Swine Flu Guidance for Adoptive Families

As many of you know there have been confirmed cases of Swine Flu in Texas and in other parts of the United States. There is useful information on the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) website for any concerns you have regarding Swine Flu. As a parent you should know the symptoms associated with Swine Flu and take precautions for your family.

Symptoms of the Swine Flu are similar to those of the regular or seasonal flu and include fever, lethargy, lack of appetite, and coughing. Some people have also reported runny nose, sore throat, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. If anyone in your household experiences flu-like symptoms they should see a doctor right away. Please do not take a sick child to school or daycare.

To protect yourself, use good health habits including covering your mouth and nose when you cough, wash your hands often, and avoid close contact with people who are sick. Other good health habits to practice would be getting plenty of sleep, being physically active, managing your stress, drinking plenty of fluids, and eating nutritiously.

If you suspect that yourself or someone close to you might have Swine Flu please seek immediate medical attention. Please take care of yourselves and your children.

Art Auction Fundraiser Was a Success!

This past Sunday we held our First Art Auction Fundraiser. It was more of a success than we could have imagined. The auction sold over $10,000 in art and we receieved 25% of the profit. We sincerely thank everyone who came and supported us as well as Perry Berns Gallery for his donation and time for this event. We are making plans to do this fundraiser again next year. Please watch our events page for the upcoming date.

Family to Family Cookbooks

Family to Family Cookbooks are now for sale. Please email Jennifer O'Leary at jennifer@fam2fam.org if you would like to purchase one or more of these as a fundraiser for the agency. All of the proceeds will benefit Family to Family Adoptions and our educational fund provided to help our birthmothers achieve a higher education. The cookbooks are $18.00 each. Thanks to Tami, one of our adoptive mothers, who created and published the cookbooks for us, and thank you in advance for your support of Family to Family.

Adoptive Family Training

The next Adoptive Family Training will be held at our office on May 16, 2009 from 10 AM to 2 PM. Please send questions or RSVP to jennifer@fam2fam.org if you would like to attend. This is a required class for all of our newly contracted adoptive families. Space is filling fast. Topics covered include establishing relationships with your birth parents, how to talk with your chid about adoption, Life Books, and other related adoption questions and information.

Family to Family Placement Statistics

Since January of 2002, Family to Family has completed 232 Domestic Placements. We are frequently updating our statistics involving these placements and sharing them. Below is our most recent update to include placements from January 2002 to December of 2008.

Family Structure:

173 Placed with Married Couples 75%
47 Placed with Non-traditional Couples 20%
12 Placed with Singles 5%

Ethnicity of the Child:

100 Full Caucasian 43%
38 Cauc/Hispanic 16%
38 Full Hispanic 16%
2 Cauc/Asian 1%
5 Native American 2%
25 Cauc/African American 11%
5 Hispanic/African American 2%
19 Full African American 8%

27 adoptions have been with families who have adopted a second child through our agency, and 3 placements have been with families who have adopted a third child through our agency. Of these 232 placements, our average contract date to match is 5.1 months and our average contract date to placement is 6.5 months.

Please feel free to contact our agency with any questions regarding these statistic or to inquire about our domestic program and receive additional information. We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Cord Blood Registry and Adoption

Family to Family and Cord Blood Registry (CBR) are working together to ensure that our clients understand the benefits of cord blood banking. More and more of our adoptive families are choosing to bank their baby’s cord blood for several reasons. Banking cord blood has many benefits and has been used to treat many diseases such as leukemia, sickle cell, and Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma to name just a few. Please visit the CBR website for a list of diseases treated with stem cells at www.cordblood.com.

Having peace of mind that these stem cells are available is one of the main reasons that adoptive families are making this important decision for their child’s future. Adoptive parents understand that if their child should need these stem cells it might not be possible to find their child’s biological family. Investing in this service gives them the assurance to know that they have done everything they could if their child should ever be in a situation where stem cells are needed.

More information about banking cord blood is available to all of our adoptive families and any assistance needed to help complete this process. We feel that it is important to give all of our families this option as part of their adoption plan. A complete list of our agencies partners is available on our website.