Right now we are in a race to get the home study completed which means our social worker has to write an 8-10 page report on her approval for us to adopt and get in one last document for it to be complete. Fees for the United States Citizen and Immigration Service (USCIS) application will go up on Nov. 23rd. We can only turn in that application when the home study is finished. Soooo, that is our next hurdle. We have been all over town and even bugging Illinois looking for official documents that tell people all kinds of things about us. Make sure they are notarized. Make sure we have copies. Make sure we mail them into the office instead of hand delivering them. Oh my.
After we get our USCIS application in we will wait on a fingerprinting date. While we wait we will try to finish collecting more official documents for our dossier. This is the document that will contain our original home study report with the above documents and it will go to Ethiopia to be translated by the MoWA (Ministry of Women's Affairs) and then they will hopefully approve us to adopt through their country.
We are still reading and learning about Ethiopia and parenting an adopted child. One thing that was recently sent to me by our placing agency was this note. It was very moving for us and I thought I would share it with you.
This was written by the ministry director at our placing agency.
"The parents I have sat with in their dark hut have put a tremendous amount of time and thought into their adoption decision and have tried every which way .... from other relatives taking their children for a time, to selling her body through prostitution to earn enough money to feed them ... and then getting sick with HIV as a result .... to finally hearing about a window where she/he can ensure that their child will get enough to eat, will get an education, and will be lovingly taken care of for life.
I was so surprised when I started really getting immersed with adoption in Ethiopia. I assumed it would be all about the kids. I did not know that 50% of my work there would be interfacing with birth families. I do as much work with families as I do with the children ... maybe even more! I find that the same exact dynamics I deal with here in the U.S. are present in Ethiopia. The core value of Adoption Ministry is meeting the needs of birth families. I have carried that same heart to Ethiopia and find myself loving on mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles, grandmas and grandpas. I was under the false assumption that once the children were placed in our orphanages, that would be the last of the birth family. Not so! These families love their children like you love yours! They are intimately connected and concerned. They want pictures and letters after their child(ren) leave. So, I have a larger and larger circle of brave men and women who I need to visit every time I go to Ethiopia. I love these people! I want to show them how their children are adjusting and they get such delight out of the pictures and letters. Just as in the U.S. I want to do whatever I can to see that birth families heal and have a positive adoption experience. As much as it is in my power, I want them to have peace with their decision.
Americans set a higher bar for the poor women of Ethiopia (I'll use women because the majority of relinquishments come from women for the obvious reasons) than we do for our own, affluent society. Here in America, a man and a woman (one parent does not have to be dead as in Ethiopia), no matter what their socio-economic situation, can make an adoption decision, sign some papers (one time deal) and walk away. We honor these people for giving life to their children and then taking a further step to ensure their children are well taken care of. In most cases, the reasons for adoption are inability to provide economically, not in a place where they want to take on parenthood, mental health issues, wanting an intact family for their child ... etc. These are the same exact reasons people place for adoption in Ethiopia, yet we are aghast when a single dad or mom (many times sick, many times teenagers, always so poor they can barely provide food for their child) asks an agency to find a good family for their child(ren). Dare we, sitting in our comfortable living rooms (even the American poor are affluent in comparison) judge these desperate, good people? The majority are simply the most poor and marginalized in society and have taken the very hard and very complicated steps to give their child a future and some hope. I have people all the time want assurances that the reason a mother is placing her child for adoption is because she is dying. They wouldn't want to "take" a child from a mother for any other reason. Our country representative is frustrated and totally puzzled by this attitude. He says to me, "Is not poverty enough reason?" I tell him that we Americans do not understand poverty. Here in America, there is always a way. You want something badly enough, you can find a way to get it. There is welfare, food stamps, food banks, free lunches and dinners ... you can find something to eat. In Ethiopia, there are no social services and women have no 'rights,' usually no means of earning an income and no hope."
Thanks for being a part of our lives and for praying for us and our child and their birth family along this journey we are on.
With love,
Becky
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