and then will advise you as to whether the agency will be able to place an adoptive child in your home.

Once approved by our placement supervisor, your family assessment is sent to the State of Colorado for final review and approval. If you are adopting internationally, once approved by the state, we forward it to USCIS along with the immigration petitions you provide to us. Final approval by USCIS (immigration) is the issuance of your I-171H.

State and USCIS approval in Colorado takes --on average -- six to ten weeks in addition to the homestudy evaluation time.

Pre-Adoption Education:

As part of your preparation for adoption, you will receive education that will help make your adoption process go smoothly and enhance your parenting skills unique to adoption issues. A Love Beyond Borders contracts with Colorado Adoption Consultants to provide all your pre-adoption education and training needs.

There are 12 Core hours required at minimum, and up to 24 hours of training (state mandated) will include attending group trainings, taking on-line training, reading books, watching videos, or doing individual research.

In addition to the education we provide, we encourage you explore these topics on your own via the internet, adoption support groups, etc.

Some of the subjects to be covered:

Attachment and bonding
Loss, grief and adoption
Transracial parenting
Adoption as a lifelong issue
Child development
Boundary setting and discipline
Parenting a child of a different culture
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome
Medical and emotional issues related to international adoption
Adoption issues of personal interest

Post Adoption Reports and Services:

Colorado requires post-placement supervision for all adoptions to be finalized or validated in Colorado. This excludes international adoptions where the adoption was finalized abroad (when both parents met the child prior to the adoption) and where the adoptive country does not require them (such as Guatemala). However, LBB believes that as a child placement agency it is best practice for our social worker to meet with the adoptive family at least twice upon arrival of the child to the home. This is especially important for a family adopting a child older than 12 months, because adjustment may be more difficult on the child and newly expanded family. We will be able to assist you through this transition time. For this reason we ask our homestudy clients to agree to a minimum of two post adoption visits after the child arrives home.

Your post-adoptive commitment to your child’s country may include a need for additional post-placement home visits for an extended period of time, which we will be happy to provide for an additional fee. For this service we provide the additional post placement visits and certified reports if required by the adoptive country. Translation assistance may be available for an additional charge.

The same adoption worker who completed your family assessment will usually work with you in post-adoption. She will visit with you and your child after placement, plus provide reasonable phone support.

For those who are experiencing severe post-placement problems, referrals will be made to appropriate professional resources.

Additional services available:

When your adoption is complete in the foreign country there are still many loose ends that need to be completed. Although you may be ready to set aside additional paperwork at this point, we strongly encourage adoptive families to tie up these loose ends earlier rather than later. You may complete these on your own, or for an additional fee LBB will be pleased to assist you.

Some additional items:

Validation of your international adoption in a Colorado court. It is affordable to validate your child's foreign adoption in Colorado, and LBB requires it of all Colorado residents. A Love Beyond Borders has experience in validating (or re-adoption as some may refer to it) foreign adoptions, and our fees are very reasonable in comparison. Some families may choose to hire an attorney or even attempt the validation themselves. The petitions for validation of your child's foreign adoption are filed in either your county of residence or the county of your homestudy agency.
File for your child's Colorado birth certificate. LBB will be happy to file for your child's Colorado Registry of Foreign Birth (basically like a birth certificate which will list the birth country) upon finalization of your county validation. This service is nominal and usually a part of the validation services package.
Secure your child's social security number/card.
File for a Certificate of Citizenship (COC) if both parents did not meet the child prior to the adoption being approved abroad. This can only be done once you have validated your child's adoption within Colorado.
Fulfillment of additional post-adoption requirements of your adoptive country, if any (above the basic visits required by LBB). This includes additional home visits and filing of certified reports to the foreign country or your placement agency (if not LBB).
Counseling: Any additional counseling provided by one of our social workers beyond the basic post adoption visits for children and families in need. If you choose to work with a counselor or specialist unaffiliated with LBB, LBB can provide you with a list of qualified professionals to meet you and your child's needs. We are well-connected to the adoption professionals throughout Colorado and can provide recommendations to any number of professionals.