MAPP Class Week 1 - Orientation.... or wow... wonder who'll be back next week

Ok... i know i'm a geek and obsessively research things.

but seriously - some of the people at the MAPP class tonight shocked me w/ how little they seemed to know.

it was almost as if they had plucked 16 other people off the street to take the course.
 
there were two personalities that stood out the most to me...

one woman who... talked MORE THAN ME!!!!!!!!!! interjecting her personal experiences to every question or comment people had... and would end up making the two teachers cringe.

some of her questions/comments that most shocked me:


---- why would anyone ever consent to an open adoption, it seems mean and confusing to the kids, and if the parents are drug addicts, not safe, you never know what they may do... and proceeded to tell a horror story of a friend of hers whose open adoption is going badly

---- what if the natural parents come and bang on our door and try to get their kids back? will we be safe?

The best response I heard from our teacher... "you really need to stop watching LIFETIME movies". she also was quick to point out that of her EIGHT adopted children, FOUR are OPEN and they have never had anything nasty or horrible happen to them



another woman was (according to hubby) drunk or stoned... i think maybe mentally impaired w/ a thick "King of the Hill" mumbling accent (according to hubby - she was slurring)

i know i'm being slightly harsh.... i remember thinking the same thing in birthing classes... don't these people know how important this is????? why haven't they read/researched/learned everything they can????? i was especially surprised with this in the foster care classes because it is such a concious decision. you don't ACCIDENTLY become a foster parent!

So... the class

Mainly tonight was all paper work to be filled out and due dates (oh my!). Good information was learned --- but thanks to http://fosterpodcast.com/ most of it was review for us.

i knew what to expect tonight because i had googled the crap out of MAPP foster care classes trying to find some sort of outline.

best source ---outline of different foster care classes

I love the two teachers so far.

In our area there are TWO agencies that deal with prospective foster/adoptive parents. In order to protect our and (their) anonymity somewhat --- they shall be called Ray(she is full of sunshine and happy) and Daisy.

Ray is from the agency that my father has been involved with since it's founding. It began as a children's shelter and had grown from there. Sounds like they will be doing alot of the support for foster parents. Daisy is from the case worker agency. The agency that is, in some ways, over the other (but not really).... nothing is clear in this picture. They deal w/ adoptions as well.

i am sooooo excited to get into the classes where we learn more information. nervous to see who will return. so far from the 4 counties these agencies serve... we are the ONLY ones from our county!