Hague Prayer Request

I received the following email from our adoption agency. Join me in prayer, won't you?

Dear Families,

I just wanted to send you a quick update to let everyone know that today we did submit to Hague our petition for re-consideration. They now have 15 business days (3 weeks) to respond to us whether they will re-consider us or not. If they choose to re-consider us, there is no specific time line for their decision. If they decide not to reconsider us, then we will have to wait until next summer to re-apply for Hague approval. So please pray that the people that will be reading our re-consideration letter that they find it in their hearts to re-evaluate our agency for Hague accreditation. The more people praying for this the better. We will let you know as soon as we hear back from them what their decision is.



Rebecca Davis and Tina Qualls
Rebecca.Davis@ChildrensHope.net or Tina.Qualls@ChildrensHope.net

Children's Hope International
11780 Borman Dr., St. Louis, MO 63146
Tel: (314) 890-0086 - Fax: (314) 427-4288
www.ChildrensHope.net

Out of Review

As best I can tell, our dossier is officially out of the review room. I must say, I was kind of worried about it because several months ago our agency asked us to supply the C*C*A*A with more information. If you remember they were wanting more details on Brad's gall bladder surgery; which I still find funny. But, we complied and had letters sent by Brad's doctors. Since then, I had asked our adoption consultant a few times and she said that they had gotten it and we had not been asked to supply anything else. However, the C*C*A*A's document processing box had never updated to say that our LID was out of review. The Rumor Queen mentioned that it was taking particularly long for February LIDs to be out of review. But, finally earlier this week the C*C*A*A's document processing box on their website was changed. This means that we are officially in the MATCHING ROOM. This is the room, where one day pictures of our family will be on a screen along with information about us, The Farmers, from Georgia. And, on another screen they will have children and eventually, side by side, will be our family and the child that they pick for us. That at least is my understanding of the basic concept of the process. But, regardless of all the minute details, it is surreal to think about.

Now, I must temper this exciting post by saying we still have at the very least a year and a half to wait. So, this process won't take place for a long time.

Along the lines of waiting, there has been a rumor that the formula problems china is experiencing will affect adoptions, because orphanages using the tainted formula have had children to become ill, and some of them sadly, became ill at the time there new parents were coming to get them. I don't think I have to visually type or "say" this, but that would be a nightmare in the worst possible way.

Please Pray

Hello Faithful Friends & Family!

Brad & I really need your prayers right now. There are some specific adoption related matters that we are seeking God's face about. We REALLY need to hear from God as to what to do. Could you please be in prayer with us. Unfortunately, I can't really go into specifics right now. But, we are needing to make some decisions. Join me in prayer, and please pray continuously throughout the next couple of weeks.

Father,

We believe that you placed a desire to adopt in our hearts and minds. We know that you specifically ask, in your word, for orphans to be cared for (James 1:27). And, we know that you have adopted us into your own family (Rom. 8:14-17) and thankfully, now, we are your children; whom you love.

Lord, you also say that you will instruct us and teach us in the way we should go (Psalms 32:8). And, right now, God we really need to know the way that we should go. You also say, Father, that if anyone of us lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. (James 1:5) God, we confess to you that we need wisdom and discernment; and we are boldly asking for it.

God, in our heart of hearts, we want your Best plan for us. Although, we would like our wait to end and we desire our child even now. We still agree with your plan, whatever it is, and we know that ultimately it is the best and perfect plan. Again, God, we do not want to take any steps that would be outside of your best plan, even though my heart is hurting. So, God direct our path as we try to trust in you and Not in our understanding (Prov 3:5-6). And, Father please help us to trust more completely in you. Your word reveals many blessings for those who put their trust in you. Help us to do just that. God, increase our faith and help our unbelief (Mark 9:24).

Lord, help us to believe that this vision is for a future time. It describes the end, and it will be fulfilled. If it seems slow in coming, wait patiently, for it will surely take place. It will not be delayed. (Habakkuk 2:3).

Father, show us your will and give us your peace. May fear and doubt be removed.

-Amen

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!