Waiting for a Match

After all the dreams and waiting. Now is one of the most difficult parts. Now you’re waiting for a phone call. The one that in many cases says, “We have a child for you…would you like to come in and see the pictures/video?”.

As with everything, this varies country to country. In some countries you may not see the child until you arrive in the country you are adopting from.

The Waiting Child

Many agencies have waiting list of children waiting for a family to give them the love they so deserve. These children are called “waiting children”. Some families pick an agency solely because they saw a picture of a waiting child on the web. Some countries don’t allow pictures or information to be posted, but the agency can email you pictures. These children are waiting for a vast number of reasons. They may be older than people are requesting at the time (a young toddler can still be considered too old). They may be infants, but they may be a boy and the agency has no one waiting right now. They also may be considered special needs. Special needs can vary from a cleft lip, to the loss of a limb, a questionable blood test, exposure to transfused blood, TB, Hep B, or Hep A, and even HIV, as well as many others. This is what our little Bekah was considered because she had active TB.

While reading the newest email from our agency I scanned down to the bottom section where they listed “waiting children”. There staring back at me, in a spit-stained boy’s blue shirt was a beautiful 15 month old little girl. She was out of our age range, but her eyes bored into my soul. When my husband walked in from work that night I (very casually) said, “Honey, there is a sweet little girl on the ‘waiting child’ list. She’s 15 months old and her name is Ayane.” My husband (much to my surprise) immediately looked at me and said “Well, why isn’t she ours?”.

When you decide to consider a waiting child, ask to view their file. You may ask a pediatrician to look at it if you are worried that you may not be able to handle a certain special need. PRAY PRAY PRAY. Ask God for His will in this decision. He knows what you can handle more than even you do. Then you request a match (all the waiting time you expected just goes away! J). Some one else may ask to get matched too with the same child. This can be an emotional roller coaster. Let us tell you though….it’s worth it!!!

Waiting….and Waiting

Waiting is often one of the most stressful parts of the adoption process. It’s similar to pregnancy in that you can feel this child who resides in your heart, but you have yet to hold them in your arms. Those that have not adopted may not understand the longing and the feeling of already knowing your child…but that doesn’t matter…it’s very real.

Here are some suggestions that may help you through the wait.

SUPPORT

Your support may mainly come from your family and friends, but here are a few more avenues to consider.

· Prayer, the Bible and a prayer group can help you more than almost anything else. Talking to God, the Bible, and knowing others are praying for you and with you can give you a feeling of peace that only God can offer.

· Your agency may have “call in” sessions that you can participate in to keep you up to date on the latest information on your program. They may also have a web group to participate in.

· Yahoo Groups gives you an opportunity to find a group that fits you and your needs. Just get on your search engine and type in Yahoo Groups and sign up-it’s free! The messages often come in emails and you can reply to the group or you can post to a web page/board. One of my favorites is Christian International Adoptions. There are other wonderful groups, but since everyone is not adopting from your country you cannot compare your “timeline” to others whose adoption may have gone quicker. Though we feel comfortable with country specific Yahoo groups, some may find more anxiety in comparing their process with others.

A great Christian Ethiopian Adoption group is CAFEkids.

We also recommend finding a Christian group, though we are also a member of a non-Christian one, there seems to be more bickering and it is a lot larger. Though you can get some great information from these they also can abound with rumors and can be very stressful during your waiting period.

PREPARING FOR YOUR CHILD

This is a great time to start preparing for your child. Get as much information as you can and prepare yourself for whatever may come. (See Preparing for Your Child).

GET YOUR FAMILY MORE ORGANIZED AND HABITS DEVELOPED

“Huh?” you may ask. “What does getting my habits developed and getting organized have to do with adoption?”

As you add to your family life gets more complicated, blessed and wonderful, but more complicated. You have more doctors appointments, recitals, soccer practices, and LOTs of snuggle time. Your attention is demanded more. If you have some habits you may struggle with now is the time to work on them.

We are not the best housekeepers and in adopting our child from Russia it occurred to us to clean, but not develop better habits. So what happened when Max got back home? We had less time and our house reverted to the usual “tornado hit it”. BIG MISTAKE!

