We're Officially "Pregnant"! - 10/12/2004

Ladies and gentlemen, start your clocks: WE ARE DTC!!!!!!

On Friday, October 8, 2004 we recieved a letter from our facillitators,USAA, telling us that we have been assigned to Group 103. A quick e-mail to those who have gone before us on the USAA web group, China 33, confirms that this letter is sent out after your dossier has been sent to China! So our paperwork is now in the hands of the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA), and we are in the baby queue!

While I waited for Tracy back on July 2nd, I chatted with Yasmine who says this is how it's gonna go:

We get the letter with our Group #
We wait 6-9 months (on avarage)
We will recieve 3 phone calls:
1) from Yasmine telling us that the CCAA has notified them that our Group has been assigned and the referrals are on their way
2) from Tracy telling us that we're parents and that our daughter's photo & info are being Fed Ex'd overnight to us
3) from Yasmine telling us that China has issued our Visas and what our travel date is.

There is about 2 weeks between calls 1 & 2, and anywhere from 1 week to 6 weeks between calls 2 & 3. When we get call 3, we'll have about 10-14 days before we leave.

That's the good news. The bad news is that there isn't going to be a whole lot to tell you for the next 6-9 months. No sonograms, no aminocentisis, no Braxton Hicks, no bulging belly, no morning sickness...just nothing - it's a paper pregnancy. So we'll share any information that happens to come our way, but hopefully we'll start having alot more to say come next May. So stop by when you can, and set a reminder on Outlook to begin checking regularly in the spring!

We'll leave you with the Dossier Prayer, which kinda says it all:

Dossier Prayer
Oh God, you know your children's needs and the desires of our hearts better than we can speak them. We pray for your blessing on this sheaf of papers, now winging its way to the other side of the world.

This stack of documents tells so much--yet so little--of who we are. Between the lines, behind the official seals, our deepest dreams are written.

God, you made miracles of ordinary things: quails and manna, bread and wine. Take these ordinary papers and use them to guide us to our miracle.

Bless the work of those who bring families together: the agency staff and facilitators; the government bureaucrats here and abroad; the orphanage officials and caregivers.

Bless the birth family whose child's future we will be privileged to share, and comfort them in their sorrow.

Bless all the adoptive parents and children who wait for their papers to move and their miracles to occur.

And most especially bless the child, born or unborn, who will be our child forever.

This dossier is the link between our lives and hers, oh God. It is the symbol of our hope--the instrument that will bring our family together. Speed it on its way, and sustain our faith during the difficult months to come.

~Julie Higginbotham, Chicago

The End (of the Paperchase) is Near - 9/3/2004

2 Certified birth certificates, one for each of us: check
1 Certified marriage license: check
1 Notarized copy of a homestudy by a licensed CA Social Worker: check
1 Signed petition to adopt a child(ren) from the Peoples Republic of China: check
1 Signed financial statement: check
2 Medical forms certifying our good health, signed by a licensed MD: check
1 Signed letter from our credit union verifying we have the money for the adoption: check
2 Certified clearance letters from the County Sheriff, one for each: check
2 Letters from our employers stating what we do & how much we make: check
1 Certified copy of Jeff's divorce papers from psycho hose-beast ex-wife: check
8 Passport pictures, 2 sets of 2 each: check
9 Photographs of us as a couple: check
2 Copies of the first 2 pages of our passports, 1 each: check

