Thanksgiving in Haiti

A group of people from our church went to Haiti this week for Thanksgiving. I wanted to go soooo bad. But since I already have a trip planned in January, it wasn't possible. Luckily, they are sweet enough to take pics of the kids and send them to me throughout the week.

Jovanika

James

Jovanika swinging with her friends

Happy 3rd Birthday Jovanika!!

Our sweet girl is 3 today! It has been 5 months since we met this little angel and oh how I miss her sweet face!! Can't wait to see her soon!!

We are in IBESR!

We got an email from Haiti on Friday that our paperwork has gone to IBESR. According to the website, now that the paperwork is in IBESR:

Your child's paperwork is put together with your documents and the file is then presented to IBESR (Haiti's Social Service Department) where a social worker will look over all of your documents and decide whether to approve your adoption request.The director of IBESR, the IBESR lawyer, the head of adoption services at IBESR, and the IBESR social worker must all sign off on your dossier. This is four stages of approval. It can take anywhere from 2-6 months.

What does that mean exactly? Who knows. But it does mean we are moving through the system. Any news is good news at this point!

This next week is an exciting week.... Jovanika is turning 3.



I wish we could be there to celebrate her! Although I can't be there, there is a group from church going over Thanksgiving week. I have given strict instructions to each of my friends going to love on my babies and get some pictures for me. It makes me so happy to know that there will be a group there to love on them and play with them. I am excited to see some updated pics of the kids, too. This last month we got an update from the orphanage but there were no pictures. I was so disappointed. But then again, I know they are so busy with all of the children and trying to get photos of every single child must be a daunting task. During this month of giving thanks, I am so very thankful for all of the people working to make these adoptions possible. Also for all of the nannies who take care of these precious children while they wait for their forever families.

In less than 2 months, I will get to go spend a week with the kids!! I CAN'T WAIT!!!!



And I can't wait to meet this sweet boy for the first time!

Why does it take so long?

I found this on another adoption blog. I found it very helpful to help understand what is going on over there while we are here waiting.

The Hatian Adoption Process

Haitian adoptions are highly complex and challenging to complete. Under Haitian law, they can be completed by an attorney or a director of one of the 67 creches licensed by IBESR - the equivalent of Haitian social services. Most Haitian adoptions are accomplished by creche directors acting as facilitators. Very few attorneys have the extensive amount of time and dedication required to process an adoption case.

The many steps listed below must be followed for each and every adoption. Add to their number the extreme difficulty of accomplishing each one: every step must be accomplished in person and by hand. Most of the offices listed do not have computers. There will be no communications by fax or email or even by official phone calls. Facilitators must visit each office personally to check on the status of each case, and carry it by hand through the traffic of Port-au-Prince to the next stage of the process.

Pre-IBESR
Before an adoption case can be presented to IBESR the adoption facilitator must gather all of the following documents:

1. Passport pictures of the child
2. Birth Certificate
3. Attestation of signature on Birth Certificate or extract from the National Archives
4. Legal relinquishment of custody from the biological family to the orphanage from the local judge
5. Psychological evaluation
6. Medical evaluation
7. Laboratory tests
8. Social history
9. Proces Verbal (A court process in which the biological family grants the creche the right to place their child with your family specifically for international adoption. Can only be completed after your dossier is in Haiti.)

IBESR and Dispensation
Your dossier can now be submitted to IBESR. If your family does not meet the criteria of the law of 1974, your dossier can be pre-approved for Presidential Dispensation and delivered to the Presidential Palace by IBESR. Dispensations are published in the Haitian legal journal Le Moniteur. Following Dispensation, IBESR will sign off on your dossier and grant an Authorization of Adoption.

Parquet Court
The 'step' we refer to as Parquet court is actually a very complex series of steps and processes involving multiple offices and repeated trips between them.

1. Attorney addresses a Request for Judgment to the Chief Justice of Parquet Court
2. Birth parents are interviewed in Parquet Court
3. Parquet Court signs off on "approval judgement for adoption
4. Facilitator takes approval to DGI for stamp of authorization
5. Back to Parquet for enforcement of the approval judgement
6. Authorization and redaction from the Civil Registrar Officer for legal Adoption Decree
7. Verification in Parquet of the adoption documents by the Civil Registrar before signing the adoption decree
8. First Legalization of the Adoption Decree, in Parquet Court
9. Second Legalization of the Adoption Decree, at the Ministry of Justice
10. Third Legalization of the Adoption Decree, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
11. Obtain attestation of Adoption Decree from the National Archives

Ministry of the Interior
All international adoption cases are reviewed by the Ministry of Interior. In order to obtain authorization to request a passport, the following documents must be submitted for each child:

1. Four passport sized pictures
2. Birth Certificate
3. Attestation for the Birth Certificate
4. Extract from the National Archives for the Birth Certificate
5. Relinquishment
6. Proces Verbal of adoption
7. Adoption approval judgement
8. Adoption Decree
9. Attestation of the Adoption Decree
10. Power of Attorney for creche director and/or attorney
11. Stamp from DGI
12. Notary letter for the passport
13. Identification card of facilitator and/or attorney on the case
14. Biological parents' identification cards
15. Adoptive parents' MOI form, identification, and passport photos


The Ministry of Interior will grant authorization to submit the dossier to Haitian Immigrations for a passport.

Haitian Immigrations
The facilitator will submit authorization to apply for a passport to Haitian Immigrations. This is generally a quick process - one to two weeks, if all equipment is working properly.

