WTF??

Rant on:
What the hell does this mean?? Is this a sign that the China program is bound for closure? I relied on this source of information. It was coming directly from the powers that be in China. No interpretations from anyone. The dates were given as to which LIDs were moving out of the review room and which LIDs were finally matched. Now we waiting parents have to be the persistent pain in the arse for our agencies?

Add to this the email we received from our agency telling us that the best case scenario for us is to receive our referral three, yes I said three, years from our LID. That would mean finally travelling in 2010! I can't wrap my head around this. All I want is to be a parent. What the hell am I doing wrong??

Rant off...as you were folks

Yes..It's true...I suffer from bouts of PRS

PRS or Pre-Referral Syndrome
It's that time of month again...I don't mean PMS but PRS or Pre-Referral Syndrome. This is a much more dangerous time of month than PMS is for most women, even worse than PMDD.

Typical Symptoms: Women in the process of Chinese Adoption will sit in front of their computers, for days on end trying to find one tiny shred of fact regarding the latest LID cut-off or actual date of said referrals; either through forums, chat rooms or blogs. Most women WILL lose some sleep during this time by choosing to surf for clues until the wee house of the morning, get a few hours of sleep only to get up extra early to see if anything has surfaced in the 3 hours they were asleep. Most women feel anxious, go through bouts of excitement and depression and appear to be losing her mind to those around her. When she will allow herself to be torn away from her cyber hunt, she will be prone to bouts of sobbing, shopping spree?s for baby items (mostly in pink), and will tend to eat copious amounts of Edy's Slow Churned ice cream. In extreme cases some women will lose short term memory, they will forget to take care of their daily responsibilities such as letting the dog out, planning dinner, going to work, etc. Some women will even forgo hygienic rituals, skipping showers, putting hair in ponytail, or wearing sunglasses to the grocery store to hide the dark circles and pale complexion due to lack of sleep and make-up.

Cycle Duration: Women usually experience PRS symptoms from 2 days to 2 weeks before the onset of Adoption Referrals being received at adoption agencies and can show continued symptoms for 2 days to 2 weeks AFTER referral information has been officially announced. Warning: Those experiencing symptoms 2 weeks before AND 2 weeks after SHOULD SEEK
MEDICAL ATTENTION or at least have an extremely supportive network of family and friends who can make sure that she doesn't go to work in her underwear or fall asleep in unusual places.

Life-time Duration: This is a chronic disorder that will continue on a regular basis until the cure* is administered. Years ago experts in this area believed the duration of PRS to only last 6-8 months. Then 10-12 months, 22-24 months and now some believe it could go as long as four years. As you can see there is not a definite end to this syndrome and those considered experts actually have no idea either.

*Cure:One adopted daughter, home in her mother's arms.

taken from a forum that I belong to, that was taken from a blog out there somewhere :)

Here comes Corrie...

Yes, I admit it. I have a problem. I am a Coronation Street addict!

This is a joke, right??

Imagine my surprise when I read the article below. One can't seriously think that the powers that be in China(who are so diligent in their reviews of families hoping to adopt a child) would approve someone like Britney Spears to adopt twins! Is this a case of celebrity special privelege? Is there a way of adopting privately in China? For the love of all that is good please let this be a bunch of bullsh*t tabloid pot stirring. Read on, friends...read on...

People News
Just what Britney needs, two more kids
08/31/2007 - Britney Spears - USA © Erik Kabik / PR Photos');
//-->

