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From Freedom Fighters to Fathers and Mothers
Adoption and the Military By Alina Kelly
When Lynne Chase and her military husband decided to adopt a daughter, they knew timing was going to be important. Adoption referrals were taking over 450 days, and the couple knew they would only be at their California duty station for two years. After that, Chase's husband was likely to deploy.
For Lori Hernandez and her husband, their first adoption process began while they were both stationed at Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska. When they received the adoption referral for their daughter, Hernandez had nine months remaining on her commitment, and she fought a tough battle with the Air Force to get maternity leave, which is not provisioned for adoptions.
These are just two examples of the unique challenges facing military families who wish to adopt. Fortunately, with the right information and a little preparation, military families can build the family they always dreamed of.
By the time Hernandez and her husband applied to adopt their second child, they had relocated to Arizona. "For the second adoption, even though our first home study was still valid, the Arizona legal system (the county courthouse) wanted an Arizona home study, not a Nebraska one," she says. "That means we had to pay full price for another home study."
Chase says the biggest challenge in their adoption was getting to China to pick up their daughter before moving to their next duty station in Georgia. "If we had moved before getting Baylee, we would have been required to get a home study update," she says. "This would have delayed the process since a home study update would be delayed until after we found a house, unpacked and located an agency. All the while our daughter would be sitting in the orphanage."