US Immigrations
Note to international readers - US Immigrations performs the most rigorous investigation of international adoptions. Other nations' Immigrations process are different. Please check with your agency to learn about the process for your home country.)

Parts of the US Immigrations process can occur concurrently with the Haitian process, however USCIS cannot sign off on the case until they have verified the final Adoption Decree and the child's passport. DNA may be requested at any time.

American families are advised to work closely with their agencies to ensure a smooth and efficient US Immigrations process for their child.

Approximately three to four weeks following completion of all USCIS investigations and adjudication of the I600 for the child, the case will be forwarded to the Department of State for issuance of a Visa. The Department of State also has the right to request DNA testing for birth parent and child. Adoptive parents need not be present for the Visa appointment.

Parents who can prove that they visited their child prior to the issuance of the Adoption Decree by Parquet Court will be issued an IR-3 Visa. Their children will be automatically granted full US Citizenship upon arrival in the US.

Families who did not visit their children prior to the date of the Adoption Decree must file for citizenship for their children. Failure to file for citizenship will leave the child as a legal immigrant and unprotected by the rights of full citizenship. Please refer to the USCIS website for form N-600 and instructions on how to file.

Bombshell!

I feel like Nancy Grace saying that!

Last week, one of the adoptive moms from our group visited Haiti. She was kind enough to send me these pictures of the kids:



I was SO THRILLED to get these pictures!! I love that we have this supportive group of adopting parents who get pictures and love on each other's kiddos when they are there and we aren't! This is the first picture I have seen of Jovanika's head. In the pictures the orphanage have sent me, her head is covered up with a hat. Needless to say, I am very concerned! Everyone I have talked to about it assures me it is probably a fungal thing. I was just surprised to see THAT. That looks worse than just a little ringworm or something, you know what I mean?

Speaking of surprises....

One of the adoptive parents who was visiting in Haiti sent me an email. Whenever something starts with "I don't know if I should tell you this, but..." you know it can't be good. Last week while she was in Haiti, she was at Dr. Bernard's (the man who runs the orphanage) office after going to court. While they were getting ready to head back to the guest house, a woman showed up with an infant. She was giving it up. So they all got in the car together to take the baby to the orphanage. They all started conversing. The woman said the baby was 6 months old, however, my friend said the baby girl was the size of a newborn, just tiny. The lady told her that she had 2 younger children already there who are being adopted out. When asked who her children are, she responded with:

JAMES & JOVANIKA!!!!

It doesn't stop there. She also said something about there being another kid who is older than J & J. The language barrier was a bit of an issue, so it is a possibility that there was some confusion or misunderstanding going on. But it was made pretty clear that this little baby is the little sister of our kids.

My first response when I read the email was tears. The first though that ran through my mind was "what if we get a phone call that says we HAVE to take this baby if we want to take the other two".... since they don't split up siblings. Then I kind of began questioning things, because if they don't split up siblings (which is what we were told when they told us we had to adopt James if we wanted Jovanika)than where is this older sibling she mentioned? Then I wanted details.... what did the parents look like? Were they excited their kids are being adopted? How did they know the kids were being adopted? Lots of things ran through my mind. But most of all, I worried about getting that phone call. Don't get me wrong, I would love to be able to take all of them. But we do not have the means to take care of all of them. If I had Angelina Jolie's resources (and nannies) then I would love to be able to do that. But we don't. It was a stretch for us to agree to take both children. I also feel guilty about splitting up these kids. I have to remind myself that they don't know each other. But still... I kind of wish I didn't even know. I would have saved myself the stress and guilt of playing the "what if" game. With all that being said, I am so glad that this mama told me what was going on and gave me a "head's up" regarding the situation. I know it must have been stressful on her deciding if she should say something or not.

The shock has worn off. We haven't decided if we are going to call and inquire about all of this. Part of me wants to take the "maybe if you ignore it, it won't happen" approach. Part of me also thinks that the baby has been there over a week now and we haven't heard anything, so maybe that is a good thing. So please pray that things stay on track and none of this new information hinders our progress.

Dossier sent to Haiti!

This is the stack of paperwork being delivered to NLL in Haiti tomorrow!! I whole-heartedly believe that if we required prospective parents to jump through these kinds of hoops to be approved to procreate, we would have a lot less issues in this world!

Tonight we dropped off our paperwork with our friend who is headed to Haiti in the morning. SOOOOO glad to have this part done! And very thankful to know someone to take it for us. Now to sit back and wait......

Dossier complete!

Just as I was losing hope that we were going to get the forms back in time from the Haitian Consulate, we had a surprise waiting on the front doorstep this afternoon!!!

Perfect timing.... tomorrow we can make copies of everything and take it to our friends tomorrow night. They will be hand delivering it to NLL in Haiti on Thursday morning!!!!

This also means we are officially finished with the paperwork portion of this process. We can finally breathe a sigh of relief. The last 3 months has been consumed with making sure we have every document notarized, authenticated, mailed to the right people, etc. etc. etc...... It feels so good to be able to sit back and wait on everybody else to do their part for a while.

Speaking of.... I read online today that Haiti was supposed to appoint a new prime minister today. They have been waiting on this because the prime minister appoints all of the people in government office, like the people who sign off on adoptions. Things have been on hold or moving very slowly over there because there have not been people in place to do these jobs. Hopefully with someone in place, they can get things moving and the process will speed up.