I am not inclined to switch countries or agencies. Oh sure, I have my moments when I want to throw up my hands, bail, and take a trip around the world. But no. I must be more patient than that.
It's been 8 months since I first posed this question. It's been 4 months since I last updated the # of LIDs and families ahead of us. At that time, October of 2009, there were 71 LIDs and 450 families ahead of us. Today, there are 70 LIDs and 408 families ahead of us. It's clear that families are bailing (or choosing to take waiting children) much faster than China is working its way through CHI's long list of log in dates.
In all of 2009, there were (roughly) 50, (only 50!) referrals out of China for CHI's China Program. I am not a mathmetician, but simple math once again gives me pause.
I went into this thinking the adoption of a baby was in my relatively near future. Most days I've made peace with the fact that things change and that we could very well end up with a not-so-baby child. That is OK. (Brent is not as hung up on the "as young as possible" request as I.) It is possibly we will be sitting here in another 2 years, in roughly the same spot in line. We've been logged in for 30 months. 30 months! CHI's website says the wait is 3+ years (36 months). Private emails to families in the program say it's 45 months. Will we get a referral in 15 months?
Technical stuff: (it's all pretty technical, but this stuff is particularly bad)
Our 2nd fingerprint approval expired last week. Our second I-171h form, the approval form from China that says we are fit for parenting a orphan from China, expires this June. We've used our one time free extension. Rather than get it extended for a third time, I think we have to file the I-600a again (the same form we filed to get the original I-717h approval. Ugh. And since our one-time extension is going to expire in June, we have to PAY again to file another I-600a. $670 filing fee plus $80 per person for another fingerprinting. And, USCIS requires an updated home study in order to file an additional I-600a. Ack.
And so we wait.
