Information

I get a lot of questions asking me about our wait for Malley, and why the wait has increased. I don't really know the answer. It is not black and white, and there are a lot of contributing factors.

There is a lot of talk about how China is trying not to draw attention to the fact that they have child abandonment "issues" especially during the Olympics while all the world is watching. This article does some to explain why our wait has increased, but when you balance it with this post it is hard to know really what to believe about what is actually going on. I do find it sort of interesting that the first article was in a Chinese newspaper DURING the Olympics. The second link may not make a lot of sense to anyone that hasn't followed Chinese adoptions "behind the scenes," but it basically says that the cutoff date for referrals this month split the dates that the Chinese are normally off for Chinese New Year (2 weeks). So, if no one was there working, how were there referrals in that date range. The post goes on to propose that the reason for this is that the Chinese did not want to have a large referral batch during the Olympics.

The second article goes on to mention that the process could "possibly" speed up now that the "orphanage donation" has increased; as this might be more of an incentive to get children paper ready if they will benefit from a larger donation because of it. It is precisely this type of thing that infuriates me. According to the author (we have no way of telling how accurate they are) China has plenty of children, they are just not "paper ready". So, these children are living in orphanages a lot longer than is absolutely necessary. And, in the author's opinion, when the donations increase, so will the number of paper ready children. It's just sad.

I've already said that the whole "wait" is a muddy, difficult process that I will probably never understand. Is it the economy? Is it China "saving face"? Is it orphanage directors hungry for more money (and maybe this is good for the kids)? I don't know. But, I do know this: the wait time has now grown to 30 months ( 2 1/2 years). We've been logged in for 18 months, so we have at the very least, a year to go. If the CCAA is only going to refer 3 days a month, it'll be a while no matter what.

There is no need to comment y'all, I'm just thinking out loud. I'm just trying to read and educate myself about the world of Chinese adoptions. I like to put some of my findings here. I don't know why, or at least, I probably couldn't explain why without writing a book.

Immigration Approval Received Today

Again, folks, we have some good news & some bad news. It is so frustrating that we can never just get good news; that any news we get is always tempered with new fears and worries.

The good news is that we received our Immigration approval today. The approval date is July 22, 2008. It is good for 18 months, so it will not expire until Jan 22, 2010. However, our fingerprints will expire on September 7, 2009; so we will definitely have to be refingerprinted, and in all likelihood, we will need to apply for immigration approval again.

The bad news is that our agency lost it's Hague accreditation. If a country is a Hague country, like China is, a family can not adopt using an agency that does not have Hague accreditation. This is actually a good thing, and is in place to protect the children, so I am very glad that China is a Hague country. But, I'm not to pleased about our agency losing accreditation.

When we applied, our agency did have Hague accreditation, but it was recently denied after one branch of the agency was non-compliant. If I understand correctly, this non-compliance was the result of an employee (who is obviously no longer there) and CHI is trying to regain it's compliance. But Still, this is so frustrating to me. They sent the email notifying us of their denial on a Friday evening, and have sent other emails out stating that they are working on contacting all of the families to talk with each on about their specific situation.

Right now, because we are already logged in and because we have just received our new immigration approval, I think we are considered "grandfathered in". But, I am not positive about that. I do, however, know that other families that are in a similiar situation as ours, have been told that they (we) would not be affected and our adoption was not in jeopardy in any way, including being pushed back in the 'referral line.' I'm not really sure how much of that I believe.

I also know that CHI has chosen Holt as a back-up agency for any families. But, I really don't know how all that will work, and I don't know if we will need to use them or not. So, I'm just waiting for my phone call to talk about the specifics of our personal adoption.


All in all, I am dismayed and downcast. I have no idea what we're supposed to do (if anything). I keep hanging on to the year 2009, but in my head I really feel like 2009 will come & go and yet Malley will still not be home. When my thoughts head that direction, it very literally makes me sick to my stomach. What? Another year, Lord? Really?

Letter Finished

Hey guys!

Very quickly, I just wanted to let you know that I called the doctor's office to check on our letter, and she called back to say that it is finished. They are going to notarize it there (BONUS) and I'm going to go pick it up tomorrow at 8:30 AM (they have 1/2 day Saturday hours). After that, I'm going to get the kids from mom's and then head over to church to help clean up from VBS (hopefully by 10:00).

Anyway, this is good news. Please pray that the content of the letter will be sufficient and that the notary will be written and done correctly. Pray that it will be accepted and that our dossier will be moved to the Matching Room. It will be such a relief to be in the final room of the process.

