Adoption Update

The last few weeks have been surprisingly quiet. Almost relaxingly quiet, as we look ahead to the March and April looming before us. I still have no travel orders (a point I choose not to be nervous about), and so I have very little plans to make. I have been in touch with the American Consulate in Guangzhou, and the head of management came across as quite helpful. He said we can get a few balls rolling after the holiday (today), so I look forward to a conversation - and hopefully some travel orders - tomorrow or the next day.

Until then, we sit and wait. And we do all of the little jobs which need to be done. I back up all of our photos and videos. I organize our storage. I freeze a few extra batches of baby food. And I put everything in place for the adoption.

I spoke with our social worker here in China a few days ago, and learned quite a few interesting pieces. Allow me to catch you up.

This time last year, I was 7 months pregnant and we learned that we were nearing the top of the adoption list. We put together a friendly letter to the Chinese government, asking to defer being matched with Mei Mei until after Annika's first birthday. A few other families were sending the same letter - a letter which was unprecedented for our social worker. Over the past year, a few of those families have reached the 12 month mark, and we have seen a new precedent.

It seems that China is not too concerned about when we begin our process again. We would like to wait until Annika is closer to 18 months before bringing Mei Mei into our family. Apparently, putting off our letter re-starting the adoption process is not time sensitive.

**Please let me stress here. We have not been matched yet. Mei Mei is as yet a concept - not a real person. Putting off meeting her means delaying when we receive our match. It does not mean leaving our child in an orphanage for longer than necessary. **

The new precedent also implies that once we restart our adoption, we will be placed at the top of the list. That is, once we send in our letter requesting to get things moving, we must be prepared for things to move immediately. We will likely be in the next batch of matches. Rather amazingly, it seems that we have quite a bit of power over exactly when we receive our next child. Looking at the number of dramatic changes taking place over this year, that bit of control is warmly welcomed.

At this point, we anticipate writing that letter in about November of this year. If things go as patterned so far, we will meet Mei Mei about 2 months later. We will approach the bidding process with this timeline in mind. Our current goal is to move to our next post at the end of August or beginning of September, giving us a good 3-5 months to settle in before the next major life event. This is not in our control, but will guide which posts we bid high and which posts we bid low.

And I am counting on the members of the foreign service in our new post to be welcoming and supportive immediately. The move to Shenzhen proved amazingly warm and simple - an answer to prayer, no doubt. And so far, every member of the Foreign Service who has heard about our invitation to the March class has dropped everything to chat and answer questions. It seems like a very strong community, and I look forward to joining.


FYI: In case you're concerned about the potential disruption of a government shutdown on our plans to move, be somewhat reassured. The HR professionals in charge of hiring Dave have been told (hearsay, I realize - this would not stand up in a court of law) that funding has already been committed to the March class. Should the government freeze, Dave will reportedly still have a job.