Sunday, December 31, 2006

Happy New Year!!!

I'm up early smoking a pork roast. Things are running smoothly (check it out on my food blog), but I just wanted to take the time to wish you all a happy and blessed New Year! 2007 figured to be exciting for many reasons, but 2006 was also filled with many blessings. While we made the decision and announced our adoption plans, everyone, and I mean everyone has been so supportive. I've never had so many people smile at me before. I even ran into an old friend at Sam's club on Friday who now has 2 kids. He seemed genuinely excited for me - a guy he had not seen in 4 years - a guy that was really just a moderately close friend.

Even so, the red-head and I also became an aunt and uncle yet again, and also became a great aunt and uncle. My parents moved, Melissa "retired" from her job and is going gangbusters on prepping the house for a bigger family. There are many other things to be thankful for this year, and obviously much to look forward to in 2007.

Not sure if I'll get a chance to post again until later in the week. No major updates - we did receive some more of our paper-chase materials the other day - a copy of our marriage license and a copy of my birth certificate. We have our individual interview's on Thursday, so please keep us in mind that day. Not a scary hurdle, but another step to be sure.

Monday, December 25, 2006

Merry Christmas!!!

Just wanted to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas. As you might guess, this year has been extra special. It's been mega-difficult to no think about CJ as we visit family, attend church events, and read Christmas cards.

These last 2 weeks in December has been particularly special as more and more people learn about what we're up to, we're finding more and more amazing experiences along the way. Everyone we talk to is sooooo supportive in so many different ways. Whether it's processing paperwork quickly, offering to pray, or even just welcoming us into the club of parenthood. Lot's of folks speak of a cousin, friend, or church-mate who adopted and how they got to see not only the process, but the way in which everyone involved were blessed. Lately, we've been bolstered by the smiles and comments of co-workers, government clerks, and even lab nurses.

I am sometimes too quick to discuss that process and talk about all the "stuff" we have to go through to qualify. Meanwhile many of you ready to talk to us about parenthood. This really helps us to snap out of the technical mode and back into "getting us one of these!" It's fantastic to have so much backing from all those "Rod Chairs" out there.

Once again. Thank you and Merry Christmas!

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Paperchase Rounds 2 & 3 - big wins

The paperchase continues...
What a day!!! Got a lot done in a short period of time.
Physicals and drug tests:
I worked from home today, which enabled us to take time over lunch and go to our physical exams required for the adoption. I haven't had one of these in many years, and I was totally expecting it to be more invasive. You know - turn your head and cough type stuff. Nothing like that took place. The Dr looked in our ears, throats, whacked our elbows and knees, and asked a ton of questions. She was quite personable and we are quite glad we switched doctors. In actuality, we never had a regular doctor at the other place, which was clearly part of the problem. We also had TB tests and tetanus shots. Once we were done, we headed over to the lab and submitted blood and urine samples. So we'll know in a couple of days if either of us does drugs or had AIDS. I'm pretty confident we'll clear those hurdles! So, the end result once the tests come back will be yet another completed form required for the home study.

You may recall that I promised not to disparage anyone or any organization through the process - hence I won't name our former doctor's office. But, I see no reason not to put in a good word for those people and organizations that have helped us out and are worthy of mention. Doctor Neihls practices at St. Lawrence Medical Associates. It's a nice facility with a pleasant staff, and it's literally 1 minute from our house!

Criminal background checks:
The mailman also delivered our completed criminal background checks this afternoon. Those of you who were worried that just because we were cleared of child abuse, maybe we were wanted on money laundering charges can rest easy. We're both clear of criminal history - at least as as far as the state of PA knows! Either way - yet another hurdle in the long list.

Next up - new copies of birth and marriage certificates.

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Friday, December 15, 2006

Paperchase, round 1 in the bag

Just a quick update tonight. We both received our child abuse clearences today. Having worked with kids since college, Melissa's been through this a bunch of times before. Apparently, the clearence comes back way faster if you write "Adoption" on the. Took less than a week, when it normally takes 2-3 weeks.

