Sunday, September 24, 2006
10:53 AM
If you are adopting from Vietnam, or considering it, you MUST read this now, over at Mrs. Broccoli Guy. I've pretty much run away from the whole Vietnam adoption community (save my agency and some families we have become friends with) because I see families making the very same mistakes we made at the beginning of this, and it's happening over and over. It really breaks my heart, because I start thinking about how if our previous agency came through, we wouldn't have Grace today. I can't bear the thought, so I avoid anything that sort of triggers it.
Look, let's be honest- most first-time adoptive parents are not that interested in the "official process" at first. They want their baby, and they want her NOW. If they can get her a few months earlier, what's the harm? I mean, the babies ALL need homes, no matter how they came to be in an orphanage, right? That's what we thought- if we got Cupcake home sooner, it's better for all of us. And we were being told that it was all on the up-and-up, so ignore what anyone said- they were jealous and trying to start trouble for us. We were being told that since the Vietnam process was just starting, no one really knew what the rukes were but the adoption officials.
So who do we believe, strangers we never met on the internet telling us one thing or a professional who had a decent record and who we had many long discussions and whom we felt we had a "connection" with? Think about it.
The first thing first-time adoptive parents look for in choosing an agency is timeframe. We were guilty of that, and we learned our lesson the hard way, which is why we wound up changing agencies after we began the process.
It's only after you become invested in the process and the community for several months that you begin to really understand WHY it's necessary to play by the rules.
Bottom line: You gotta just deal with the fact that there's gonna be a wait. There always is. If there isn't, either your agency is lying to you through their teeth or doing something incredibly illegal. There ARE some families who don't care- they just want their baby home. And for them that works. No one can convince anyone to do this ethically, because the official waiting period is not exactly ethical itself. It's not fair to anyone- children or parents. I mean, it'd be better for everyone if it were much faster. It just *can't* be. Not everything that is physically possible is the best thing for anyone involved.