08/31/2007 - Britney Spears - USA © Erik Kabik / PR Photos
Nov 26, 2007, 12:30 GMT
';
var PageContent= 'Britney Spears is reportedly set to adopt Chinese twins.\n\nThe troubled singer - who recently lost custody of her two sons, Sean Preston, two, and 14-month-old Jayden James, to ex-husband Kevin Federline - is allegedly in the final stages of talks with an agency about adopting the six-year-olds.\nFriends claim Britney - who has three supervised visits with Sean and Jayden a week - is desperate to fill the void in her life since she lost the boys and believes opening her home to the disadvantaged youngsters will give her life new purpose.\nA source said: "She misses her boys terribly and needs them in her life. She thinks adopting the twins is the perfect solution."\nThe \'Gimme More\' singer - who was ordered by a judge to undergo random drug tests to prove she\'s a suitable mother - is also said to be planning her own funeral.\nBritney, 25, is so concerned her unhealthy lifestyle will eventually take its toll so has splashed out £25,000 in case she ends up in an early grave.\nA friend added: "Adoption and a funeral? They two don\'t exactly go hand-in-hand.\n"Paying for a funeral is a sensible thing to do - but not when you\'re only 25! It\'s a case of too much, too soon with Britney."\nEarlier this month, Britney was banned from driving with Sean and Jayden and her court-ordered parenting coach recently slammed her mothering skills, saying her household: "Ranged from chaotic to almost somber with no communication at all."\n(C) BANG Media International';
PrintArticle();//-->
Britney Spears is reportedly set to adopt Chinese twins.
The troubled singer - who recently lost custody of her two sons, Sean Preston, two, and 14-month-old Jayden James, to ex-husband Kevin Federline - is allegedly in the final stages of talks with an agency about adopting the six-year-olds.
Friends claim Britney - who has three supervised visits with Sean and Jayden a week - is desperate to fill the void in her life since she lost the boys and believes opening her home to the disadvantaged youngsters will give her life new purpose.
A source said: "She misses her boys terribly and needs them in her life. She thinks adopting the twins is the perfect solution."
The 'Gimme More' singer - who was ordered by a judge to undergo random drug tests to prove she's a suitable mother - is also said to be planning her own funeral.
Britney, 25, is so concerned her unhealthy lifestyle will eventually take its toll so has splashed out £25,000 in case she ends up in an early grave.
A friend added: "Adoption and a funeral? They two don't exactly go hand-in-hand.
"Paying for a funeral is a sensible thing to do - but not when you're only 25! It's a case of too much, too soon with Britney."
Earlier this month, Britney was banned from driving with Sean and Jayden and her court-ordered parenting coach recently slammed her mothering skills, saying her household: "Ranged from chaotic to almost somber with no communication at all."

Talk about being put on a shelf...

This might give you an idea of just how many other families are waiting patiently to move from the review room to the matching room. Somewhere in the stacks and stacks of dossiers awaits ours. As of yesterday, those with dossiers LID on or before Aug. 31/06 have finished being reviewed. Those with LID of Dec. 8/05 are finally receiving their referrals. Almost a two year wait for them. Could late 2008 be our time? As much as it kills me to wait, I think that I can deal with that. Longer, however...well that is the bigger question. Do good things really come to those who wait? Today, my answer is yes. Ask me again tomorrow.

Speed up, slow down...Where does the truth lie?

G'day sports fans! I thought that I would enlighten you with today's tid bit regarding wait times for our adoption. The runours are flying once again. I get my daily updates from Rumor Queen, since we get absolutely NO updates from our own agencies. I try to take everything with a grain of salt and not read too much into things.

Is there a glimmer of hope that things are going to start to speed up. I sure hope so. For the love of all that is good, I hope so.

Here are the terms for the abbreviations used in the post below:
CCAA (China Centre of Adoption Affairs)
SN (special needs)
NSN (non special needs)
LID (log in date)
IA (international adoption)
SWI (social welfare institute)

Happy reading! Fingers and toes crossed.

