Because it hasn’t been mentioned:

IRC

Sometime also mentioned SimpleX, which I’m looking into myself, but have no experience currently.

I’ll recommend Home Assistant.

Understood. Wife and I went through this (now 20-ish years ago).

We ended up adopting, but stuff like this in the USA is quite heavily political unfortunately.

You mentioned North America, but I’m not sure how Canada and Mexico see this stuff.

I wish you much luck going forward, and encourage you to DM me if you’re curious about adoption.

Best to you!

I didn’t follow the link, and I’d rather not because I still don’t know what it’s about.

I’m happy to help, but you must meet people half way.

I don’t know what help you’re asking for, and I don’t want to click a random link to find out.

Help people help you. Describe what you need help with within the post.