Today, Val and I went to the travel clinic to get our shots. Its hard to believe that at this time last year we had just started talking about adoption. We had talked about it, Val being more serious about it than myself, but neither of us knew very much about it. So many questions arise in that initial stage. Are we capable of raising more children? Can we afford the process right now? Domestic or international? What if our adopted child has special needs? How difficult will it be raising a multi racial family? It would take a couple more months of major prayer and a tonne of research before we would commit to doing this.
The year has flown by, and the shots today reminded me of how fast this process up to date has been and how soon we might be traveling! (maybe November or December) A year might sound long to some of you, but many international adoptions take three years, depending on the country.
The list of vaccinations and oral medication we had to take today was quite extensive. Yellow fever, Typhoid, Tetanus, Malaria, Cholera, and Hepatitis A and B. I already had the Hep shots years ago because of my occupation, so I had three needles whereas Val had 4. My shoulder is killing me right now, apparently from the yellow fever shot, so I imagine Val, having an extra needle and being quite petit, must be pretty sore!
Posted by Derek
Showing posts with label Our adoption story. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Our adoption story. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 05, 2011
Monday, September 19, 2011
It's official!!!
It’s been a month, and I have lots to say today!
When I wrote last, we were on our way to the approval meeting in Toronto, at our agency. On the day of the appointment, we dropped our oldest 3 children off at the bus stop and our youngest child at a good friend’s house.
[Many of our close friends have been incredibly supportive and helpful in this whole process, watching our kids, writing reference letter after reference letter....we are so thankful for our friends!!! It is so important to have a strong support system while you are adopting, during the process and after!]
So we were on our way. It was our first day alone in weeks, so it was a bit of a date for us I guess, and it was great to have the time to talk on the way to Toronto.
We arrived at the consulate’s office at 10, just as it was opening. We met with the consulate, who signed and sealed our documents and we were out of there in about 20 minutes. Thinking we would have to wait a long time, we had not scheduled our adoption meeting until after lunch. So, while we waited, we went to a local Afghan restaurant and ate some delicious kabobs for lunch. Toronto is a fabulous place to try all sorts of different foods, and we’ve tried to eat at a different ethnic restaurant whenever we go.
After our meal we headed to our agency. We handed in our papers and documents, signed some more papers and documents and wrote out a cheque! And our adoption became OFFICIAL!!
One exciting thing that we talked about at the meeting, was the appointment of a sort of liaison in Guyana. This is a woman that has just been hired by our agency since we last spoke to them. She will be in Guyana, working on our behalf to find a suitable match for our family. She will be doing the work that we were expecting to have to do on our first trip. Her job will be to identify a child that matches our government criteria (namely born after July 2010), making sure that child is adoptable, and getting a medical done for them before we even hear about it.
Basically it is saving us a trip! We don’t have to travel to each individual orphanage anymore looking for a baby, we will just get a referral like most other countries do. This is a huge relief on many levels. We are excited that we are not required to go “pick” a child as this task seemed impossible! Also, we are thrilled that we may not have to go to Guyana 3 times. We love the idea of going to see the country where our child was born, but it will be so hard to leave our other children behind every time. One less trip is also much more affordable, (although we are paying extra to have a liaison in place it’s still less then paying for 2 more flights!).
So now, our papers are on their way to Guyana. Actually by now they are probably sitting on the desk of our liaison!
And we wait. This time though, we are waiting for a phone call saying that a baby has been found!!!!
This call could come anytime. More then likely it won’t be next week, and realistically it could take months. But, it could be as soon as NOVEMBER!!!!
Now, this first trip will be a shorter one. Maybe as long as 10 days or as short as just a week. We will go to Guyana, meet our baby :) and register the adoption with the courts in Guyana. Then, when our intentions are made known we fly back to Canada without our baby, and wait until the court reconvenes, which usually takes about 2 months. At that time, we may travel again, this time for a longer trip of 3 or 4 weeks. At that time we will be able to finalize the adoption and take our baby to Trinidad for a visa so we can take him or her home with us.