October 9th, 2007
We all know that the CCAA told multiple agencies and countries during their tour that things will pick up after the first of the year. Specifically, they will do 15 days at a time (or take two calendar months to do a LID month, there were several variations that said the same thing).
As I’ve noted before, it appears that in order to do 15 days at a time they will need to increase the number of NSN referrals issued per month in order to make that happen.
There has been a lot of speculation on whether this will happen. People remember that the CCAA has told agencies other things in the past that didn’t turn out to be true, and so there is a good deal of mis-trust about this statement.
I’ve received a few emails from people who claim to have special knowledge. Though they are a bit cryptic about their actual source, it appears from what little they do say, that their sources are probably different from each other. And yet they all have a few things in common. The most notable being that the 15 days per month are not going to happen. Putting them all together, I believe the main points are:
The ceiling/quota next year will be even lower than this year (which is lower than last year’s ceiling/quota).
The COA (which is part of the State Department?) is frowning on agencies that are trying to be vague about the wait times for China.
Two weeks (15 days) of referrals will not happen. They may get close a few times, but do not expect it to happen on a regular basis.
The Special Needs Program is now the primary focus, and they are trying to ramp the NSN program down as quickly as possible without it becoming a media event or having an outcry about human rights issues.
What does this mean?
I don’t know. I have people with “special insider information” saying both things - that the ceiling/quota is going to be higher next year from some and that it will go down yet again from others. The supposed sources for the good news seems to be agencies and facilitators and for the not-so-good news seems to mostly be from U.S. official channels. How would our State Department or USCIS or COA know these things? I don’t know.
Also, at least two agencies seem to be basing their speed up statements on the fact that they know that the CCAA is has matched their clients pretty far out ahead of time. As I’ve said before, I’m sure that the CCAA is matching some families far ahead of time, but I don’t know that they have matched everyone ahead of time. I have some circumstantial evidence from the most recent batch that tells me that they are not matching everyone early. I don’t know anything for sure, but if I’m correct on that then at least two agencies are basing their speed up hopes on incomplete information. Just because the CCAA has matched their families pretty far in advance, it does not mean the CCAA has matched all families so far in advance.
One thing I have heard quite a bit of that seems to be in agreement from all sides: Current SN vs NSN consulate appointments seem to be more SN than NSN. Also, many agencies (not all agencies, many agencies) are reporting that they are now sending more families to China to complete a SN adoption than they are in the NSN program. I believe that at this time the SN program is bigger than the NSN program. Not in terms of dossiers, of course, but in terms of children actually being adopted each month. (As a side note, the State Department numbers should be out soon for the fiscal year just ended, it will be interesting to see what those numbers say. I wish they broke them down by program, but I guess we take what we can get at this point.)
I believe that December is about 60% the size of November. I also believe that the CCAA should be able to get through December in three months (with maybe a few December LIDs included in a fourth month that would be mostly made up of January LIDs). This assumes that they continue to do about the same number of NSN referrals per calendar month as they have been doing. If they increase that number then it could be less than three months, if they reduce that number even more, then, well, I don’t want to go there.
As far as speed up rumors, let’s look at a bit of history. Over the past two years we have had at least two big events where we were SURE things were going to speed up in the next month or two. First there was the promise last summer that the CCAA didn’t want the wait to go over a year. We were certain things would speed up since we were so close to that year mark - and even when we hit the year mark there were agencies saying it wouldn’t go over 14 months, that the CCAA was working hard to keep the wait from continueing to grow. I believed them, as did many others.
Then, last fall we had the combined rumor of new SWI’s being added to the IA program in the spring plus Brian Stuy’s statement last September that we were currently at the longest wait times. And then there was the waiting dad with a December of ‘05 LID who asked the CCAA director face to face when he would get his referral and was told December. (We all thought it meant last December, none of us thought it was possible it would be the following December.)
So last fall we were all pretty much believing things would speed up, which didn’t happen. And then came January ‘07 and they put the brakes on even more.
There was also the rumor from agencies that the CCAA wasn’t going to let the wait get to the point where people would have to redo their I-171H, but the CCAA later made it pretty clear that they were not concerned about that and if we didn’t like it we should look to our government to change, not to them to shorten the wait.
More recently I’ve had correspondence from people who apparently believed Bob C on APC back in June when he promised that a ceiling would be reached on the waiting time over the summer. Though I don’t think that was a big event, just a few dozen people who hung their hat (and hopes) on his words.
So where does this leave us now? We’ve basically been promised (again) that things are going to pick up a bit. Soon. And this time we are hearing it from the CCAA (told to multiple agencies and governments over the summer) as well as agencies continueing to get this word now from the CCAA. Some of us interpret the CCAA’s statement to governments and agencies to mean this next batch (since we are through with November) and some people interpret it to mean the batch to arrive in December (the first batch of the CCAA’s next fiscal year) and some people interpret it to mean the batch to arrive in January (since that’s the first of 2008). And many of us feel like Charlie Brown and the football - not going to fall for it again. But then, hope springs eternal, and maybe they are telling the truth this time and the football won’t be yanked away yet again.
To summarize:
We know that if things stay exactly the same then LID days per batch should increase because we know there aren’t as many people logged in during the next few months.
We’ve been promised 15 days at a time (two months to do one month, etc), which would seem to mean an increase in the number of referrals per month.
There are rumors out there that the ceiling/quota will indeed be higher next year, which means maybe they are going to pull it off.
There are also rumors that the ceiling/quota next year will be lower, which would be very very very bad.
We may know this month, or next month, but at the latest we should know by the January batch whether this rumored speed up is going to happen.
There are dozens of theories of why things may be about to speed up. This blog post is too long as it is, so I’m not going to go there.