I'm imressed at the fanciness of the certificate. It looks like something you might frame and hang on the wall - fancy type, and slightly off-white paper. Can't image actually doing so, but it kinda feels good getting our first official government approval related to the adoption completed. They call it the "Paper-Chase" for a reason, and we win round 1.

Anyway, those of you with kids out there will be glad to know we're in the clear!

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Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Technical updates

Not sure what's going on, but it seems like blogger beta find a way to blow away my edits from time to time. Anyone else notice that?
If I save a draft of a post, or go back and edit a post, I'll notice sometimes it reverts back to an older version. It's very frustrating.

The reason I point this out is that I updated the previous 2 posts with some links that I thought I had in there before. So if you're interested, take a second peek and you'll see some interesting info.

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

A little more Guatemala detail

Having given you all some detail of what's to come here in the good old US of A, I figured it might make sense to also discuss how this all will work in Guatemala. Truth be told, some of the reasons we were attracted to this program revolve around the fact that we actually get a lot of info about what's going on there.

Here's what we know - the path that a child takes into being placed for adoption. I won't get into some of the stuff we learned in the class last week - discussing reasons why a child might end up in need of a family. In most cases (like 95%), it starts with a mother making a choice for her unborn child, so we'll go with that scenario. Why she chooses that option would depend on a lot of factors.

1) A Guatemalan woman chooses an adoption plan for her child, either unborn, or newly born. This kind of choice must be very painful, but takes a great deal of reflection to admit that you may not be able to care for the child you carried for 9 months.

2) That woman is referred to Bethany Christian Services, who coordinates all of the legal and social service proceedings in Guatemala. This is different than most international programs, where Bethany maintains a relationship with orphanages and other organizations.

3) Once born, the birth mother and baby both submit blood samples to be processed for DNA match in the US. Once the match is made, the rest of the legal proceedings begin. I don't know all of the details of these proceedings, but just like in the US, I'm sure there's paperwork, profiles, and background checks.

4) Meanwhile, the birth mother has given up her parental rights from a legal point of view in Guatemala. The child is then placed with a Bethany trained foster family.

5) Bethany refers the child to prospective American parents on the waiting list. That would be us - presumably some time this summer:)

6) The Guatemalan foster family continues to provide care for the child with social and financial support from Bethany and the adoptive parents, such as training, formula, and medical care. Updates (including health & development), pictures, and gifts are exchanged between adoptive and foster parents.

7) We would be allowed to visit for 1 week some time after the positive DNA results.

8) All parties continue to wait for the legal process as the appropriate American and Guatemalan agencies exchange information and approve final immigration and adoption. Once everything is approved, we will be able to travel to Guatemala City and pick up our daughter.

Sorry if all of that seems tedious. It's just that most people I talk with have no concept of what actually happens in Guatemala. To those of you who are praying for us, our family, Bethany, and our soon-to-be daughter...

...May I suggest you also pray for her birth-mother, and when the time comes the foster parents?

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A little more USA detail

A lot of people ask us "so when can you bring her home" or "how long's that gonna take"? This comes to use from our closest friends as well as those whom we don't really know. I think most people realize that any kind of adoption can take a long time. We've gotten fairly deep into the "official" paperwork - often referred to as The Paperchase. Getting clearances, physicals, drug tests, etc, etc. All of this is required by the laws of the US government and to some degree the Guatemala government. So, let me describe the process and basic timeline with a little more clarity.

Where we are now: We are currently in the home study process (that's a great link if you want a comprehensive explanation of this). This is where a professional licensed social worker literally studies the family and home of the prospective adoptive parents. This is why we need the various clearances and must be interviewed. In January, the social worker will also visit our home for an inspection. The end goal of the home study is to produce a giant packet referred to as a dossier. Parts of the dossier are used for these purposes:

  • An application to Department of Homeland Security the right to bring a foreign orphan in to the United States.
  • Documentation for our family to formalize the adoption and become CJ's legal parents
  • To apply with the proper Guatemalan government agencies (often referred to as PGN) for the right to adopt a Guatemalan born orphan.
  • Lot's of private internal adoption agency stuff that I won't get into at the moment.

