Some people have asked about what the process of adoption will look like for us. So I'm going to try to break it down (as much as I know anyway) and explain some of what we will have to do and the fees that will be required along the way.
STEP ONE: The first thing we had to do was choose a country. Now I know that seems like the easiest part, but how do you choose one over another? Aren't all the children from all the countries equally in need of families? We had to start by narrowing down ones we knew we couldn't adopt from yet. Now, at the time we were under the impression that as long as you were of age for that particular country, you could adopt with the help of an agency from the USA. When we started this it was partially true, but this summer (2014) that all changed. Because of the new Hague Convention being heavily enforced in America, we have to comply with a Hague accredited agency. This means that the pool of agencies that we were looking at got significantly smaller. It might have been fine had we lived and adopted from the US, but at this point it does affect us. The Hague convention is doing amazing things to protect the children involved in adoption, as well as adoptive parents, so I don't want to come across as if this is just a huge unnecessary obstacle I wish would be taken away. The main problems it presented us with at the time was that 1) most agencies that were Hague accredited would only accept potential parents 25 years or older, 2) it took several countries we were considering out of the equation entirely.
While I'm talking about choosing the country, I must mention a few we considered and why we decided against them. The first one was China. This was shot down almost immediately because China requires adoptive parents to be 30+ years, and have many requirements like taking the child to the country your from instead of staying in China.
The second we really wrestled with was the USA. The main problem we encountered was the lack of information of expats adopting from America. We weren't sure if we could even qualify. The other thing that led to us not pursuing information heavily was that since we were considering adopting a toddler to an older child, the adjustment might just be too much. Going to a new country with a new family that doesn't speak your language and then moving to ANOTHER country that speaks an entirely different language. Coming from an American foster system, there might even be HUGE behavioral problems created by the handing off of the child to family after family. While we believe these issues could be over come with love the requirements for expats was to sketchy and varied from State to State.
We also considered countries closer to us like South Korea, Taiwan, Philippines, etc. But they didn't pan out for different reasons.
The country we originally landed on was Poland. The reason for this was a book we had read
A Guide To Almost Free International Adoption, which outlined a way to adopt without an agency. It was TONS cheaper, and we knew we had the motivation to do it on our own with just an attorney's help. However, while inquiring with an agency about a home study, we found out about the Hague convention. It was required for all international adoptions to go through an American Hague Accredited agency starting in 2014. We knew we would not be able to complete our adoption with less than a year between us and the new rule, so we decided to open our options again and pray about other countries.
After much research (which before you pry into an adoptive families reasons for NOT choosing another country, know that it is a very, very difficult decision) we decided on Bulgaria. Our reasons for Bulgaria are outlined in another blog post. See (
http://d-carrs.blogspot.sg/2013/12/decision-on-which-country-bulgaria.html)
But also know that we could have chosen a number of other countries, but felt led towards Bulgaria. I can't describe it much better than that. We went over cost, location, race, ages available, why they were orphans, and facilities for orphanages. Some of our reasons might seem trivial, but like I said, it was a very difficult decision for us, and you really can't get started on the next step until you decide firmly.
STEP TWO: Choosing an agency proved harder for us than I would have thought. There was just a list on a website that told about agencies that offer adoption from Bulgaria (like I said, the country decision had to be made first, or we wouldn't have had a way to search for a good agency to help us). We had to look for a Hague accredited agency that would work with expats, provide a home study for expats OR allow another company/agency to perform the home study, be available for our time zone, and show integrity in their adoptions. We had to look at a ton of little factors too; things like Christian vs secular, location in the US, technology use, adoptions per year, and many other things.
We were between about five agencies so I emailed them all asking questions about their agency, the program for Bulgaria, and most importantly, did they work with expats! A few immediately answered that they did not work with expats, so they were crossed off the list. There was an agency that never answered back, crossed off. And then there were two. I was between two agencies that both looked great for us. I eventually had to be specific in what I wanted, be a little picky and I landed on MLJ adoption agency in Indiana.
