A little hope...

This is a petition being signed by all the other people like me that have done everything within the time restraints given to us. It seems to me from this, that it is now up to the United States government to make the decision to allow us to be grandfathered in after September 1st. This is a little glimmer of hope. It will be interesting to see if it works.

AMERICANS UNITED FOR VIETNAMESE ORPHANS – GRANDFATHERING PETITION

June 2008

 

Dear CCAI Co-Chairs Landrieu, Coleman, Oberstar, and Brown-Waite:

 

Thousands of families have been in the process of adopting a child from Vietnam for as long as 2 years. Please help them complete their adoptions and give a child an opportunity to be raised in a family environment. With the recent studies on the effects of institutionalization on children, there should be no question that a family environment is an optimal one, which every child should have the opportunity to experience.

 

We implore you to use your influence to procure a letter from the Dept of State and USCIS, addressed to Dr. Long, Director of the Vietnamese DIA (Dept of International Adoption). On April 25th 2008, he announced that dossiers of American families received by July 1st, 2008, and matched with a child by September 1st, 2008, will be allowed to be processed to completion. All dossiers not matched with a child will be returned to adoption service providers, dashing hopes of raising a child for the 1500-3000 American families who are in the process of adopting a child from Vietnam.

 

Please ask the Dept of State and the USCIS to request that Dr. Long allow all dossiers submitted by July 1,2008 to be “grand fathered” by allowing these families to receive a child referral even after Sept 1. He has indicated that he is agreeable to this request IF the Dept of State and USCIS agencies will state that they will honor this change by continuing to approve qualified I-600 (orphan petition) and I-234 (visa) applications for families matched after September 1st. Vietnamese law requires a current bilateral agreement between sending and receiving countries; the one between Vietnam and the United States will expire on September 1st, 2008. Dr Long has indicated that Vietnam would waive this requirement for the remaining dossiers, if asked to do so by the Dept of State and USCIS.

 

Thousands of prospective parents applied to USCIS to adopt a child from Vietnam, believing in good faith that the US and Vietnam would continue to work together to complete ethical adoptions.

 

Since November 2007, USCIS has implemented DNA testing and the Orphans First program. These steps should help improve confidence in the adoption process, and allow the US and Vietnam to negotiate a new MOU with the goal of becoming a Hague country. Closing the program at this point will leave 1500-3000 families and orphans in limbo for as long as two years, while Vietnam makes necessary steps towards acceptance of the Hague Convention. As the JCICS Children's Rights Campaign of June 2008 has pointed out, if adoptions stop between the US and Vietnam, so will the backbone of humanitarian support that has helped tens of thousands of orphans who will never have the opportunity to be raised in a family environment.

 

We urge you to act upon this request without delay, by ensuring that the Dept of State and USCIS write this letter to Dr Long. This is a very trying time for the many families who wait month after month with little word, and we hope that their dreams of raising an orphaned child does not end in sadness.

 

Sincerely,

 

The Undersigned

Waiting...

Even though it is very early on Sunday morning, I am writing this as if it were still Saturday. I called Carl at the agency this afternoon to make sure my dossier got to him by noon. He confirmed that it had arrived and we discussed the fact that it may be necessary to expedite the translation of the dossier because of the time frame involved. I have realized that nothing is stable in the world of international adoption. New things come to light whether they were overlooked, failed to be mentioned, changed by one or the other governments, or, of course, I just do not remember being informed. I know that I am guilty of not remembering who I talked to about what during the course of a day. Due to the number of people I deal with, sometimes conversations seem to run together. One thing that I totally understood when I heard it today was, " unless the September 1st date is extended, my chances of getting a child are unlikely". I have known this all along, but still had more hope than I do right now. There are so many things I do not understand. I could have stopped this process when I first found out about the deadlines, but felt the urge to continue. It is such a weird feeling to think that all this work may not bring a child into my family as I had hoped. I know I am not alone in the way I feel. I know there are alot of other people going through the same thing. In some ways I feel worse for them because I know how some people feel like they are not complete without a child. I am so blessed to have family and friends that care and are supportive. I have looked into some of the domestic options open to me and I am not convinced that is for me. The next 3 months will be very difficult. Trying to have hope that I will be matched or the date will be extended, and also wondering what life has for me should it not work out. When I was young, my Dad used to tell me," it you want something, wait 2 weeks, and if you still want it, then it is ok to get it". It has been alot longer than 2 weeks...LOL.

Try again...

I made it back from Atlanta one more time and have the state "seal" on everything and have sent it back to my agency. My dossier has to be translated into Vietnamese now and hopefully will be in Vietnam in about 2 weeks, I hope. Now I wait. This is the most surreal thing I have every been through. Trying to control my emotions, excitement, doubt, fear and everything else you can imagine is very difficult. I am sure I will have to pester my agency at least weekly to find out if any little bit of information has come to them. I really don't see how they could blame me. I sure would like to reap the rewards of all the hard work that has gone into getting this adoption together. We will see...

