Impending Challenge

We are moving along (slowly) with our adoption plans, and that has lead me to obsess over a possible complication. I mentioned before that the social worker was caught totally off guard by my questions about the timing of placement and its impact on my breastfeeding our adopted newborn. That was back when I first contacted her via email to get info about her agency. I have not brought it up again because of her initial reaction. Since the agency has a firm policy of not placing babies until the biological mother has signed away her rights, which cannot be done before the fifth day, I researched my chances of breastfeeding a newborn who had only had bottles for his/her first five days. Everything I read and everyone I contacted (including La Leche League) agreed that it would not be a problem to switch a baby at that age from bottle to breast. That put my mind at ease that although it could take more work than initially nursing my biological babies, I could do this.

When we last saw the social worker, she mentioned (in relation to some other topic), "If the placement is delayed for a couple of days for some reason." Those reasons would be either the biological mother or father not signing to terminate their rights on the fifth day. That gives me a big challenge to think about. What if some mom chooses us to be the parents of her child, we accept, and then she or the father hold things up for another week or more? Being able to successfully breastfeed this baby is more than just a passing fancy for me. On the other hand, what would the biological mother, and more importantly, the social worker handling all of this, think if we backed out on the grounds that the baby might not be able to latch on after two weeks on bottles? She may wash her hands of us and refuse to show our book to any other moms. The poor woman who had made the difficult decision that we were the ones to raise her child would be left without a family for her baby and think that we were evil, selfish people. There are plenty of agencies and independent adoption scenarios that would allow us to bring our newborn home directly from the hospital "at legal risk" which means that the mom could change her mind until she signs the paperwork. We chose this agency for several reasons, and at the time, they totally outweighed the concerns of nursing a five day old for the first time. Hopefully, this is just me stressing about "what if's" and things will go like they should once we are matched...

Another thing that has come out of me thinking about nursing and timing is, am I doing breastfeeding a disservice by keeping quiet? Shouldn't I, as an experienced breastfeeding mother and advocate of nursing, be trying to educate our social worker about the benefits of breastfeeding (both biologically and for the adopted child)? She deals with adoptive parents and pregnant women all day long; she's in a position where she should know about this topic. I could flood her with websites, doctor's opinions, and real adoptive mothers' experiences to educate her. Instead, I have kept my mouth shut since her initial surprised reaction. I don't want her to think of me as that mom while she's writing her home study report and choosing which women to show our profile to. I think that makes me selfish, but this has been a long road, and I want to reach the baby at the end of it. Maybe I could give her all of that information after we've been placed with a baby. She could see how well it's going for us (fingers crossed) and read the information and come away from our adoption with new knowledge and acceptance.