711 Dossiers Ahead of Us!

I made a little spreadsheet based on information that is in the monthly China Program newsletters we receive. Every month there is a list of log in dates (LIDs) and I can see where we are in line.

After looking more closely, I can tell you some "fun" facts about our place in line.

1. There are 711 dossiers ahead of us. In other words, 711 families have LIDs that are before 8.23.07.
2. There are 417 dossiers with 2006 LIDs.
3. There are 299 dossiers with 2007 LIDs (including ours; there are 4 other families with the same LID).
4. The next LID that will get referrals is 1.6.06.

I think that if I keep track from now on when referrals come, I might someday be able to offer an educated guess about when we might get ours. I really have no idea if that will work, but it gives me something to play with.

Believe it or not, it could be worse. When we got our LID, there were actually 942 dossiers ahead of us. The growing wait time as well as a host of other issues has caused 231 families to drop out of the China Program.

Expiration of Forms

After US Citizenship and Immigration (USCIS) approved our I600A application, the "application for advance processing of an orphan petition," (for $670), and we had our fingerprints taken and approved by USCIS, ($80 each), we received our I171H form from USCIS that says we are approved to get a Visa for our child. These are very important steps in the adoption process and were the final pieces that allowed us to submit our dossier to China.

The I171H form expires after 18 months, in our case, in December of 2008. We get one free extension that lasts for one year. If we are not home with our child by December of 2009, we have to submit and pay for the I600A all over again.

Fingerprints expire in 15 months, in our case, in August of 2008. We will most definitely have to go through this process and pay all over again. Insane.

It would be very easy to get discouraged by all this, but in the end, that would just make us miserable. We knew the process was lengthy and we jumped in anyway. The more into it we get, the more we learn just how bizarre it can be. Nothing to do about it but abide by the rules and wait. :)

Six month LID anniversary!

We've been logged in at CCAA for six months! As slow as this wait seems, we are making progress!

Our lid group started out with six families, and one family has since dropped out...I am pretty sure that is the Cristoffoletti family who adopted three-year old Spencer. You can check them out here. http://www.cristofolettifamily.blogspot.com/


A few things have happened with regard to the CHI China adoptions. Wait time has grown significantly - it could be up to four years now for those who are just starting the process. We hope that wait time pertains to those who are just starting and not to those of us who are already logged in. We think that is the case, but are not positive. That is likely why there has been a huge decrease in the number of applications for Chinese adoptions - from 828 in 2006 down to 292 in 2007.

This is what is posted in the most recent China Program Newsletter:
Wait Time from Paperwork Submission to Referral: The current waiting time from paperwork receipt in China until referral is 25 months. We fully expect the wait time to grow to over 2 years in 2008 and continue to climb over time to possibly 4 years.

I am just not sure how to interpret this. I may very well mean that our wait time, even though we have been logged in for six months, could grow even as we are making progress.

Krista

Why is the wait soooo long?

I get asked this question all the time. To be honest, it's a difficult question to answer. Families with Children from China (FCC) is an international, nondenominational organization of families who have adopted children from China. The purpose of FCC is to provide a network of support for families who've adopted in China and to provide information to prospective parents. With recent changes made from the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA) with regard to prospective adoptive parents, FCC wrote a letter to CCAA. You can read that letter here:
http://fwcc.org/FCC_Response_May_2007.htm

FCC recently received a response to their letter from the CCAA director. You can read the translation of this letter here: http://fwcc.org/Translation.pdf

The short answer is that there are far more adoptive parents waiting to adopt from China than there are available orphans. But it is interesting to see the dialog between the two organizations.

Krista