Any day now?

We're living our lives, going to family events, plugging away on getting the house "home study visit ready."  Still trying not to let the wait get to us, but of course it does, though we try to keep faith that everything will work out in the end.

Like other families who set out on the journey to adopt from Kazakhstan, we've started to have the "what if Kazakhstan never opens" conversations -- with each other and with our adoption agency.

There are rumors that Kazakhstan will open within the next few weeks.  But, of course, there have been rumors like this before, and nothing really came of them. No one seems to know anything, but there's hope, of course.  Even so, our agency does not want to string us along, and we have talked about what do to if there's no movement from Kazakhstan.

There are other options, of course.

There's Ukraine, but the general political instability there concerns us, even if adoptions are continuing to be processed. (At least for now -- who knows what tomorrow will bring?)  They also have a policy/process of "traveling blind" without a referral, and the children available are all age 5 and above or have moderate to severe special needs.  We have great respect for families who are called to adopt special needs children, but at this time, as first time parents, we do not feel that we are called in that direction.  Even if we were, however, traveling blind leads to very little time to review the child(ren) and their medical files.  We don't feel this is a good fit for us.

Then there's Bulgaria.  They have a good solid program, but their wait times for a referral are higher, so we'd prefer to keep this program as more of a "last resort."  They also don't seem to allow adoption of children under the age of two, which isn't a deal breaker for us exactly, but would narrow down the diversity (and potential number) of sibling groups that would work for us due to my younger age.

Latvia is another option, though a limited one due to my age and the fact that they rarely allow children under the age of nine to be adopted.  However, we are willing to explore this option if a waiting sibling group we qualify for becomes available.  If this happens, our agency will call us.  However, if we get much farther with another country, this option would no longer be viable, which is fine, because at least we would then be moving forward.

Kyrgyzstan is currently our first choice back-up country.  They are very culturally similar to Kazakhstan, and they are a Russian speaking country (many also speak Kyrgyz, but the orphanage we would adopt from is Russian speaking), which is good as we have been learning Russia. Kyrgyzstan borders Kazakhstan and is also a former Soviet republic.  There is less time in country on the first trip that Kazakhstan requires, though, and we have come to see the 30 day bonding period as a major blessing.  They are also not currently open, though they have allowed agencies in the US to apply to become accredited by the Kyrgyz government.  This country is at the "any day now" point in terms of announcing which agencies are accredited -- and our agency has applied.  The hope is that, following accreditation, Kyrgyzstan would accept dossiers fairly quickly, though this isn't guaranteed.

So where does this leave us?

Waiting, still, though waiting with more options, especially with Kyrgyzstan seemingly serious about reopening their adoption process. 

If Kyrgyzstan opens (meaning they've accepted our agency and are also accepting dossiers from US families), we will continue to wait for Kazakhstan until our anniversary in mid-May.  At that point, if Kazakhstan isn't open, we will pursue Kyrgyzstani adoption.

We appreciate prayers and support during this time of decision -- both for our own decision making and that of the countries involved.

Lent and the Wait

Lately, I feel like our entire lives could be summed up in various blog posts titled ____ and the Wait.  Christmas and the Wait.  Cleaning Up the House and the Wait.  Spending Time with Friends and Trying to Forget About the Wait Even When They Ask How the Wait is Going and, well, the Wait.

I try to keep this blog about adoption and related things -- so if religion in general or the Catholic religion in particular offends you, ignore this post.  Religion is not going to be a major subtopic of this blog. 

However, I do think I would be remiss if I were to lie and say that the Wait, the ever present, unrelenting Wait, doesn't effect my spiritual life.  And the optimistic part of me that hopes that everything will be A-Okay and our children will come home soon and one day some other future adoptive mama who is reading this (the way I now read blogs of families in the "kids are home" phase of adoption) with an aching spirit wondering how in the world to survive the wait will come along and hopefully be encouraged.  That part of me knows I need to talk about the spiritual/religious end of it all, because that future mother might struggle as well with the rotten stuff.

Or maybe this blog is mostly an echo chamber for me to rant -- and no one will be either offended or encouraged.

Either way, here goes.

Waiting is hard.

Everybody knows it.

Sometimes, there's a known timeline.  Little kids know how many days 'til Christmas, 'til summer vacation, 'til the family trip to Disneyland.  And there are all those little things that families do to make it easier -- Advent calendars full of chocolate, a Mickey Mouse pen to cross off days on the calendar.

