check what they mean by special needs. Some special needs are easily repaired in the USA. Like crossed eyes, club feet, cleft palate others are more serious.
Is gender a deal breaker for you?
Would you consider adopting domestically privately or through foster care?

Have you thought about foster to adopt. We were worried about the wait and decided to do foster to adopt for our first adoption(s). We had heard it was fast and free, especially if you will take more than one child, which it was. We were quickly placed with the following ages over a 2 year period -6,3,2,1,1,0. We decided to adopt the 0 year old, passed on the 3 and 6 year old, and the 1, 1, and 2 year old went home. We made a lot of connections during that period and learned a lot about how to adopt quicker. We adopted 2 more infants private through connections we made doing foster to adopt. In our state, age did not seem to be a factor for foster to adopt. So, 3 babies in a 19 month period, we would have never believed it. Dont know if you would consider it, but just a thought. It is painful to say goodbye to the ones that go, but not as painful as being childless. Also, you can do straight adoption of children in foster care also, but they are usually older, mostly ages 8-17. However, sometimes there are young children. Our state just posted a sibling group of two ages 2 and 4, it just is less frequent. Best of luck whatever you decide.

I agree. Further investigate what they consider “special needs”  We have two cleft palate kids from China who were also considered special needs because they were over the age of 6.  Sometimes age itself can be considered a special need.  Our process for that particular adoption took about 13 months from start to finish.  Best of luck to you!!

I agree. Further investigate what they consider “special needs”  We have two cleft palate kids from China who were also considered special needs because they were over the age of 6.  Sometimes age itself can be considered a special need.  Our process for that particular adoption took about 13 months from start to finish.  Best of luck to you!!

I’m sorry my post posted twice for some reason??????

I wouldn’t get discouraged just yet.  While the law does in fact promote domesitic adoption first, it also requires domesitic families to use a licensed agency, which prior to the law this was not required and in fact only about 30% of domesitic adoptions went through a licensed agency.  There is talk that international adoption rates would actually increase because domestic couples will not want to go through all the extra paperwork, training and have to work with an agency.  We have adopted from Taiwan, and are in the process for our second child.  Being open to gender will help, it is easier to adopt a male than female in Taiwan.  Also, the Taiwanese level of special needs is something to look into.  They consider something extremely minor to be “special Needs”, where in the US it wouldn’t ever be called that.  Talk to your agency more and ask questions.

We brought our healthy 1 year old boy home from Taiwan 6 months ago. We waited for 2 years from the time our agency sent our information until we got a referral. It then took almost 8 months until we picked him up. We were also told it would take a while and that we should look into special needs and older children. We actually changed our request from a child up to 2, to a child up to 5. In the end our referral for our son came just after his first birthday. Our documentation said his first priority was to be adopted domestically, but a suitable match was not found. It was so hard and frustrating to wait, but for us is so worth it.