So for now, we have some more work to do! We have an appointment booked at our local travel clinic for the first week of October to go get travel vaccinations. The list is long: Tuberculosis, Typhoid, Yellow Fever, Rabies, Hepatitis A and B, Cholera, Dengue Fever, anti malaria drugs.....we are going to be protected against everything you could think of!! Most of these drugs are between $40 and $200, and we are very fortunate that Derek’s drug plan covers all of them!!! What a relief! Many of them need to be given 2 or 3 times over the course of 4-6 weeks, so that is why we are getting them right away. We’ve also started looking at hotels, flights and other things like that, just to get a feel for what is in the country. Pretty exciting stuff happening here!! We are so thankful that everything is going so smoothly so far. It’s been about a year since we first brought up the word adoption in our home, and only 9 months since our home study began and here we are getting vaccinations already!
God is so good :)
When I wrote last, we were on our way to the approval meeting in Toronto, at our agency. On the day of the appointment, we dropped our oldest 3 children off at the bus stop and our youngest child at a good friend’s house.
[Many of our close friends have been incredibly supportive and helpful in this whole process, watching our kids, writing reference letter after reference letter....we are so thankful for our friends!!! It is so important to have a strong support system while you are adopting, during the process and after!]
So we were on our way. It was our first day alone in weeks, so it was a bit of a date for us I guess, and it was great to have the time to talk on the way to Toronto.
We arrived at the consulate’s office at 10, just as it was opening. We met with the consulate, who signed and sealed our documents and we were out of there in about 20 minutes. Thinking we would have to wait a long time, we had not scheduled our adoption meeting until after lunch. So, while we waited, we went to a local Afghan restaurant and ate some delicious kabobs for lunch. Toronto is a fabulous place to try all sorts of different foods, and we’ve tried to eat at a different ethnic restaurant whenever we go.
After our meal we headed to our agency. We handed in our papers and documents, signed some more papers and documents and wrote out a cheque! And our adoption became OFFICIAL!!
One exciting thing that we talked about at the meeting, was the appointment of a sort of liaison in Guyana. This is a woman that has just been hired by our agency since we last spoke to them. She will be in Guyana, working on our behalf to find a suitable match for our family. She will be doing the work that we were expecting to have to do on our first trip. Her job will be to identify a child that matches our government criteria (namely born after July 2010), making sure that child is adoptable, and getting a medical done for them before we even hear about it.
Basically it is saving us a trip! We don’t have to travel to each individual orphanage anymore looking for a baby, we will just get a referral like most other countries do. This is a huge relief on many levels. We are excited that we are not required to go “pick” a child as this task seemed impossible! Also, we are thrilled that we may not have to go to Guyana 3 times. We love the idea of going to see the country where our child was born, but it will be so hard to leave our other children behind every time. One less trip is also much more affordable, (although we are paying extra to have a liaison in place it’s still less then paying for 2 more flights!).
So now, our papers are on their way to Guyana. Actually by now they are probably sitting on the desk of our liaison!
And we wait. This time though, we are waiting for a phone call saying that a baby has been found!!!!
This call could come anytime. More then likely it won’t be next week, and realistically it could take months. But, it could be as soon as NOVEMBER!!!!
Now, this first trip will be a shorter one. Maybe as long as 10 days or as short as just a week. We will go to Guyana, meet our baby :) and register the adoption with the courts in Guyana. Then, when our intentions are made known we fly back to Canada without our baby, and wait until the court reconvenes, which usually takes about 2 months. At that time, we may travel again, this time for a longer trip of 3 or 4 weeks. At that time we will be able to finalize the adoption and take our baby to Trinidad for a visa so we can take him or her home with us.
So for now, we have some more work to do! We have an appointment booked at our local travel clinic for the first week of October to go get travel vaccinations. The list is long: Tuberculosis, Typhoid, Yellow Fever, Rabies, Hepatitis A and B, Cholera, Dengue Fever, anti malaria drugs.....we are going to be protected against everything you could think of!! Most of these drugs are between $40 and $200, and we are very fortunate that Derek’s drug plan covers all of them!!! What a relief! Many of them need to be given 2 or 3 times over the course of 4-6 weeks, so that is why we are getting them right away. We’ve also started looking at hotels, flights and other things like that, just to get a feel for what is in the country. Pretty exciting stuff happening here!! We are so thankful that everything is going so smoothly so far. It’s been about a year since we first brought up the word adoption in our home, and only 9 months since our home study began and here we are getting vaccinations already!
God is so good :)
Tuesday, September 06, 2011
Approval!
As some of you know already we finally got our letter of approval from the government of Ontario!!!
Another step done.
So now on Thursday we head to Toronto. First, we meet with the consulate of Guyana in Toronto. We have a document that we have to sign in his or her presence. Doesn't that sound important? I think it sounds almost intimidating! I'm not sure why we have to sign it in the presence of an official, but after we have done that we are allowed to send our documents to Guyana.