Now, we just have to wait again. In the meantime, I need to have both of our passports renewed as both Brad's and mine expired in April. We also have some adoption "education/training" to attend, but we've still got plenty of time to do that.

Some Exciting Good News with a little scare and Prayer Request for good measure

Y'all what I'm about to tell you is truly good news. It is just the news I needed to lift my spirits and keep me waiting for the long haul. It also just about scares me half to death.....But enough of that all ready, let me tell you what it is.

My China Adoption consultant called and said that the CCAA (Chinese Adoption Officials) are reviewing our dossier and they need more information. Did y'all hear that? Someone in China is actually holding our file and knows that we exist.

I had known that our LID was getting close to being in the review room, but I had not heard (from anywhere) that our LID was actually there. This is some really exciting news. Their little Chinese hands are holding our paperwork and looking at it and reading it with their little Chinese eyes. No, our paperwork is not lost somewhere in the vast country of China......it is exactly where it should be.

Now, don't go thinking that we're any closer. The same amount of time that lay ahead of us yesterday is the same amount of time that lay ahead of us today; but just to know that our dossier is being reviewed in the review room is such a good and final feeling.

In case you don't know, the China adoption process consists of a review room and then finally a matching room. In the review room, your dossier is reviewed and verified and checked and double checked. Then it moves to the matching room. In the matching room, your file is "matched" with a child. From what I understand, the process is kind of cool, but I'll save that for another post. Or, you can look for the Rumor Queen link (to the right) and you'll find an area on her site that explains it.

Ok and now the scare: The CCAA is requesting more information about Brad's gall bladder surgery. They want to know why it was removed and what his recovery has been. In a way, this completely cracks me up. Out of the both of us, you would think that if one of our medicals would get questioned, it would be mine.....what with a history of cancer and an autoimmune disease. But instead, they pick Brad's gallbladder removal, and almost imply that people have those removed just on a whim. I also felt a little silly calling the surgeon to ask him for a letter that states why Brad had his gallbladder removed 3 YEARS AGO and what his recovery is/has been?

But, we're just going to form the scare into a prayer request. When I called the surgeon, his nurse informed me that he was out of town until Monday, and even on Monday, he will be in surgery all day. So, he won't even get to the letter until Tuesday and then it has to go to get transcribed. She indicated that it may be at least 2 weeks. Somehow, I don't really think that will sit well with my agency of China, but what can I do.

The only other option is trying our Primary Care doctor (who is retired now). I have contacted our current primary care doctor, she has Brad's chart/files from the doctor that retired. It was the retired doctor that ordered the gallbladder test and advised Brad to have it removed because it wasn't functioning. So, based on his chart, our current Primary care doctor may be able to write the letter too. I have a call in to her as well. I'm not sure which doctor is preferred by China, and I have a call in to our adoption agency to try to get clarification. Please pray that who ever China prefers will be able to get us a letter quickly (because we have to get it notarized).

*UPDATE: While I was typing our adoption consultant called back and said either doctor was fine, but it needs to be fairly quickly or it will push our dossier back in line. So, PLEASE PRAY that our Primary Care doctor can get it to us as quickly as possible, because we know that it will be 2 weeks for the surgeon to get it to us.

All in all, it's some pretty exciting news......just scary!

A referral milestone??

A lot about this post will depend on whether you're a "glass half empty" or a "glass half full" type of person. When I read the first couple of sentences of the update from our agency (below), I was kind of excited. Wow, 15 referrals is a lot nowadays. And, then towards the end, it really struck me. It says that the next families to receive referrals will be those with LID's of February 9, 2006. You know what's significant about that day? It is exactly one year ahead of our LID, which was February 9th, 2007.

This was exciting to me for about 30 seconds, and then the realization hit. We have a year to go, 365 days worth of Log In Dates before ours is here. And remember, that doesn't mean we are a year away, that just means there are that many days worth of referrals ahead of ours. But, any way you do the math (and trust me I've finagled them every way possible), we've got a long way to go. Currently, the wait is at 29 months, we've been waiting 16 months already, so we have at least 13 more to go. And, that is IF the wait doesn't continue to climb. Right now, I'm just praying that we can get her in the year 2009.

