What to Do While Waiting to Adopt
If you’re wondering what to do while waiting to adopt, you’re not alone. For most hopeful adoptive parents, the waiting period is the longest (and often the hardest) part of the journey. It can feel like everything is out of your control and like your life is on hold while you wait for a phone call that may or may not come today.
But waiting doesn’t have to mean doing nothing. This season becomes intentional, productive, and even empowering when you know what you can be doing.
Waiting Is a Real Part of Adoption
Most hopeful adoptive parents spend a majority of their journey in the waiting phase. This adoption waiting period can bring a mix of hope, grief, anxiety, and uncertainty…sometimes all in the same day! I remember that rollercoaster of emotions from both of our waiting periods all too well.
There’s no “right” way to feel while waiting to adopt. What matters is recognizing that this season is part of the process, not a failure or a pause in your journey. Nearly everyone endures it when trying to adopt, and I’ve yet to meet a hopeful adoptive parent that truly enjoyed the whole wait. You’re not alone!
For most hopeful adoptive parents, the waiting period is also the longest part of the process, something I explain more in detail in my post on How Long Does Adoption Take?
Shift to Intentional Waiting
One of the most helpful mindset shifts during the adoption waiting period is understanding the difference between passive waiting and intentional waiting.
Passive waiting sounds like:
“There’s nothing I can do right now.”
“We just have to wait it out.”
“Everything is out of our hands.”
Intentional waiting sounds like:
“What is within my control right now?”
“How can I prepare in ways that support my future child?”
“What can we do to put ourselves out there to match or get eyes on our profile?”
Intentional waiting doesn’t speed up time but it does help the time feel more meaningful and proactive.
Focus on What You Can Control
When you’re waiting to adopt, it’s easy to fixate on what you can’t control. Instead, bring your attention to what you can.
This might include:
Making sure your home study and paperwork are complete and up to date
Learning more about adoption ethics and birth parent perspectives
Thinking through (and discussing with your partner) your preferences, boundaries, and hopes
Preparing emotionally for openness and uncertainty— This is hard to do before you’ve experienced it, but open adoption is not nearly as intimidating as it may seem at first. You can read more about how open adoption works here.
Enhancing your online presence to give expectant mothers the full picture of what life in your home looks like.
For us, using social media to match for adoption provided practical steps to take during our wait. We posted often, sometimes even every day, with each post giving us another chance for an expectant mother to find us and getting us one day closer to our match. These efforts led us to both of our matches. You can read more about how we used social media to match for adoption here.
Build Connection Instead of Counting Time
Waiting quietly without connection can make the adoption wait feel heavier than it already is. Finding community, whether online or in real life, can help normalize your feelings and remind you that you’re not alone.
Connecting with other hopeful adoptive parents allows you to:
Share experiences without explaining everything
Learn from others at different stages
Feel seen in a season that often feels invisible
Make friends that will last you through this season and beyond— I have so many great connections from during our journey that I still keep in touch with today, years later.
You don’t have to walk this part of the journey by yourself. Facebook adoption groups and the adoption community on Instagram are great places to begin making these connections.
Be Proactive
If you’re pursuing independent adoption (or even if you’re using an agency), the waiting period doesn’t have to be entirely passive. For us, using social media to share our story and connect with others gave us a sense of ownership over our journey during the wait…it’s also how we matched!
Building an audience allowed us to:
Share who we were as people, not just paperwork
Feel more connected and like we were really getting ourselves out there
We even got recognized in public once by someone we didn’t know, thanks to shares on our posts!
Be proactive and take ownership in a process that often feels unpredictable
This approach isn’t right for everyone, but for us it changed how the waiting felt and gave us more autonomy over our journey.
Prepare Your Heart, Not Just Your Home
It’s natural to focus on physical preparation; nurseries, supplies, checklists. But emotional preparation matters just as much while waiting to adopt.
This season can be an opportunity to:
Practice holding hope without urgency
Learn to sit with uncertainty, while embracing what you can control
Reflect on the kind of parent you want to be
Growth often happens quietly in the waiting, even when it doesn’t feel the most productive.
You Don’t Have to Just “Get Through” This Season
Waiting to adopt is hard, but it doesn’t have to be wasted time. With understanding, support, and intention, this season can become one of preparation rather than stagnation.
If you’re feeling stuck in the waiting or unsure what your next step should be, I offer 1:1 calls where we can talk about where you’re at in your journey and I can give you tips regarding what’s doable for you. This is especially helpful if you’re using social media to match (or want to) and feeling stuck.
And if you’re looking for a practical place to start, you can also download my Private, Independent Adoption Checklist, a guide to help you always know the next right step along your journey.
You don’t have to navigate adoption alone. There are so many resources available to help you adopt a child, and I am cheering you on every step of the way.