There were several things that just really made MLJ appealing for us. The first was that they answered IMMEDIATELY every time. The second is that they had a much better website and were more liberal with the information the placed there. The third was the lady that is over our program is a Christian who has adopted herself named Lydia Tarr. And the last thing is that MLJ and Mrs. Tarr have blogs that are updated with amazing information constantly. All of that together was just reassuring.
STEP THREE: This one can look different for other adoptive families, but for us the next step is fundraising and saving money. The reason for this is that we have been working very diligently on getting out of debt, and the total cost of our adoption will be from $27,000-34,000. We have worked our way through Financial Peace University by David Ramsey, and we are on our way to being debt free, hopefully by the time we bring our kids home! We honestly struggled doing the fundraising BEFORE the home study because we didn't want to appear overeager and uninformed about how adoption really works.
We were a little afraid that people wouldn't want to help us so early in the process, knowing we hadn't completed our home study. On that note, I need to add that for if some reason we don't pass our home study and we are unable to adopt, we will donate the money raised to helping orphans in some form. We would really at that point like to try again, knowing what we had done wrong and continue our adoption plans, but we are open to just donating to another couple adopting or an organization helping orphans.
We have been saving money ourselves as part of the budget we came up with, and have selling certain things that proceeds our adoption. We have gotten some sweet gifts from family and friends as well, and there is a link on our blog and our Facebook page (
https://www.facebook.com/AdoptingaBurgundyWillow?ref_type=bookmark). Add us and follow us to find out about upcoming fundraising events!
STEP FOUR: The first thing we are saving up for is applying to the agency and getting the home study. We don't know exactly how much this will cost as our circumstance is a little different than most other adoptive families. For most people it costs around $3,000-5,000 to get the adoption started, and $5,000 for the home study. We now have enough money to cover that first fee (at least the $3,000) and we are confident we will be able to raise the money for the home study by February/March 2015.
STEP FIVE: This step is a little fuzzy to me, but I'll try to let you know what I know about it. This is the step that we submit a dossier (said "doss-ee-ay") and later in this step, we will accept a referral of a child or sibling group. At the point the dossier is filed and we accept the referral, we have to pay anywhere from $9,000-19,000 depending on circumstances. The dossier, in short, is a file about us. It will include all the paper work that is involved in adoption. It will have the home study, our financial and employment information, our marriage license, birth certificates, medical reports, immigration approval, reference letters and an adoption education completion certificate. In all it will have anywhere from 8-15 documents included, and all of it is sent to the country we want to adopt from. Once we send the dossier, we wait.
Here's where I found the information about the dossier:
(
http://www.mljadoptions.com/blog/what-is-an-adoption-dossier-20130108)
We wait for a referral for a child or sibling group. We can also check out waiting children who have special needs (being an older child or part of a sibling group counts as a special need). Once we find a child(ren) that we are interested in we can let the agency know and see if they are still available for adoption. I actually set up an account already with a website, and it lets me know when children matching our profile become available. A few weeks back they sent a picture of these little girls that nearly broke my heart to have to wait for. It was comforting to pray for a family for them though.
The wait time for a child(ren) from Bulgaria, I'm told, depends entirely on your flexibility. The more special needs you are open to, the easier time they have matching a child to you. Once we accept, it will be about four to six months until everything is processed and we can move on to my favorite step!
Here are some wait times others have had from our agency: (
http://www.mljadoptions.com/blog/flexibility-key-to-shorter-wait-for-families-adopting-from-bulgaria-20140707)
STEP FIVE: Travel! Oh, how this word excites me! This will be the point that we travel to meet our children, and set up a court date to go pick them up! We'll get to meet them, ask them if we can be their mommy and daddy and they can be ours forever, see where they've been living, play with them and give them some simple gifts! We will be there approximately a week the first time, and I think this might even be part of accepting the referral. The second time will be to get everything court official and bring our kids home! At this point we will need to pay a $3,000-6,000 fee, and I'm not entirely sure if that includes our plane tickets, translator and other transportation and accommodations.
Now that I've gone through the basics of what our adoption process will look like, can you think of any questions you would like answered personally or think that I should find out? I have done a ton of research, but there is still so much information out there yet to be found! I would appreciate any input or advice as well! I love hearing from you!