Day one of a new adventure

Call me crazy. Some already have. That's ok. It's not something that everyone has a desire to do. But if you know anything about me, you'll know that I never do "easy". I tend to take on these huge challenges in life. And here is a new one...I got in line at 2:30 this morning to secure my spot for Ironman Canada 2008.

Let me be absolutely clear about this. I DID NOT get caught up in the emotions of watching the race yesterday and then sign up. I DID NOT base my decision upon those that I have trained with over the past year. I searched deep. Had a lot of discussions with Darren. I CAN, and WANT to achieve this goal.

I am in awe of all of those that finished yesterday. I have the deepest respect for those that started but were not able to get to the finish line. They dared to try. These athletes come in all shapes and sizes, young and old.

I have made a commitment. I hope that I can count on your support and encouragement along the way.

Little Pieces of the Puzzle

"An important part of our children's lives are the finding ads published by their orphanage. The finding ads are important for two reasons: First, since they are published within a few months of finding, they represent the earliest tangible proof of our children's lives, pre-dating all of the adoption paperwork we receive at adoption. Second, the photographs contained in the finding ads are earlier than any other photos a family will receive during the adoption process."

"Since 1999, the orphanages in China are required to run a provincial newspaper advertisement for children that are found and brought to their orphanage. We call them "Finding Ads." These ads contain information about where and when the children were found and which orphanage is caring for them. Originally these were text-only ads, but most provinces now include photographs in their ads. These photographs are usually the earliest available pictures of the children, some from as young as a few weeks old."

(taken from Brian Stuy's web site http://www.research-china.org/)

I had no idea that this was part of the whole adoption experience for our wee one. The reality for our daughter will be that her natural birth family left her somewhere so that she would be found safe and sound and start her life in a SWI, in hopes that she would one day have a forever family. I do not condemn these birth families. There are so many reasons that could lead to their ultimate and life altering decision. I cannot imagine the emotions and personal struggle that it takes one to give up their child in the hope that the child might have a better life...life at all in some circumstances.

Lately I have struggled with knowing that there will come a day when our daughter will have so many questions about her birth family. And the unfortunate reality is that we won't have any answers. It tears me apart that she may grow up feeling like she doesn't belong, doesn't have roots that she can search for. I struggle in that she may not have a sibbling to grow up with, and that one day she may be totally alone. And we will contribute to the creation of that destiny.

My only true wish in life is that I can be a good parent. That I can be enough. That I can be truthful, and do my best to help our daughter through the time in her life that she needs to know who she is, where she came from. I can't sugar coat the reality. But maybe I can cushion the inevitable hurt that she may feel. But she needs to understand the reasons that may have led her to being given up. in all likelihood, we will never know the reasons. We can only guess. I choose to believe that her birth family will never forget her. I choose to believe that it was a gut wrenching, heart breaking decision for them. And I hope that they will know in their hearts that Darren and I will give their birth daughter nothing but love. Nothing but love. Forever.

Baby K is coming home!

Our dear friends in Edmonton just got word that they are approved to travel at the end of the month to Thailand to finalize the adoption of their little boy K! It has been a roller coaster ride for our friends and the smooth ride is coming. Congrats you guys!! Em, you inspire me. You have been the picture of patience with everything that you have dealt with over the past few years. I am so thankful that our paths crossed. I can just see the smile on your face when you hear little K say "Mommy".

It has to be a sign!

It just has to be a sign. On my way out from an awesome swim session the other morning I saw this swim cap in the window of the tech shop. Upon further reflection (and reality check) I realized that these are meant to hype the upcoming summer olympics in Beijing in 2008. But it's all about me, right? One day Darren and I will be Beijing bound. Why not have a little reminder on my head three times a week? Ok, I am obvioulsy going loopy :) And there is an Ironman slated for China in 2008. Coincidence?