Hard as I try...

It seems like throughout my life, no matter how thorough I try to be, I always miss something. Carl, the guy at my agency that I deal with, called me today to let me know that they had received my dossier. We were going over it over the phone and of course I had filled out one area that I should not have. That was not a big deal. Next, as he was looking them over he said that there was not a state seal on any of them. DUH!!! So, I am leaving tomorrow night when I get off work, driving to Atlanta, AGAIN, to be at the Secretary of State's office at 8:30a.m. on Friday. Carl is overnighting the documents back to me so they will be here in the morning. I will get them "state certified" then hopefully be able to send them same-day back to him. 

I have learned alot of things I never even thought about during my adoption process. The most valuable is acceptance. The ability to let things that you have no power to change float over you and not keep you in a useless state of existence, is priceless. Not that I am not REALLY pissed off for a minute...LOL. But to "not live in the problem but in the solution", I have known before, but I guess needed to be reminded. I have people tell me all the time that they hope that the child will appreciate what I have gone through to get him. What is more important than that is, that I appreciate all I have gone through. The process of adopting an international child has been one that has truly changed me for the better and helped in my evolution into the kind of person I REALLY want to be, and most often don't live up to. 

FINALLY!!!!!

It has been a few weeks since I made an entry here. The only reason I am going to go into all the details is for reference. As I stated in my last entry, I was fingerprinted in Jacksonville and was under the impression I could pick up my approved I600A form that I have been waiting on for nearly 5 months now, the following Monday. Instead, it turned out to be a day over 2 weeks later. I picked it up this morning at 9a.m. When I held it in my hand, I was almost emotional. This is the United States Government approving me to bring an orphaned child into this country. This is the one thing you absolutely have to have or you are out of luck. In addition to the 5 month torture of waiting on it, I had to have a ton of documents notarized, then taken to the county where the notary was licensed, then county and state authenticated, which means the notary's signature was validated. Because of different documents being notarized in different counties, I went to the Clayton, Worth, Lee, Dougherty and almost Baker county court houses. Thank God I asked if the Baker county notary if they had someone else who was in a closer county. Organizing all the papers, which are written in both English and Vietnamese, and making sure everything had been done correctly was a job. There is no way I can express in words how difficult this has been since I was working on a deadline of getting my "dossier" documents overnighted to my agency in Ohio by this afternoon. I made it to the FedEx office at about 6p.m. I made sure that the forms were in a hard envelope as to not get damaged. There was 8 months of hard work in that envelope and it was such a relief finally getting it sent off. These documents have to be translated and then sent to Vietnam. I was so excited about getting everything done, I forgot to send the fee for the translation in with the dossier. I will do it tomorrow. As I have said, it has been awful waiting these past 5 months on the approval of this form, but now comes the hard part. I will know by September 1st or before if I will be able to get a child. As it stands right now, I have to be given a referral by that date. Maybe that will change and the Vietnamese government will be a little more flexible on that date. At least I can now say that I have done everything that Vietnam and the United States have required of me to adopt a child. I just hope and pray to God that they come through on their end.

Tomorrow!!!

It is May 12th. I am in Jacksonville, Florida. Tomorrow morning I have an appointment to FINALLY have my fingerprints taken at 8 a.m. Possibly by this time next week, I will have the approved form in my hand. The one I have been waiting on since January 9th. I am proceeding with caution, with this adoption. I am well aware there is just as much chance that it will happen as there is it will not. I have not been buying many things at all from the beginning. Just a few. Tonight before I left my hotel to get dinner, I drove around the area I am in just to see what was around. I had been looking for some letters to put on the wall that spell "Aeson". I found a store that had just opened next to a Kohl's and found them there. I guess that was a real act of hope or faith, however you want to see it. 

Hope

It is late, but Carl, the head of the agency I am using, called tonight. I was discussing with him some details of the dossier that I am getting ready. He was very encouraging in alot of ways. The agency is not requiring alot of the fees at the usual time frames because of the risks involved right now. As I stated earlier, I am going for my fingerprints for my I600A in one week. This is a big deal. I discussed with him being open to a child that might be up to 2 years old or maybe even a little older if it comes down to that. There are only about 12-13 on the waiting list for boys at this time. I think alot of people might give up with all the things going on right now. Even though there is some doubt in my heart, I am not giving up. I feel led to go on. It may be just wishful thinking, but I feel like it will happen ( at least that is how I feel today ). PRAY YA'LL !!!!!