How long this will take: There's no way to know for sure. Our social worker is fantastic at keeping us up to date and making sure we know what to do next. In our last couple of e-mail exchanges, the latest guesses have us completing the home study by the end of January. It will take about 2 months (1-4 at either extreme) from that time for DHS to approve the immigration. That puts us into the end of March. Any good project manager would add at least a month to the estimate assuming a change order or some VP changing priorities - oops, sorry, wrong subject there. Anyway - let's assume some kind of delay somewhere, but not quite worst case. We could be sending our paperwork to Guatemala sometime in April/May.

Then what? Then we wait for Guatemala to approve the adoption as well. This could take a couple of months - which puts us into June. Soon after that well get a referral and start the immigration process from Guatemala. I'll include another post about the Guatemala process - I think it's worth discussing.

So, bottom line - when can you bring her home? Based on all of that stuff above. We really are looking at bringing home CJ right just over a year from now. It would seem most likely to happen in very early 2008. Right now, we're mentally prepared for Jan/Feb 2008 - if we beat that, then great - either way it will be a major blessing!

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Monday, December 11, 2006

First frustrating delay? - Update crisis averted!

This weekend and morning, we're experiencing what might turn out to be our first delay and it's coming from a source I never expected. There's no government involved, Bethany is still doing a great job, and nothing got lost in the mail.

It's our Doctor's office!!! I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.

I promised myself that I would not disparage and organization (ok, I might pick on the state or fed government here and there). I'm sticking to that promise, so I'm not going to post the name of the practice we use. Truth be told, it's not just them.

One of the requirements for the home study process is to have a complete medical exam, including drug test, TB test, etc. We cannot proceed to the next steps (individual interviews and home visit) until we have those results. So I called our Dr office on Sat morning and left a message. They never called back to so I finally got ahold of them this morning only to learn they have no openings until January!!! I was only surprised for about 10 seconds. Even explaining the motivation behind my call did not help. The best she could offer is for ME to call back and check for any cancellations. Funny thing, because our last experience with them wasn't so hot either - we'd been thinking about going somewhere else.

So, I started calling around, and very few offices even had a person answer the phone, so I ended up leaving messages. The only one who answered was only a couple of days better than our current office.

We already have our next meeting scheduled and we even waited until January to make sure we would have plenty of time to get the exam and drug tests done. I can't believe it's possible we'll end up delaying that meeting because of this. Ugh. OK, time to calm down, this will work itself out, right?

UPDATE: I was able to get an appointment for us next week. I'd like to think the fact that I did not rip our old Doctor's office had something to do with this getting resolved. Do you believe in Karma (like Earl)? Well, I don't really either. Ok, well maybe I do, but don't quite call it the same thing. Do unto others - or in this case don't do!

Thursday, December 07, 2006

Overwhelmingly on the same page

We did indeed have our interviews today, and it wasn't the least bit scary. I guess most people think about social workers as looking for a problem. But really, Jessica seemed like she was just trying to get to know us. We spend about 90 minutes being "interviewed", and 30 or so minutes going over the next round of paperwork.

The whole thing was really just like a pleasant conversation with a new friend. Of course, they are providing a service for us, but they are also partnering to achieve the same goal - bringing a child and her parents together. We discussed our marriage only briefly - pretty much just how we met and how we decided to marry. She also asked us a bit about our education and employment histories. Then we talked about our decision to adopt via Guatemala. The time really flew by.