This time we are going at the adoption with a different perspective. We are working now to develop the habits we need to. We have become a part of Fly Lady, which is also a Yahoo Group. We found our nitch and though we are not very active in it anymore my dishes are done EVERYDAY (smile) and our laundry is folded. My house is even about an hour away from being comfortable with visitors coming over at most times. This may not seem like a big deal to you, but it makes a tremendous difference and will make life a lot easier with our newest little one.

Remember that habits take time to develop. Two weeks will probably not do it. Don’t give up and remember your life will have a little easier adjustment time if the habit is developed before your child arrives home.

Talk to Your Medical and Dental Insurance

Since we are not in the insurance field we are hesitant to try to explain the laws governing medical insurance. If you wish for detailed and informed information you can go to the website for Adoptive Families Magazine, scroll down to where they list articles, and click on the "more" option. They have an article on Medical Insurance. You may also contact us and we will email you the article.

It’s hard to look at the waiting time as a blessing, but try to find ways in which God can use it to prepare you.

Difficult Decisions When You Are Given a Referral or Match

*Please remember that in some countries it is illegal to post a picture of your referred child until they have been through court and are legally yours.

Congratulations! You have a referral! This is the moment you have long waited for! You may fall instantly in love and know this child is yours or feel oddly detached. Remember though, you and your husband (usually) did not fall instantly in love. Though we did know that our little ones were ours immediately, this DOES NOT happen with everyone.

You now have a choice, a very difficult one. Do you accept the child offered you or do you decline this child. We don’t mean to make it sound cold or heartless, but it may a valid option depending on the agency or country you are adopting from. In a small agency you may have a choice, where as a larger one may expect you to accept the referral unless health concerns (with a doctors letter) has led you to decline.

When we were finally matched with Nikolai, we knew we were looking at our son. Things moved fairly quickly at that point. We requested a Russian Doctor evaluate him (this cost us approximately $500.00). We did this not because we would turn this match down if something was wrong medically, but because we wanted to be prepared for whatever may come up once we brought our little boy home. We highly recommend this, if it’s available. The more prepared you can be, the better.

We believe it is also a good idea to have a doctor (that specializes in international adoption medicine) in the U.S. evaluate the medical information on your child. We knew we would accept whatever child God intended for us. We also felt we would be better prepared to help our child, in whatever ways he or she needed, if we had a doctors input. This is about being prepared, it is our version of an ultrasound or blood tests during pregnancy. This heightens your ability to prepare. It usually does have a price tag, but if you are unable to afford this, often a local pediatrician will look over the file for free. They will not be as experienced with international adoption, but it is better than not having anyone look over it.

If possible, it is also wonderful to have a local doctor in country evaluate your child. This isn't always possible and you need to make sure (before you request) that it won't endanger your adoption (by offending someone you don't want to offend).

We were matched officially with Max by the Russian courts (remember every country is different). We traveled within weeks and attended court while there. With Bekah we waited three months (after match) while her paperwork went through the necessary offices and she was legally ours before we traveled. The time this takes can vary. Between the many holidays in foreign countries, the different work hours and weeks, and the whole different sense of time, you can’t predict how long OR how short it will be until your child is legally yours or you receive travel news.

Tip: When Thinking About Naming Your Child

We struggled when thinking of changing the name of our child. We thought that it would be a hard enough adjustment without adding a name change to it. Obviously we changed our minds (smile). This is why:

When we met Max, his name was Nikolai Sergevich . The odd thing was, he didn’t know it. He had been so neglected that his name was hardly used. He was named by the police officer that found him on that freezing street corner.
Nikolai was starting a new life. He was just as much a member of our family as our biological children. All of our biological children have a Biblical name and a family name. We believe that a family name is especially beneficial to an adopted child who may struggle with identity sometime in the future.

Max was our father’s name. Nikolai (of course) was from his heritage. Michael was the warrior angel (and Max is a little of both).

Teaching your child their new name:

We used Max’s Russian first name as his middle name, calling him Max Nikolai. Though he really didn’t know either, we thought this would make it easier on him. This is so you don’t take any form of identity from your child, but add to it with your family identity as well.

If you change your child’s name completely, it is a good idea to temporarily use his or her current name as a middle name. You then use the name you are changing it to as the first name (does that make sense?)(smile).

Example: Her name is Natasha and you are changing it to Ellie Elizabeth. You would then call her Ellie Natasha for a while.

This will enable your child to get used to the name you are changing it to, while still responding while you’re talking to him or her. You eventually drop the name you do not wish your child to have.