Description of the adoption process (LONG)...

So, last that I wrote I was explaining about our decision to travel down the road of adoption. Once we'd made our mind to adopt, we were very eager to get things moving. We started to research different adoption agencies prior to our last round of fertility treatment. We had all but decided on the agency that we would use to do our homestudy (our homestudy agency) as well as the agency that we would use to help us find a baby in Guatemala (our placement agency). We heard about an adoption symposium from our fertility doctor and while attending met a wonderful woman who shared her story with us. She and her husband were unable to have biological children. She is hispanic and her husband is caucasian (sounds familiar). They adopted their daughter from Mexico, which is very uncommon. She said they spent a lot of money, a lot of time and a lot of frustration trying to get through the adoption in Mexico. After the struggle to bring their daughter home, they decided to adopt a son from Guatemala. They decided to use Families Through International Adoption (FTIA) out of Indiana for their placement agency. This woman RAVED about her experience with the agency, as well as her experience with the adoption process in Guatemala. We were sold. After some additional research, and our last failed fertility attempt, we signed our application with FTIA in May 2006 to adopt a child from Guatemala. For those who are not familiar with the adoption process, or specifically with the process to adopt from Guatemala, I thought I'd give a little overview....

1) Pick your placement agency, which is any adoption agency in the US that has specific agreements with orphanages and/or adoption attorneys in the country that you want to adopt.
2) Pick a home study agency to complete your state DCFS requirements, as well as the social worker portion of the documents (if your placement agency is located in the state that you reside, they are able to complete your homestudy. Otherwise, you must select a different agency within your state of residence).
3) Prepare all of the necessary documentation for your dossier and work with the social worker from your home study agency to complete your home study. The dossier is the "application" that will be sent to Guatemala. It includes documents to meet the requirements of Guatemala, the US Embassy, US Immigration Services, DCFS and your placement agency. The home study includes personal home visits from a licensed social worker, as well as a lengthy write up about your ability (financially, mentally, emotionally, physically, medically) to parent an adopted child.
4) When all dossier documents and the home study are completed, the documents are sent to your placement agency and you are officially on the waiting list for a child. For us, this meant the beginning of a 3 month wait for our daughter! We went on the waiting list on 9/5/06 and found out about Liliana on 12/15/06.
5) The "referral" of a child is when the agency provides information about a specific child for your family to adopt. Upon review of the documentation, if you chose to proceed with the adoption, you complete more paperwork. This, combined with your original dossier, is then sent to Guatemala for translation and is used by the adoption attorney to proceed through the process.
6) The attorney submits your paperwork to US Immigration Services to get preapproval to bring the child into the US as an adopted child. The US Embassy will then issue authorization to have DNA testing completed on the birth mother and child (this is a requirement of the US and Guatemalan governments to prove maternity). When DNA testing is completed and is a match, you get preapproval from the US Embassy to proceed to the next step.
7) The attorney will submit a Power of Attorney in Guatemalan court to represent us. He then files our dossier with a Guatemalan Family Court, who will complete interviews with Lili's foster mother and birth mother. The social worker from Family Court will review our dossier and home study, and make a recommendation to approve our file. If the judge approves, this is Family Court approval.
8) After receipt of US Embassy preapproval and Family Court approval, the file is submitted to PGN (Guatemalan legal arm that approves adoptions). The file is reviewed by attorneys in PGN and can take weeks to months to get approval of the attorney. After an attorney approves the file, it must then be approved by the PGN Director. This is often the longest part of the process.
9) After PGN approval, the birth mother will sign the final adoption decree making Lili legally our daughter. The attorney will request a revised birth certificate for Lili (with our last name and Moses & I listed as her parents). Upon receipt of the birth certificate, the file will be submitted to the US Embassy for a Visa appointment (this is referred to as "pink" because the appointment slip is on pink paper). At that point, we will get a call telling us when we are scheduled for the Visa appointment, we will fly to Guatemala and get Lili! During the last part of the process, a passport will be issued, Lili will have a final appointment with a US Embassy doctor, and we will be saying goodbye to Lili's foster family. The trip to pickup Lili will be somewhat last minute, but will be short and sweet (just a few days in Guatemala!) When we return home, Lili will legally be our daughter and will be a US Citizen.

Whew!!!!! It's hard to describe the process to anyone who's not part of the adoption circle. Lots of steps, lots of waiting and lots of uncertainty. For those of you who wonder "How long until she comes home?", there's really no good answer. Every step in this process can have it's delays... there are average timeframes for everything, but no consistency to anything regarding timing. If I had to say the average timeframe from the time of the referral (acceptance of the child) until bringing the child home, it averages around 6-8 months. The quickest I've seen anyone get through is 4 months, and the longest I've seen is 12+ months and still waiting! So... that said, say a special prayer for us, do a little dance, light some candles... whatever brings luck to those you are thinking of!

Until next time....