This new stack of paperwork includes forms for background checks, physicals and drug test, and child abuse clearances. None of this is new to Melissa as she worked through some of these procedures when hiring staff. We also received our dossier packet, and a complete set of instructions on how and when to fill out each section. Some of this we can do now, other parts will have to wait. It really seams like the ducks are starting to get themselves in a row. All in all, it's mostly filling out forms and instructions on obtaining new copies of our birth and marriage certificates.

I'm not sure how to describe the most interesting form. We must list all possible ways our name might have ever been used. For instance, think about JFK. I'm sure we've all seen his name any number of ways. John Fitzgerald Kennedy, John F. Kennedy, John Kennedy, Jack Kennedy, J.F. Kennedy, and so on. So, M and I must list every conceivable way our names might have ever been used. Interesting huh? I wonder if we need to include the rampant misspellings of our last name!

All in all, neither the interview or the stack of paperwork are intimidating. Oh, and what's with the title of this post? When the social worker asked us about the reaction from our family and friends we looked at each other, completely un-planned and simultaneously blurted out, "Overwhelming". Must be the truth!

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

The Food Blog

OK, I've set it up. A separate blog for my food experiences.
http://gds-food.blogspot.com/

Enjoy!

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Oh yah, and some news

As for some actual updates, just a few quick ones before I hit the hay tonight.

We're moving on to the next step in the process!!!

1) All references have been returned. Thanks so much to all of those folks.

2) We handed in our big packet of information that even included some witnessed documents (thanks very much to those witnesses - you know who you are).

3) We have been officially assigned a social worker - her name is Jessica and she is clearly quite capable and caring at the same time. Jessica will guide us through the rest of the process

4) We have scheduled our joint interview on Thursday. This is a large part of our home study - a word your going to see here repeatedly over the next couple of months. Next will be individual interviews and a home visit. We home to complete those by the end of January.

5) After stopping on our way home yesterday for our traditional post-Lancaster milkshake from Sonic we picked our our first required reading (Raising Adopted Children) and a map of Guatemala from Barnes and Noble. I still can't figure out why Sonic doesn't have chocolate ice cream. Oh well. In case you didn't know, they're building one in Morgantown right now.

That's the update for now!

gittin' a ejukashun

Yesterday was our International Adoption Education class. This was held at Lancaster Church of the Brethren - which has an excellent facility and I trust an equally impressive ministry.

The class focused on the language of adoption, attachment issues, and all the issues around becoming an intercultural family. Let's set aside attachment issues for now, but the language of adoption and cross cultural concepts are linked to some degree. I'm sure you're thinking, huh?

Here's what I'm talking about. Much of the language we use revolves around habit. For instance - think about once we are home with CJ. If someone asked you who her REAL parents were, what you would say? Some lady in Guatemala? Melissa and me? Not sure?

The point is not that we might answer this question the wrong way - it's about the language we use. CJ will have birth-parents and adoptive-parents. But you really should only use those terms when speaking on the matter of adoption itself. There was a day when even adoptive parents would introduce their kids - "these are my 2 son's and my adopted daughter." Can you imagine how the adopted daughter would feel? Another issue I had not considered was how to discuss adoption with other person's of authority such as teachers, Sunday School teachers, coaches, etc. In many cases, people are apt to actually be less critical of an adopted child for fear that they may react differently than everyone else. 95% of the time, this is not the case. Adopted kids misbehave for the same reasons as their peers.

Now, thinking about becoming a multi-cultural family - one's initial reaction might be "isn't she going to be an American." Oh yes, of course - she'll be integrated into our culture just as much as a biological kid would be. But we cannot ignore the fact that she'll always look different, and others will consider her Latino first, adopted second, and an American third. It will be unfair of us to ignore her birth culture, and we don't plan to do so. Bethany encourages all adoptive families to find ways to expose their children to the arts, food, and heritage of their home-country. I'm sure more of this will come up as we continue in the process. This is not about political correctness (don't get me started on that), it's about understanding what's really happening through adoption. A color blind society is about equality not sameness.

