I have to say that the more people I tell about our adoption, the more I am amazed at their responses. Sure, I get those "Why would you want to adopt from Bulgaria?" or "What if something's wrong with her?" comments, but for every rude comment I get, I think I get 10 more complimentary ones. People are genuinely interested in knowing more about the whole process, and I think the question I get the most is "Have you met her yet?" followed by "When do you get to pick her up?". So I'm sure that if all these random people in the "real" world want to know, then so do you wonderful internet friends of mine. So here goes.
Adoption is not usually a quick process. Whether it be domestic or international, adoption is about red tape galore. I mean if I had a penny for all the miles of red tape, I'd be a wealthy woman. As much red tape as there is domestically, there is twice as much internationally. For example, the FBI fingerprints. Those babies are reserved for international adoption and even then, not all international adoptions require them. And to put the cherry on the sundae, they have to be done in ink. One of most important government agencies can't be bothered with things such as electronic fingerprints, or so I'm told.
Another aspect of all adoptions is the home study. Which by the way ours has been submitted for review! Hooray! In case you don't know the home study is basically a report (ours is 20 pages long), that states that you are physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually ready to adopt. It also talks about the state of your home and your finances.
While we are finishing up the home study, we are also working on compiling our dossier. It's a French word. Look up the pronunciation. Please don't say it like it looks. The dossier gets submitted to Bulgaria. It will include lots of documents, including our beautiful home study. Somewhere in this we have to be refingerprinted. This time electronically. Once our dossier is submitted, it's all out of our hands. Let the nail-biting begin. I hate being out of control. I. Am. A. Control. Freak. (If any of my fourth graders read this, I'm in trouble. Big time grammar issues!)
So right now we are still gathering paperwork and waiting for my fingerprints to be approved. I know I've exhausted the topic of my fingerprints. At this point you are saying, "Good grief Courtney! Quit whining about your stinkin fingerprints!". But people I need them to complete our dossier. Again I say "Come on FBI!" We hope to submit our dossier by the end of May or beginning of June.
Then the wait begins. Now here is the thing. The wait can be long. Like years long. Like around 2 years long. At the end of the wait we receive a referral, which we either accept or decline. If we accept (which we most likely will), we get our travel dates. Within a month we will travel to Bulgaria to meet and spend 5 days with our baby. Now for the clincher. We come home. Without our baby. For 2-4 months. Ugh . . . During this time Bulgaria will process our paperwork, so that when we go back the court appearance is merely a formality. The second trip will be approximately 7-10 days, and then we head home with our little girl. Everybody say "Hallelujah!" When we come home we will have to complete 5 post adoption reports, but the adoption is finalized in Bulgaria.
So there ladies and gents, is the international adoption process in a very simplified nutshell. This is why my FBI fingerprints are so important. Did I mention we need them for our dossier? Oh I did? Good, just wanted to make sure we were clear on all that. Anyway, we are not on the waiting list until we submit our dossier to Bulgaria and it has been accepted. Hence all the whining.
No comments:
Post a Comment