It's almost like an approval to send our approval so that we may be approved once more. Whew.
Next, we are heading to our agency for our official approval meeting. There we will hand in our document, our 2 character references, and our marriage licence, passports will get notarized again. This time our agency has volunteered to do that for free, which is wonderful considering how expensive it really is to get it done by a lawyer!
Oh yes, we also have to give what is called a retainer fee, which is basically a lump sum of money we give our agency in trust, for costs (paperwork, people working on our behalf in Guyana, lawyers fees, court fees, other fees, more paperworks, etc. etc. etc).
And then.....(drumroll please....) we are officially EXPECTING!!!! (In adoption terms of course).
After this meeting our paperwork and profile will be sent to Guyana to the Red Cross Home there. We could hear from them anytime after our paperwork gets approved by the government of Guyana. We are thinking months, but it may be less or more depending on the availability of children.
Another step done.
So now on Thursday we head to Toronto. First, we meet with the consulate of Guyana in Toronto. We have a document that we have to sign in his or her presence. Doesn't that sound important? I think it sounds almost intimidating! I'm not sure why we have to sign it in the presence of an official, but after we have done that we are allowed to send our documents to Guyana.
It's almost like an approval to send our approval so that we may be approved once more. Whew.
Next, we are heading to our agency for our official approval meeting. There we will hand in our document, our 2 character references, and our marriage licence, passports will get notarized again. This time our agency has volunteered to do that for free, which is wonderful considering how expensive it really is to get it done by a lawyer!
Oh yes, we also have to give what is called a retainer fee, which is basically a lump sum of money we give our agency in trust, for costs (paperwork, people working on our behalf in Guyana, lawyers fees, court fees, other fees, more paperworks, etc. etc. etc).
And then.....(drumroll please....) we are officially EXPECTING!!!! (In adoption terms of course).
After this meeting our paperwork and profile will be sent to Guyana to the Red Cross Home there. We could hear from them anytime after our paperwork gets approved by the government of Guyana. We are thinking months, but it may be less or more depending on the availability of children.
Monday, July 18, 2011
Another Step in the Process
This week we got a letter in the mail from our adoption agency. We are about 2 or 3 weeks away from getting an approval letter from the government of Ontario! So before we get that we have a few things to do:
We have to get 3 more reference letters (because the 6 references we handed in at the beginning of the process isn't enough :)
We have to send in our marriage certificate and passports for the 3rd time to get notarized again!
We have to go to the Guyanese consulate office in Toronto and sign a document in the presence of the consulate.
Once we have this done, and we receive our letter of approval then we meet with our agency for an approval session, where more papers will be signed and of course some fees will be paid :)
And then.......we wait for the okay from our agency to GO TO GUYANA!!!
That could take months, or weeks. It's up to the discretion of our agency. They will call the Red Cross in Guyana to determine if there is a chance there may be children available now, or if we should wait a few months....so I guess time will tell. But things are moving along again! If you'd like to pray for us, please pray for this baby that we haven't met yet. Most likely he or she is born already or just about to be born. It is a bit un-nerving knowing that your child is out there and you cannot protect them from anything for the first year of their life!!
We have to get 3 more reference letters (because the 6 references we handed in at the beginning of the process isn't enough :)
We have to send in our marriage certificate and passports for the 3rd time to get notarized again!
We have to go to the Guyanese consulate office in Toronto and sign a document in the presence of the consulate.
Once we have this done, and we receive our letter of approval then we meet with our agency for an approval session, where more papers will be signed and of course some fees will be paid :)
And then.......we wait for the okay from our agency to GO TO GUYANA!!!
That could take months, or weeks. It's up to the discretion of our agency. They will call the Red Cross in Guyana to determine if there is a chance there may be children available now, or if we should wait a few months....so I guess time will tell. But things are moving along again! If you'd like to pray for us, please pray for this baby that we haven't met yet. Most likely he or she is born already or just about to be born. It is a bit un-nerving knowing that your child is out there and you cannot protect them from anything for the first year of their life!!
Friday, May 06, 2011
Recommended for Approval!
