Why China?

First of all, let it be known that this was a difficult choice. In fact, I must admit I was really hoping that we didn't have to choose the country for a long time. Each country's international adoption procedures were different and had good points and bad points. When we were faced with the first decision... choosing an agency... we chose a Christian agency that offered many options for countries simply because we couldn't decide. CWA (Christian World Adoption) has been a fantastic adoption agency. They are located in North Carolina and South Carolina (and we are in Virginia)... yet the distance has shown to cause no difficulties whatsoever.

When we first applied to work with the agency, we were honestly looking into the new Kyrgyzstan adoption program... and perhaps Kazakhstan. However within a few days, we realized that their procedures simply wouldn't work with our current lifestyle. Those adoptions required much longer traveling plans... in fact, we would most likely have to fly over there twice for two weeks each trip or stay for six weeks. Neither of those options would work with Mike's work schedule nor did we wish to leave our children back in the US without us for so long.

Guatemala was a viable option... we even knew of a family at our church that adopted from there, but the country cost was prohibitive for us. We also knew a family who had adopted from Russia ... but that country had a similar travel plan to the "-stan" countries.

Korea was a very well-known option (although CWA did not offer that program). Our friend Christy S. worked for an adoption agency that dealt with Korea, and she spoke highly of the program. Our next-door neighbors John and Joanna just adopted Sara from Korea and were very supportive of that country's program. The foster mom of their daughter was even a Christian. However, we had it in our heart to adopt a daughter, and that wasn't an option for us through Korea. We already had a girl in our family, so we were ineligible to request a gender. Our understanding is that most of the adopted children from Korea are boys. So despite hearing only positive things about Korea, we found it just couldn't work for us.

We then began looking into China. China's international adoption program has been around for a very long time and is considered very reliable. When researching international adoptions you begin hearing a lot of stories of families that had incredible heartbreak or setbacks that delayed adoptions, cost a lot more money than anticipated or were completely misleading. However China was not usually a source of problems... it was a fairly well-known program that was the most "popular" one in the US. According to the US Dept of State website, 6,493 orphan children received immigrant visas from China in 2006. The next highest group was from Guatemala (4,135 children) and then Russia (3,706 children).

At the time in which we applied and began our Chinese adoption process, very few changes had occurred in their requirements for adoption since its inception. Funny that I say that... a few months into the program, we learned that CCAA (China Center of Adoption Affairs) was changing a lot of requirements effective May 1! For a few days there, we panicked that we wouldn't be eligible. (Our main fear was a requirement to have fewer than 3 kids currently in the home.) However, we were quickly assured that we should be fine assuming our BMI's were in range and that our net worth was enough. They were. Despite the fact that we still qualified, many people were suddenly disqualified. One of the big changes was the fact that no longer could single parents expect to be given a referral... married couples would be given priority. Here is a link to FAQs about International Adoption through China. http://www.china-ccaa.org/swsy/swsy_index_en.jsp

Unfortunately in the last six months to a year, Chinese adoption referrals have slowed down in comparison to the number of requests. When we began our process, we were told that the referral-wait-time (after China logged us in after receiving the dossier) was 12-13 months. That was in October 2006. Now, in June 2007, we are looking at 20 month waits with an expectation for the wait to go up even higher by the time we receive a referral. Going on that information, we are not expecting to now receive our referral for perhaps 2 years (maybe more!) We completed our dossier papers in mid-April, mailed them to CWA who reviewed them around April 25th, and the dossier was mailed to China on April 30th. Our log-in-date (LID... found in the left margin of our blog) is May 14, 2007 ... 3 years to the day after Tommy's due date! (Tommy was actually born May 9th... Mother's Day, 2004.)

So when watching for referrals, we'll be looking for the LID of current referrals in relation to our own.

Wish us luck in staying patient during this long, long wait. I knew God was about to test my patience when we first heard 12-13 months. Now, I really need to pray to remain patient. He has a child in mind for us... whether she is already born, conceived or still a "sparkle in our eye" (as my Dad referred to this pre-conception period of time). God has the perfect child for us, and we'll just have to accept the wait for his plan to be followed through. In the meantime, we can pray for our future daughter, her biological parents and the incredible decisions they will make on her behalf, and the caretakers at the orphanage where she will be cared for until we come to get her.... not to mention our current family and the adjustments we'll all be making in the months and years to come.