Talked to another agency

I heard back from Gla.dney this afternoon and it doesn't seem like it's worth changing agencies to go with them.

The pros would be that the wait time is 12-14 months (which is less than a lot of agencies say, and hopefully is even a slight overestimation, since most agencies tend to exaggerate the wait time); and that they come highly recommended.

The cons are that we'd have to fly to Texas for an orientation; if we're lucky we could attend said orientation in November but most likely not until January; we'd have to attend infant parenting classes locally and online (which I don't have a problem with per se, but they'd have to be completed before we could be approved which means that part would take a lot longer); and we'd have to pay 75% of our total fee (which would be nearly $20,000) in order to be shown to birthparents (meaning unlike with our current agency who doesn't require money up front, we couldn't leave if things slowed down). From what I understand, there'd be lots of paperwork and classes to complete after orientation and all of that means, at least in my estimation, that we wouldn't even get to the point of being shown to birthparents until probably late winter. So only THEN could the 12-14 month wait would begin. Oh, and the woman I spoke with told me they are working with less birthmothers than normal. Great!

I don't know. It just seems like after waiting nearly a year with our current agency, that last thing I want to do is take ourselves off of a waiting list, only to start over on a new waiting list early next year that has an estimated 12-14 month wait time. And there will probably be a couple months between moving our homestudy and being officially on the new waiting list where we won't be waiting with any agency.

While we have decided that money will not be what keeps us from adopting (we know that we will never be in a position to actually afford adoption and so taking out a loan will likely be a necessity and something we are willing to do in order to grow our family), it has to be part of the conversation. And in this scenario, the situation would have to be really great to justify the the enormous increase in cost. And I don't think I can justify it when the timeline would be pushed back so much.

I mean, if we start waiting with Glad.ney in winter 2010, 12 months would be winter 2011 and 14 would be spring. At that point we would have been waiting with our current agency more than two years and I'd hope that we'd be picked by that point! Not to mention if we stay with them, the cost would be about $20,000 less!

So, for now, changing agencies doesn't seem like it would get us much farther ahead. I think we'd need an agency that we could switch to relatively quickly in order for it to be worthwhile. I might call a couple more this week just to see.