Getting back to that looking different thing. During the class, we reviewed a series of situations where others will be nothing less than rude. Even in today's America, people will judge a person based on how they look. Rude comments will be heard in the line at the grocery store. Strangers will ask if she is adopted, acquaintances will inquire how much we paid for her. Friends of friend who are not aware of the adoption will wonder if one of us "slept with a Mexican." (this is a real quote by the way). There's so much wrong with that last statement, I just won't go there yet.

On a more positive note, we learned a great deal about how to handle these situations. We also discussed certain steps we can take to prevent attachment problems after returning home. Think about it - adoption is a scarier ordeal for than child than for anyone else. First, she is carried in the womb by a mother who lovingly chooses life. Then that mother makes the extremely painful decision to place her for adoption. Next, she is cared for by a dedicated and capable foster family who provide her needs, witness her first milestones, and simply wait for a placement.

Several months later she's given to a new by a couple who sound different, stick her on a plane for 7 hours, then start to introduce her to brand new smells, foods, and people. Those first few weeks after returning home are critical to developing not just a bond, but an attachment between baby and parents. But all is not so frightening - we are her "forever family" - a term we heard several times yesterday. As time passes, we'll have to deal with the issues mentioned above, but if we become a strong family (with the help of all our rod chairs) we can face anything.

Here's a cute tidbit our social worker, Jessica e-mailed around today.

Saturday, December 02, 2006

It's almost Advent!!!

We decorated the tree today, and as you might imagine talked a lot about how Christmas will be different when CJ comes home. We think there's an outside chance that we'll have her with us during next Christmas, but it's not likely. At the very least, we may have pictures of her by then.

Here's a pic of our fireplace. Notice two stockings for the humans of the house-hold, plus one for our pooch and one each for our felines. It's really hard not to think about hanging another stocking from the mantle for Carmen. Lord willing, that day will come soon.



Merry Christmas everyone!

An open book - totally open

Good grief, I never want to hear another one of you complain about the amount of paperwork you had to endure for some task. We've just completed the first round on paperwork for the Home Study. The idea behind the home study is for us to work with us to document as much as possible about our home. And I mean as much as possible. It's clear that this particular round is meant to lead us into examining ourselves with great detail.

Included are 15 separate instructions. Some are release forms, some are proof of insurance, and some are "studies". Additionally, we had to complete a will - along with a declaration of guardians should anything happen to us. My brother and sister-in-law have graciously accepted this responsibility, as we have for their son our nephew.

I want to spend a post later this weekend discussing the self-studies because these by far consumed a majority of our time to this point. We estimate that we spent 20-25 hours each on the self study, adoption assessment, and family budget. Add to that some other leg work to get a will done, have some paper's signed by my employer, and scan various documents so we have a backup; and now we're talking a total of 50 hours total.

Talk about an open book. The family budget alone reveals information that I don't remember telling even our mortgage company. It was actually quite useful once we got down to it. We've been using MS Money for a while, and have a nifty budget setup in there, but not with the kind of details in the home study budget. We had to list all of our assets and liabilities, categorize every penny we spend each month, and even print out a credit report. This thing is so detailed, it even has a line item for hair care. Yup, hair care - do you know anyone that actually includes that in their monthly budget? Good grief.

One good this is that we really do have a better handle on where we stand financially. We're responsible people, and like I said - we've got a basic budget plan going - but this self examination actually made us feel better about the financial leap we're about to make.

Just one more note. The Bethany docs also require a credit report. Their recommendation is to use take advantage of your right to obtain this report on your own. I'm glad the law is there, but it seems odd that we only have the right to check our own credit once for free. You may have noticed that those web sights like frecreditreport.com are not really free. The only one that's truly free is http://www.annualcreditreport.com/. M just ran this for both of us this evening. Very interesting info. I had completely forgotten about some store credit cards that we've had for many years. I'm not even sure we actually have the plastic anymore!!!

More updates to come. Class on Monday - so please pray for us.