We are done our homestudy! We finished our last interview a couple of weeks ago and felt it hadn't gone that well. I had just finished working a 24 hour shift and was a little tired and grumpy. I felt like I was arguing a lot, and Val was worried that I had put our homestudy in jeopardy. Turns out we worried for nothing. Our practitioner has finished her report (its almost 20 pages!)and we got the chance to read it this week. Val and I are very relieved to get this hurdle past us.
My mom gave Val some luggage for her birthday last week.(very thought full!) It's funny because we've been dwelling on the homestudy for so long we haven't even thought about travelling a whole lot. Even though we might not go to Guyana for a while yet, it's slowly starting to feel like more of a reality.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Update on our situation
A few weeks ago we posted that we needed extra prayer because of a situation concerning our adoption. At the time, our agency contacted us and wanted to know if we would be willing to take two children. A woman approached the Red Cross in Guyana giving her intent to put her two little girls up for adoption, as long as they weren't split up. This was a very unique request considering we hadn't finished our homestudy, we hadn't officially signed on with the agency or paid our retainer fee. In addition to this, Guyana does not operate on a referral system. Although we weren't considering taking two children at the time, we readily accepted. The reason why we didn't post this on line was because it was very tentative and up in the air, but we needed your prayers and we thank you for doing so without knowing the reasons behind it! We didn't hear from our agency for several weeks, but in those weeks we applied for citizenship for a second child just in case. We found out yesterday however, that this adoption of the two girls is not going to go through. The mother has decided to keep her girls and raise them herself. While this has obviously been disappointing for us, it's good to hear that the family is staying together. We had been praying for the mother from the beginning, and we're glad she is in a place that she feels that she can take care of her children.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Pray!
Hi Friends!
There has been some new developments in our adoption journey!! Because of the nature of the situation we are in, we can't really elaborate at all, other than to ask you all to PLEASE PRAY for us! I promise that when we can, we will fill you in on what is going on here, but for now what we really need is lots and lots of prayer.
Over the last few weeks, and in particular the last few days Derek and I have seen God leading us in dramatic ways. It is amazing how when you ask, He answers.....and not always in the way you expect. In fact, sometimes He answers in a way that is better than you could ever imagine!!!
Monday, March 07, 2011
Telling our other children
When we first came to the realization that adoption was the way we would be going, we didn't really tell our children. Our oldest is 6 and our youngest is 2, we thought a wait of 2 or more years would be a long time for little munchkins to understand. But we did slowly start to introduce the idea to them. At supper we always have devotions and prayer with our kids and so one day we suggested that we pray for the orphans in the world. Kaylie, who is 4 said "what's an orphan?". So we explained how there are many children in the world who have no mom's and dad's and that they are called orphans. "That's horrible!" she cried. "They should come and live here, we have lots of room for orphans"
Well, that was easy :)
Everyday we talk a bit more about that idea. One day Derek said to them "What if we did take one of those orphans to live here with us?" Ryan said, " That would be great!" Derek said "Well, what if the one we took home had different color skin then you....maybe a bit darker? Maybe even black?"
(Awkward Silence)
Ryan : "Well that is no big deal, when they move here they won't be in the sun as much, so their tan will go away and they will be more pink"
(oh boy....)
Jack: "Ummmmm. That wouldn't be good. It would be really wierd."
Yikes. I guess we have a bit of work to do. Actually, since then Jack has gotten used to that idea.
They have no time frame in their minds except for "one day, when our baby comes home...." and for now, that is good enough.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Some Basic Info
I just wanted to give you a little overview of what we will be working towards in the next couple years. Yes, years. This is not going to be a quick and easy thing. Actually the more I read about it, the more I suspect that this is going to take a lonnnnnnng time.
But, that's okay. We are ready for a wait, (although ask me again in a year and a half and I might not be so optimistic).
So here's the quick version:
- Decided to adopt internationally
- Researched agencies to see what options were out there (still doing that!!)
- Contacted an adoption practitioner in October and were told to call back in January
- Met with an agency in November just to get some info
- Met with 2 couples to talk with them about their adoption experiences....learned a lot from that!
- Booked a Homestudy in January and had our first meeting the 2nd week of Jan.
- Had police checks done, fingerprinting done, wrote autobiographies about our lives, answered a hundred questions on questionnaires, wrote financial reports, had medicals done, etc. etc. etc. all part of the initial homestudy meeting.
- Enrolled in PRIDE course (government required course for adoption) and finishing course next weekend.
So it's just the beginning, but there is a lot to be done. I have a feeling that we are doing a lot of hurrying up, so we can wait. But that is the way it seems to work!
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