JSICIS posted this announcement on their site today. If you have a referral, and the child originated from Tu Du Hospital, this is a must read for you.
On a personal note, my son was born in this hospital in 2001. I do not know how I can ever share this information with him. I also know I cannot keep it from him.
Joint Council (on international children’s services) is asking all families currently in the adoption process with Vietnam to complete the Vietnam survey by Friday, August 22, 2008. Please pass this on to others you know who are waiting families.
You can see the entire announcement by clicking on “Joint Council” above.
Families waiting for a Vietnam Adoption are hoping official referrals arrive prior to September 1st. The “long shot” plan “B” for many was to hope that the current Memo of Understanding (MOU) would be extended allowing families with dossiers in the system to complete their adoptions despite the program closure. This letter posted by JCICS indicates that hope for a plan “B” is dead, but there is encouraging progress for the future of Vietnamese Adoptions. Please have a look.
***RANT WARNING****
A letter arrived today from our adoption service provider. It was to inform us of the recent warnings and increased risks associated with a Vietnamese adoption. In addition, having dispatched their duty of “informing us” they want us to sign a document that says “Despite these risks, we wish to continue to pursue an adoption from Vietnam”, but will not hold them liable for losses due to an incomplete adoption. Oh, and if we are not successful, they don’t actually owe us anything but will transfer a modest amount of fees to another program. ERRRRRRGGHHH!
We have been waiting (2nd on the list, remember?) since April of ‘07 for a referral. We have reached 1A status, and so have been on the brink for 4 months of waiting that should have been six weeks. There is only ninety days left until the MOU expires. Who on earth would chuck all that at this point in the process??!!! O.K., I know this is a legal thing because they know that MANY families are going to be deeply disappointed. And in the good ‘ole USA this means you have to find someone to blame and heal your heart with a law suit hopefully resulting in cash!
Honestly, my hands shook when I opened that envelope, we weren’t expecting anything from their office and it was addressed to us personally. I didn’t think it was a referral, but hoped it was some sort of personal news. Every request for information that I send always results in getting general info about the program.
AND, I don’t want another program! In this time and place adopting from Vietnam IS not only plan “A” it IS THE ONLY PLAN!
Sheesh.
The news recently has been too much to digest. The beginning was the warning about adoptions from Vietnam and announcement summarizing “Irregularities” from the US Embassy in Hanoi in late April. These sent me reeling. Not only did it put into question our current efforts to adopt but also cast doubt upon the adoption we completed more than 6 years ago.
Shortly after that announcement I discovered WordPress and the community of those concerned about adoption. I read blogs from other adoptive parents, I read blogs of other waiting families, I read blogs of birth/first/other mothers, I read blogs from parents in Vietnam in the process of bringing their children home, I read the pages of organizations like Adoption Buzz and Ethica, and I read the blogs of adult adoptees, (most notable, that of Julia, whose blog I discovered the day of her death.) I have learned so much, but I’m still trying to digest it all. I feel a bit like my brain has burst like an over-filled balloon. And there is more to learn and absorb!
So, bear with me as I try to work through all this information. First the things I am sure of:
1. The adoption of S was never an act of charity. It was an act of selfishness. I wanted to patch a hole in my life, so that I could find joy each day instead of emptiness. I am so irritated, angry with people who tell me “He is so lucky you found him.” It is not true, S is a wonderful person who would’ve found happiness with another family in the US, or France or preferably even Vietnam. When I respond that “I am the lucky one.” it sounds petty and wrong, and they don’t get it and I need to find a better way to express this. ”I am lucky to be with him.” is a start.
2. Adoption number 2 has a different purpose. S needs family. Family that understands S’s history, shares his story. Someone to be connected to after I and J are gone. Sure, it’s for me too, but there is more to it this time.
Oh, there is still more, but I have enough set out before me for this meal. I will be lucky to digest what is already on the table.
J and I went to get our PA fingerprints today. The experience managed to dredge up all those feelings of inferiority and fear I used to feel when faced with the home study process. Gone was my “easy peasy” attitude of the “One Last Home Study” post.
When we entered the UPS Store (yes, the USP store is doing FBI fingerprinting in our county!) the clerk was busy with another customer, but finished up quickly. J’s ID was checked and was showed how to use the finger printing device as I watched. Once the instruction was completed, they left the room to complete tasks in the back. (Weird.) The thing is very much like the device that INS uses for fingerprints, but prompts and instructions are delivered in a user friendly fashion via computer monitor. J completed his prints and busy clerk emerges from the back, checks my ID and I begin since I have already seen the instructions and watched J complete his prints. Despite the fact that everything is going smoothly I am somewhat on edge. Why? Who knows? Perhaps that every one of these things seem like pointless hoops to leap through, how is it that the clerk can leave the room? Anyone could have walked in the door and completed our prints while they were in the back. Our doctor is now filling out our health forms without even seeing us, as if he too believes all of this is getting dumb. So, when I am about half way done busy, breathless clerk reappears and announces that they will now assist me since all other tasks are completed. They grab my hand and continue finger printing me while rattling off company policy about when to assist finger print clients and when not to. Apparently overseeing FBI fingerprinting ranks pretty low on the priority list, and the suggestion that I was doing fine with out help landed upon deaf, or perhaps priority plugged, ears.
That hand grab was what did it. The act of finger printing was changed from something I was doing voluntarily to gain something I desired, to something that was being done to me to prove my worthiness, to uncover some past dark deed that would reveal the monster that I really was.
I want this to be over, one way or another, I need this to be done. That one small thing really unsettled me, it is not right, it is not good.