Regardless of all that, I'm happy that there were so many referrals this month. And, I'm glad that the CCAA is within a year of our LID. And, in my head, I know that we'll get her at just exactly the right time, and she'll be just exactly who God had always planned to be our daughter. And, I know that anything can happen and be a part of God's plan. And, I know I have to lay all the dates and the waiting at HIS feet. But, I can't wait to tell her all the ways God used her to shape her mommy's heart and to force her mommy to trust God's unseen hand.

I love you my little Malley-girl.


UPDATE FROM OUR AGENCY:
Monday, June 9, 2008

Fifteen China Referrals and Three Seeking Confirmation Letters!
Today has been a wonderful day. We received 15 referrals for our China families!! There were two boys and 13 girls. The ages ranged from 8-months-old to 22-months-old which put all within the age range of what was requested by the families. This referral day covered January 13, 2006 to January 16, 2006 for a nearly 29 month wait. The next Children's Hope log-in-date to receive referrals will be February 9, 2006. In addition to today's referrals, Children's Hope received three seeking confirmation letters for families adopting waiting children.

Much ado about fingerprinting

Hey friends!

At the end of the day, we had our fingerprints taken, but that's just the end of the story. Y'all wouldn't believe what took place at the beginning. I'm going to tell you, just for the shear sake of documentation.

(I feel like I need to say, "once upon a time" or something, but I won't....this is no fairy tale, but it does have a happy ending)

It was Friday night, and Brad & I were just getting in to bed, talking about our upcoming day. We had to be in Atlanta at 8:00 AM, but the kids were with my sister, so we had the rest of the day in the ATL to do whatever we wanted. We had thought about staying overnight somewhere nice. But, instead, decided to spend the money on some home improvement projects; so we were mapping out (in our mind, not literally on paper) all the shops and stores and restaurant possibilities. We were really looking forward to the time to spend together, and were excited about the prospect of having all day and evening to do whatever our hearts desired. What luxury!! I was beginning to think that our earlier snafu had been a blessing in disguise.

But then the phone rings. Don't you hate a late night call.....ugh!! It was Brad's work, and someone had made some programming changes that had literally shut down 20 manufacturing plants. Needless to say, it was a huge deal. Poor Brad had to work very literally ALL NIGHT long. Somewhere in the middle of the night he had dealt the blow that it was not going to be possible for him to leave work at 6:00 in the morning. He told me to go on ahead and take his forms with me to reschedule him. There is not much you can say or do when your employer is having a major manufacturing outage and you can fix it. Obviously, I was disappointed.

I left the house around 5:30 (they are doing construction around Kennesaw and I wasn't sure if it would cause a delay) and on the way down I was telling God how disappointed I was. Some might call it whining, I prefer to think of it as......um.......being honest with my disappointment- there, doesn't that sound better? In all honesty, I really don't think I was whining. I wasn't mad. I was just bummed. Yet again, something was preventing us from accomplishing this seemingly easy task and it was taking a much needed 'date time' with my husband down with it. In my mind I was also wondering how difficult it was going to be to reschedule, and if it would get lost in the shuffle. I was also afraid that it would create problems if Brad and I had different expiration dates.

Anyway, Brad called while I was still driving down and he said that I should ask them if he could still be fingerprinted as long as he made it down there some time that day. He seemed to think that he could leave (for an hour or so) later on that morning. I felt it was a long shot, but when I got there, I asked, and much to my surprise the answer was yes (as long as he got there before 3 PM.)

Luckily, Brad was able to leave around 8:30 or so and he met me in Kennesaw (remember, I had his forms) then went on down to the processing office, and then went straight back to work. And, since I was already down there (and without kids) I decided to hang around and go to all my favorite shops.

In the end, all that suffered was our time alone.....Oh, and maybe my sanity for a few hours. But, it's all good. The kids won't be back until Thursday, and Brad will definitely be taking some comp time, so our 'day' is coming.

Don't you just love a happy ending? Lord knows I do. - Thank you Jesus!

Fairly soon, I should be posting about our new approval!

Happy to Announce......some good news!

Hey friends!

I just wanted to pass along some good news. I went out to the mailbox today and lo and behold, we received our new fingerprint appointments in the mail. Yahoo. Our new appointment is this Saturday, 6/7 at 8:00 AM!! Wow, that is 6 days notice. We're going to have to juggle some things and cancel some others; not to mention, get up way early. But, we'll gladly make it happen. It will be nice to have this part of the process over with. After this, we should get our new approval which will be good for 18 months, I think.

That's all, just happy to pass on some good news for a change. Oh, and keep praying!