Processing all of the chaos

The past week has been a whirlwind of emotions from cutting court appointments by 90% to families receiving court appointments as well as referrals. International adoption certainly is a roller coaster of emotions and this week proved that. Wow!!
I thought I'd sit down and share a bit more in detail about things. Needless to say, the news of cutting the court appointmens was devastating!!! We have been on the wait list for 7 and 1/2 months. In that time we have moved from 86 to 33 (unofficially) for a girl and from 53-22 (unofficially for a boy) This is with 40-50 court appointments a day. If they cut back to 5 per day how long could this process actual take us? I was very upset. If this was going to take us YEARS yet, then maybe we shouldn't be doing it. Keep in mind our girls are already 13 and 9. I was in mourning. I couldn't believe that God had brought us this far only to make it not possible. We were thinking/hoping/praying that we might be matched up by July "ish" and home close to Christmas. Now we are going to be really delayed. It was hard to not let this consume our days. After all, this child that we had hoped for and dreamed of was delayed on getting home. So very sad. After talking with a friend, she said to me, "Maybe God wanted it to be like this." That hit me like a brick!! Maybe!!! After all, God was in control. He was the one to place adoption into our hearts. He was the one that kept showing us time and time again that this was meant to be. Hmmm....Time to step back, take a deep breath, and pray!! God didn't bring us this far to leave us. Now that I'm thinking rationally, we can press forward. Our faith waivered for a bit, but now we are confident that this is still the path that God has chosen for us.

Thursday someone posted on our list serve about contacting their local Congress people. She wasn't sure if it would help, but what could it hurt? This was our kid we needed to fight for!! So--Thursday I contaced 2 of our 3 Congress people with the 3rd one being contacted on Friday. By Friday afternoon, I had emails from all of the offices. One of the offices even called me back. The guy that called was also adopting fom Ethiopia. Crazy enough we both got on the waitlist within a week of each other. I've sent lots of emails and posted lots on Facebook in regards to the big petition that was circulating. They wanted 250,000 names by Monday. That is a lot. Well..last I checked it was up to 30,000 and was slowly down greatly. Hopefully it will make an impact. Time will tell. If you haven't signed it, the link is: http://www.orphanpetition.org/. Please pass it along!

Things are still really up in the air in regards to the cutting of court appointments. The cut went into effect on March 10. Meetings are still being held to try to find a solution to this problem. Our agency, All God's Children International has been AMAZING!! They keep us in the loop. They do not report anything to us until it is factual. In these times of uncertainity it is comforting to work with such an amazing agency. The wait with them might be a bit longer, but they are the best so it is well worth it!!! They truly have the best interest of the children on the front burner. What a comfort that is to know.

I will post the latest update that we received from our agency. It doesn't say much b/c things are so up in the air. There is a big meeting on Monday in Ethiopia. We know this battle is just at the beginning. However, don't tell all of these moms that they can't have their babies. That sounds like a war! HA!  :) This is a huge obstacle to overcome. Yet our God is bigger than this! He wants to give fathers to the fatherless. He won't leave the orphans, He will come for them. We know it will be okay. It might not be easy, but it will work out. We know once we get that little bundle in our arms, all of this will melt away. Until then...please, please pray for all people involved with this situation on all levels from the precious children that might have to stay in orphanages longer, for the adoptive parents, for the courts, and for all of those acting on the behalf of the children. Thank you for riding this roller coaster with us. We do apprecite it. Keep praying!!!

Ethiopia Update: March 11, 2011

US Department of State Ethiopia Adoptions Conference Call Update Good morning families! What a week this has been for all of us! Thank you so much for your commitment to getting the word out about the petition for the children of Ethiopia these past few days! We are hopeful that the voices of these precious children will be heard. As we had shared in previous communications, there was a conference call that we participated in this morning with the US Department of State to discuss the changes the  Ministry of Women’s, Children’s and Youth Affairs (MOWA) announced. Not all Adoption Service Providers (ASPs) were able to join the call due to the number of adoptive parents on  the line. According to Joint Council, it was understood that this conference call would be geared towards informing ASPs  specifically about these changes and how the US government  would react. Unfortunately, the call ended early and several ASPs were not able to address more detailed questions geared towards the ramifications of these changes for the program as a whole. While we admire adoptive families’ desires to be a part of these discussions, we are looking forward to opportunities to connect more exclusively and  candidly as a professional network with the US Department of State and Joint Council as they learn about these details in the coming weeks. This will allow us to better communicate  with you factual information about how this impacts your family’s  adoption more specifically while also being mindful of Ethiopian adoptions as a whole. Again, though, as evidenced by the feedback  in this call by the US Department of State, at this time there is little to no information that is being disclosed. Here is what we did learn: ~Although this change has been supposedly confirmed to have gone into effect on March 10, 2011, there is no information available on what the process could look like moving forward, what cases it impacts, and if and for how long it will remain in effect. ~It was mentioned that cases already registered with the Ethiopian court could possibly experience up to an estimated 12 month delay.  It was made very clear by the US Department of State that this was dependent on a number of factors, all of which are yet to be determined, i.e. how many cases are registered, what cases  this change will impact, if this changecontinues to be in effect, etc. ~There is a vast amount of rumors going around related to this change, and none of them are able to be confirmed at this point. ~The head of MOWA has been terminated, effective next week,  for unknown reasons. ~We are hearing that there will be meetings between the  US Department of State, US Embassy, MOWA, network of  ASP Foreign Service Providers, and Ethiopian government offices during the next week. We believe these meetings will begin on Monday, March 14th; however, there is no way to know if there will be concrete solutions that develop. At this point, we are all still in a waiting stage to see how this change will be implemented. We have greatly appreciated your prayers and understanding as we have all tried to grasp this announcement. As we continue  to pursue a better understanding, we encourage you  to be wary of rumors that you hear about this change and know that we will continue to keep you up to date on the information we receive. Along with being updated  through our office, you can also continue to  stay informed by monitoring Joint Council’s website at http://www.jointcouncil.org/. We continue to do our best in addressing your questions and concerns as quickly as possible and appreciate your patience. Our primary goal remains to facilitate the progress of your  adoptions,which continues to show movement on a daily basis.  Despite all of this uncertainty, we hope you go into this  weekend feeling hopeful and staying focused on preparing your hearts for the road ahead.