This small pile of paper has taken six months and several thousand dollors to amass. This morning I carefully slipped it into a large manilla envelope with our names neatly written on the front in large bold sharpie. Then it, and I, waded through the sea of insane California drivers whom all insisted on driving the speed limit when it wasn't necessary (the cops had already nabbed holiday weekend drivers and were cheerfully writing them tickets by the time we went whizzing past).
I arrived in downtown LA at the Federal Building, cleared security (cell phone on the table, purse in the x-ray, you through the metal detctor), and headed to the second floor - room 2050 - the land of Criminals, Cops & Illegals (see post on 7/01/04). This time when I arrived, there was no armed guard, no parollees...nobody. You could hear the crickets chirp. So I signed in at window 10 and took a seat. A few minutes later an illegal Mexican woman (in CA? What a shock) and her pushy 9 year old son/translator arrived hollering for someone to come assist them. A moment later, an officious black woman, her attitude proceeding her, came out and distainfully said, "Can I help you?" then she glanced over and saw me, held up her hand in front of the translator and said, "Wait. Can I help you?" not quite so distainfully. I replied that I had already signed in at window 10. She told me someone would be with me shortly, and a split second later the nice girl we talked to 9 weeks ago appeared. She checked my name, asked to see my ID, and then handed me an envelope that was taped to the desk; "There you go. Thank you." and she walked away.
Inside was the last piece of paper: Form 171-H Notice of Favorable Determination Concerning Application For Advance Processing of Orphan Petition. This one piece of paper that says the United States of America has decided we are fit to be parents, and has forwarded a request for a visa for our child to the National Visa Center in Guangzhou, China.
I will admit to being nervous as I drove to Monterey Park. What if we had missed something? What if they had scooted up the Sept. cutoff because of the holiday weekend and we missed it?
It was quiet at USAA when I arrived. Yasmine, who answers the phone & handles the travel arrangments for the parents, informed me that Tracy was at lunch but due back in 10-15 minutes and I was welcome to wait. I waited. Tracy returned and began sifting through the contents of the envelope and rearranging documents. She gave me back Jeff's divorce papers- they aren't needed. The forms we were given for our physical exams were the old ones, and we need to have the new ones filled out with the same information. Jeff's employment letter had to be re-done because it did not state his position. Other than that, we were good! We made the September cutoff, so our Dossier will go to China (DTC) in October!
WOOOOOOHOOOOOO!!!!!!

A Red Letter Day - 9/1/2004

Color me stunned. A United States government employee actually called me back!!!! I was so shocked I could hardly speak.
The uniteligable voice on the voice mail I left the message on turned out to belong to Juanita, the nice lady mentioned in the paperwork from our adoption agency. I explained to Juanita that we had been waiting for 9 weeks. She wanted to know if our fingerprints had been done. I assured her that they had been done the same day. She asked for my last name and put me on hold so she could go find the paperwork. Ordinarily, you might be expecting that I was typing this while I was on hold (still- 6 hours later), but miraculously she (the same woman!) came back on the phone not 5 minutes later! Juanita was actally very helpful, and able to tell us that the FBI was where the delay was, and that she could have it done by next week. I guess the disappointment came through in my voice when I told her that that was ok, because we would have missed the Sept. deadline with our facilitators by then, so not to rush. There was a short pause, and then she said, "Well, I could expedite it for you... you could come down & pick it up Friday...would that be ok?" Ok? Fabulous!
Tonight will now be very busy: we need to make last minute adjustments to our financial statement, select and print nine pictures, and review all our documents so that as soon as I have the 171 I can drive the whole package to USAA in Montery Park!
THANK YOU JUANITA!

A Bead of Sweat Upon Our Brows - 9/1/2004

So! As of tomorrow, Thursday September 2, it will have been nine weeks since we filed our paperwork with the INS. We were told six to eight weeks, but most people we talked to said, "Yeah, they always tell you six to eight weeks, but really it's more like four to six." So much for that theroy. Apparently, if we lived elsewhere in the nation, we could have recieved our 171 in as little as 8 days- 10 at the most! But NOOOOOOOOOO!!!! We live in the land of the illegal aliens who are, doubtless, clogging up the system.
Somewhere in the back of your mind I can hear you saying, "So it's nine or ten weeks- relax- it will get here." And you're right (I hope), but today is Sept 1 and in four days our facilitators, USAA, will close the window for September paperwork which will go to China in October. Which means, that if we don't get that 171 damn quick, and rush our paperwork to USAA, we've lost another month and our dossier won't go to China until November, we won't get a referral until next June or July, and we won't get our daughter until next fall. It's not the end of the world, but it is dissappointing.
I called Hemlata, the director of our adoption agency, to ask if she had a phone number for the INS and she told me to use the one provided in my paperwork. So I did. At nine a.m. the line goes to voice mail for some woman who says her name so fast you can't understand it. I left a message explaining my plight, but I'm not holding my breath that I'll hear back from her. I'm going to post on the bulletin board for China adoptions to see if someone out there knows another number. We'll keep you posted.

The Accidental Adoption - 7/10/2004

An Accidental Adoption

Have you ever noticed that you hear all the time about "accidental"
pregnancies, but never about couples who experience "accidental"
adoptions? Can you imagine:

Honey, sit down. I have some news for you.