Penance is hard, too.  If it isn't hard, it isn't penance.  That's why everyone knows, deep down, that giving up your least favorite food isn't a suitable Lenten sacrifice.  However, I know I'm counting down to April 20th.  I know that all the things I gave up will be waiting for me on Easter Sunday (and, in Catholic tradition, every Sunday is a "mini Easter" and penance and fasting are actually considered inappropriate).

With our adoption, we don't have an "due date."  We simply don't know what the future has in store, and there's no promises of a reprieve on April 20th.  The less patient part of me hopes we don't have to wait that long.  :P

Also in Catholic tradition, there is the concept of offering up suffering and penance for a particular purpose -- and that's something that, despite the ranting whiney tone of this post, I find really helpful in this.  Every inconvenience, every annoyance, adoption related or not, is something I try to remember to offer up for the cause of our adoption and for all the other families who wait for Kazakhstan to reopen as well.  And that includes the Wait itself.

It can really be as simple as asking the Lord to take the negative thing and use it for the good of whatever situation concerns you -- a sick relative, a slow adoption process, or even for your own spiritual development.

I'm far from perfect at this -- and in my weaker moments I wonder if this, and my other numerous weaknesses are the reason for the Wait -- but I'm working on it.  And Lent seems like the perfect time to work on it.

Thoughts on "What Not to Say."

Ah, the blogosphere -- everybody's got a soap box, and nobody's afraid to use it.  Well, it's my turn. 

And I know it's going to be controversial.

There's a "thing" in adoption blogging -- something that's even made it to internet news outlets like HuffPo and Parents.com.  Bloggers like to make lists -- everyone knows that.  And the type of list that adoptive parents like to make is the "What Not to Say to Adoptive Parents" list.  And I'm here to argue that those lists are an issue.

Oh, I get why people make them -- everyone who is adopting/has adopted/wants to adopt has had people say "dumb things" or ask "dumb questions" and we're all pretty sick of it.  Personally, if one more person asks why we aren't adopting from the Philippines (Papa Beast is Filipino), I might lose what's left of my sanity. 

Actually, no, that's not true.  Because I've gotten used to it, and I don't even have to think of what to say before, "The wait is long and we're not eligible anyway," comes rolling off my tongue.

And that's the thing really.  No matter what you do in life, people are going to question it.  Did you decide to be a stay at home wife and mother?  Yup, people are going to make ignorant comments and ask silly questions.  Decide not to complete your college degree?  Prepare for the floodgates to open.  Do you and your husband make the choice to attend the Latin Mass, which most people believe is a thing of the past?  You better be ready for some Grade A flack.

All that, without even getting into what happens when you marry outside your country of origin and get to endure an interview designed to discover whether or not you have entered into a "green card marriage" or a "real marriage" and then, after the interview, having your own lawyer say, "I know you're planning to adopt, but you really should try to get pregnant -- it'll help with the immigration case."

None of that is fun, but sometimes being a grown up isn't fun. 

And sometimes you have to deal with people who annoy you, get in your way, slow you down, etc.  This isn't the exclusive domain of adoptive parents, sadly.  We have all found ourselves behind the driver who decides to balance the checkbook at a red light and forgets to go when it turns green.  We've all had some assumptions made about us that turn out to be false -- like people assuming that I speak Spanish because of my last name, which I got from my Filipino husband who doesn't speak Spanish either.

You can't change the whole world to think like you, read your mind, etc, etc.  There will always be people who see our last name and expect us to be Spanish speakers.  There will always be people who hear the word "Kazakhstan" and think "Borat."  And there will always be people who ask you why you can't have "your own children."

The part we can control is how we react.

Personally, I have some people (my husband, my parents, my close friends) who I know will listen to me vent and then help me laugh it off. Because, in the end, that's all you can do.

Kazakhstan in Sochi

The thing I wait four years for is finally here -- the Winter Olympics.  Oh, sure, I love the Summer Games, too, especially the gymnastics (Go Aliya Mustafina!), but figure skating is my first love.  I used to compete locally when I lived in Northern California, and I've been a life long fan of the sport ever since I first saw Gordeeva and Grinkov in 1994.

This year, though, there is a little something extra exciting about the Olympics.  Between it being in Russia -- a country and culture I have always loved -- and the excitement of the new Team Figure Skating event, there is plenty of reason for excitement.  But there's something more, too.  This year, we are rooting for Kazakhstan, wherever we can.

