Friday, April 14, 2006
7:22 PM
A few months ago, I was pretty vocal about my opinion on umbrella agencies. I truly believed that if Vietnam approved of agencies sharing their licenses, and protective measures were being taken on the Vietnam end of things, agencies sharing a license must be okay. The big argument on APV was that is WASN'T ethical for the CHILD. I still believe that as far as the children are concerned, Umbrella agencies are fine. As long as the parent agency is working with a reputable orphanage and the Vietnam government, it's ethical- for the child.
However, I'm not quite sure if I feel it's so ethical on the prospective adoptive parent side of things.
The one thing I learned from our personal experience is that you get information third or forth hand, and like the old "telephone" game, it gets garbled, or slightly changed, as it passes from person to person. This is fine for some things, but not an adoption. After a while you have no idea if you are hearing the truth or just what the agency thinks you want to hear. You start doubting EVERYTHING, and worrying if you are doing the right thing, if your child will ever come.
For us, we felt like we completely lost control of the situation - we were depending on our agency and coordinator to represent us to the parent agency and remind them that we were still out there, waiting. We were depending on the coordinator to tell us what she knew, and to get us answers to our questions in a reasonable time frame. We were depending on the coordinator to fight for us, to determine that certain situations were unacceptable and try and find a solution for us.
For us, complete dependence on someone who is depending on someone ELSE for information was too much. It wasn't something we were comfortable with. I think if you have someone that kicks a lot of ass at your agency, someone who will fight for you tooth and nail and always be in touch with information, it might work out okay.
I think at this point my position on Vietnam adoption is this- with so many agencies licensed and giving out healthy referrals, why would anyone who is ready to go forward with his/her adoption stay with an agency that is unlicensed and/or umbrella-ed? We started before any agencies were licensed, so we were hopeful our agency would be immediately licensed and everything would go as promised. And I think, ultimately, everything worked out so perfectly- if we had switched any earlier, we would not have been referred our Grace, who is my moon and stars.
But if I were starting today, or in a position where I was ready with my I171 and waiting for news, there's no way I would delay or put my faith in anyone's promises. This isn't about friendship and being loyal, and I learned that the hard way. It's about paying a professional organization to assist you in locating and adopting a child. They may have helped you with an adoption before, or seem like the nicest people you have ever met, but ultimately they are not your friends or doing you a favor- they are the people who you have contracted to help you locate and bring your child home.
Think of it this way: say you had a child who wasn't feeling well. If your normal doctor was a family friend and you found out there was another doctor a few doors down who could help your child in a more efficient, more helpful way, would you hesitate to bring your child to see that other doctor?
Certain things take precedence over patience and loyalty and I have learned that the need to find my child and bring her home is one of those things.
(Oh, and before signing with any agency, ask them how many adoptions IN VIETNAM they personally have completed. That will tell you a lot, too...)