What is it?

Well, I don't know how to say this, so I'll just come out with it.
I went out to the mailbox today and ... well, we got an I-171H.

A what?!? An I171H? As in, we're going to have another baby?!?

It looks that way.

But how? We've been so careful! I put away all the blank I600A
forms. Didn't you hide our homestudy update?

Of course I did. But don't forget, there was that one night...

What night? (pauses) Ohhh, that night. But it was only once. We
were just messing around. I didn't print clearly. I didn't even use
ink! (pauses again) But it was kind of fun.

(giggles) It was, wasn't it? I'll never forget how cute you looked
getting your fingerprints.

So now we've got our I-171H, eh? But that doesn't always mean
you'll adopt, does it? I mean, shouldn't you see the agency or
something, make sure everything's okay?

I already did.

And?

I'm five documents along.

Five documents! And they're all notarized, certified and
authenticated okay?

Just great. There was one small scare when the agency couldn't see
the notary's middle initial, but it showed up just fine under the
magnifying glass.

Thank God. And you, honey? Are you feeling okay?

I'm feeling fine. As long as I know you're happy about this.

Happy? I'm thrilled! It's always a shock at first when something
like this happens, but of course I'm happy!

Criminals, Cops, & Illegals.. OH MY! - 7/01/2004

At long last, we had finally managed to get Karen the Social Worker all the last minute required paperwork, and a $10 check for notarization, and a Fed Ex #; so if she could just get 10 minutes she could print & sign our Home Study, have it Notarized, and Fed Ex it so we could journey to the INS. She was supposed to Fed Ex it Monday. Didn't happen. So we called Tuesday, whined a little, and explained that we were hoping to go to LA on Thursday. She came through, and the Home Study arrived yesterday!

This meant that the time had now come to fill out the rather confusing I600-A form, which is the Advance Processing of Orphan Petition. I had identified the problem questions months ago when I downloaded the form from the INS website, and had even had the forethought to ask Hemlata our Agency Director the answers to these questions. Unfortunately, I had asked these questions via e-mail at work and last week my computer made some hideous noises, and began belching smoke- my hardrive is toast. So, I had to call Hemlata and ask them again...then I had to confess that, no, I hadn't backed up the info and I had also misplaced the portion of the information packet telling us where to go. I was chastized, and promised to keep better track of the child when we get her.

So, we got up at crack of dawn to make the drive to downtown LA with the rest of Southern California. The INS website says that they're only open from 6am to 12pm on Thursdays, but we couldn't decide if that was all departments, or just immigration; so we settled on an 8:30ish arrival. We knew we had found the correct building when we spotted the line of Mexicans that came out the door and down the sidewalk. Thankfully, we didn't have to wait in that line. We cleared security and were directed to room 2050 on the 2nd floor, which was odd since the lobby directory said 2050 was "Advance Parole". Hmmm. We wandered the governmental building labrynth until we found the room, where we first had to check in with an armed guard who looked like he would not hesitate to plug anyone who breathed out of turn. We walked in, the guard looked us up & down, and said "International adoption, right?" Stunned, we asked if it was that obvious, to which he replied, "Um, yeah. Check in at window 10 & have a seat." Apparently, my soccer mom outfit had worked! We signed the clip board at window 10, and when we turned around to find seats, we realized why the guard knew the purpose of our visit. 1) We were the only Caucasion people in the room. 2) We were the only people speaking entirely in English in the room. 3) Several people had lawyers and/or interpreters with them. 4) Most people looked like members of the Manson Family. Fortunately, our names were called before our butts hit a chair. The nice, if unenthusiastic, girl took our paperwork checked it over, and sent us to the 8th floor to pay $665 to file this paperwork and be fingerprinted for the FBI. We trotted up to 8, paid our fees, and then trotted back down to 2 to give her the reciept and get our fingerprinting forms. Done, over with, and outa there in 35min!

The bonus about this set of fingerprints is that they're done on a walk in basis, so we didn't have to get an appointment. The INS assistace office is right near the Mall, so we drove home, and went directly there. My prints went without a hitch...Jeff had to be done twice. Again. The great thing was that there was no waiting and we were in and out in 15 min.