Denis Ten has a good shot at a medal in the Men's event.  His silver medal performance at Worlds last year was a true joy to watch -- he even won the free skate portion.  This season has been a bit more rocky for him -- but I have faith that he will peak at the right time.





Also from Kazakhstan (by birth, at least), though representing Russia, is the lovely and talented young ice dancer Elena Ilinykh.  She and her partner Nikita Katsalapov were among the winners of the Team Figure Skating event.  They will go down in history as being part of the first team to win it!  While they sometimes struggle with consistency, they have oodles of talent, and at 19 and 22 they are both young by Ice Dance standards.  They are considered a threat for the Bronze medal, but podium finish or no, they promise to be lovely to watch.

It's Russian Christmas...

It's been a long time since I posted -- National Novel Writing Month (aka November to normal people) and Christmas really took a lot of our time.

But here we are, and it's the day they celebrate Christmas in Russia, and, by extension, in Kazakhstan, at least for those Kazakhstanis who are Russian Orthodox.  And, because the region we have been assigned to is a heavily ethnic Russian area, I have a hunch that our kids, whoever, wherever, they are, are celebrating Christmas today.  At least, they will be celebrating to whatever degree the orphanage celebrates Christmas.

I saw this graphic today on the Creating a Family Facebook group, and since it isn't anyone's personal photo, I felt that I could take the liberty of sharing it here on the blog because it really sums up how I feel today -- and always, really.

 

I've got to be honest: I wonder about our children every single day, to some degree.  The wondering is just more so, today, because it's Christmas where they are.  I was able to avoid worrying about them too much -- hoping they were having the Christmas celebration every child deserves -- on December 25 because I knew that, to them, it wasn't actually Christmas.  They wouldn't know what they were missing.  Even so, I thought of them, and I prayed -- and still do pray -- that they will be home safe by next December 25, that we will be able to celebrate Christmas as a family and that all will be right in our small corner of the world.

 

Which brings me to another graphic I found on the internet today -- it seems to be the day for that around these parts.

 

And for those kids -- whoever, wherever they are -- we have to keep going, keep fighting.  Keep doing paperwork, keep waiting for Kazakhstan to start taking dossiers from American families.

 

And that's what we are now -- an American family, with two valid, current US passports to our names.  I needed a name change, and it actually came back slower than my husband's request for a new/first time passport that was sent the same day.  Something funny happened, though, when I got my old passport back -- a holy card from the war memorial (WWI) chapel at Bassano del Grappa fell out of my old passport.  It had been there since my most recent trip to Italy in 2007.  I'm going to put the card in my new passport -- a little piece of Italy, and of my great-grandfather, to take to Kazakhstan with us when we go to bring our children home.  Whenever that is.

Annnnd everything I posted yesterday is false...

We just got a letter in the mail.

PapaBeast will be sworn in on Nov 20.  So much for anything the government tells you...even the bad news is sometimes false, praise the Lord.  :-p

If, and it's a big, huge, elephant sized if, the state department's current estimates for passport processing time are correct, and passports really are taking 4 weeks, PapaBeast could have a US Passport in hand by Christmas.

Citizenship Approved and a New Template

Papa Beast is approved for Naturalization to the United States! 

However, he is not yet a US Citizen.  Basically, the approval is similar to a marriage license and just like you need a ceremony to be married (at least here in California, your laws may vary :p), you need to take the Oath of Citizenship to become a citizen.

Unlike getting married, however, you don't get the government go ahead during the week and then have your ceremony on the weekend.  Oh no, things aren't that easy in government land.

Instead, you wait. 

It can take up to a month to get a notice in the mail with your date, time, and location to appear to take the oath.  That doesn't stop me from stalking the mailbox several times a day, six days a week (when it isn't a Federal holiday).  I tell myself that it's because I'm expecting a book from Amazon or the replacement for a damaged Blu-ray disc.  Those things I tell myself are lies.

That isn't to say that I'm not incredibly thankful that things are moving ahead -- but it isn't easy to know that it will take months more to get my husband his passport, which is needed for our dossier.

So, while we wait, I do silly things like tinker with the blog template.  I like this one, because I do like yellow and grey -- I might try to add a little blue, though to reflect the colors of the flag of Kazakhstan.  Hmmm...back to tinkering.