Now we wait. The girl at the INS said that fingerprints are getting to them in 5-10 days, but it can take the INS between 1-8 weeks to approve our application, and send us our I171-H which is Notice of Favorable Determination Concerning Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition- it's what will allow us to get our daughter's visa to enter the US. In the meantime, we'll write our Financial Statement tonight, so we can Fed Ex 90% of our Dossier information to US Asian Affairs to begin translation, notarization, and authentication for its submission to China.

If the INS approves our I600-A, it means that the government of the United States says we are fit to be parents, and the first half of the paperchase is complete. Keep your fingers crossed.

"You Look Like My Daddy..." - 6/27/2004

I was standing backstage at Disneyland today during my event when a little chinese girl came up to me and said, "You look like my daddy!" I asked her if she looked like her mommy and she replied "No, she looks like you too...but she is a mommy."

Then, without provocation she blurted out that she was 'dopted. I asked her name and she said it was Mai-Ling (pronounced my-ling)and she was 9 yrs old. I told her that my wife and I were going to adopt a little girl from China and she told me that we were very nice and she knew that we would get a cute little girl just like her!

I found the group leader and asked about the little girl and was told that Mai-Ling has known she was adopted since she was old enough to understand and has no problems telling anyone who will listen. She was too cute for words and I thought everyone might like to hear this story...

Still in delaysville!

Something To Watch - 06/22/2004

We know, we know: it's all fine and well to talk about this oddessy we're on, but how does it end?? What actually happens?
For a firsthand look, tune in (or set your VCRs & TiVos) to MSNBC this Saturday, June 26 (Jeff's Birthday, coincidentally) at 8pm ET for an encore of "China's Lost Girls" by National Geographic. Lisa Ling (from "The View") travels to China with a group of parents on the way to get their adopted daughters. It also discusses China's growing (and alarming) gender imbalance, why boys are preferred, and the girls themselves.

Very informative- bring Kleenex.

As We Come To A Screeching Halt 6/18/2004

Well! We thought we were on the move, and couldn't understand all these "delays" we read about on the adoption bulletin boards. We are now in Delayville.

I met with Karen, our Social Worker, on May 20something for our final visit. She went over the Homestudy (we passed with flying colors), and informed me that she just needed to type it up and I should get a proof via e-mail in about 3 weeks. Once it was approved, she would send us 3 copies: one to keep, 1 for the INS, and 1 for US Asian Affairs (USAA) our facilitators. The proof finally arrived on June 11. Along with a request for information on our volunteer activities. On June 14, we got a request for an additional years Tax info. So, we still don't have final notarized copies of the homestudy. Which means we still can't submit the I600A to the INS and begin the 6-8 week wait for approval.

Today I talked with Tracy from USAA, who informs me that there is a cut-off date each month for Dossier To China (DTC) submission. If we manage to get all our paperwork (including the I171-H form which is INS approval, which has only been given after the FBI ok's our fingerprints, which can only be done after we have filed the I600-A, which we can't do until we have a final Homestudy)in by the 5th of August, we would be DTC in Sept. The reality here is that Aug 5th would be pushing it. We are more likely to make the Sept 5th cutoff, which would make us DTC in Oct. I have been reading on the Adoption bulletin boards that some people have been getting referrals at about 6 1/2 months, but Tracy says that right now it's been running at about 8 months, but it is always subject to change. That timeline would mean we might get a referral next June, and would travel to China sometime next summer.

Welcome to the beginning of Hurry Up and Wait.

The End is Near - 5/12/2004

....well, the end of the Homestudy anyway! I just recieved e-mail this morning from Karen, our Social Worker,that all of our refrences have arrived, and the Homestudy is therefore, finished!! We need to schedule 1 final meeting where Karen will go over the homestudy with us, and give us copies to give to the INS and to US Asian Affairs (USAA) our facilitators; and we will give her certified copies of our birth/marriage/divorce certificates as well as pictures & a letter of guardianship to give to our Adoption Agency, Bal Jagat. We're almost over the first major hurdle!
As soon as we complete our last visit with Karen, we'll be off to file our I600A form (Application for Advanced Processing of Orphan)with the INS and get fingerprinted by the FBI. While we're doing that, USAA will be translating our Homestudy and vital documents into Chinese.
Thanks to everyone who wrote refrences, and helped us to get this far!