Meeting Update

                          Thank you for all of your prayers!  We (finally) received word on Sunday afternoon about the meeting from Friday morning.  Time (and life) in Haiti does not work like we in first world countries want or often expect it to.  They can’t blog or facebook like we want them to.  They must drive through rough roads for hours to get to the meeting, have the meeting all day, travel those same roads home again and that is not the end of their day.  You know how it is when you have been gone….there’s paperwork to catch up on, people that have been waiting to ask you questions, problems that have come up that need your attention, and the list goes on.  Notice anything missing?  Ahhh yes….the little arms that come running when you come home that want hugs that only you can fill!  That is just a tidbit of the life of our director. SO many people hinge on her words but she is mama to many children, a leader to a large staff, a fighter for the plight of the orphan and the contact person for the adoptive families across the world adopting from that orphanage as well.  While the staff and kids in her care look up to her daily there are people all over the world just watching computers for her words to appear with tidbits of information and pictures of their kids and the process.  It’s amazing really.  I’ll tell you about her full story soon.  God has used her greatly and is continuing to do so each day but back to the present meeting.

                The blog came across on Sunday with detailed yet confusing information.  As with everything we must remain positive, look for God’s hand pray through the rest!  The best news is that the referral process (matching families with children) is beginning again….Praise the Lord!  Any time that children can be matched with their forever families and begin that process of coming home is a huge praise!!  We need to continue to pray for the process.  It is easy for those in government or those not involved to make requirements without realizing the implications of their decisions.  As of now, the birth parents must come to the capital city for 3 different interviews with the courts AFTER they have signed over their parental rights.  One must understand poverty to understand how this affects them….a trip to the city may mean they will not have food for the month, if the father must miss work to travel he could lose the only job he has.  If they do not come, the child cannot be adopted.  Then they must begin paperwork for the child to be abandoned and try to track down the parents.  That means more paperwork and a lengthy time to ‘wait’ before the child becomes available for adoption.  This means the child could live in an orphanage for many years before they could become adopted. If the parent comes at any point to the orphanage to check on them, or contacts at any point in this process, it all starts over and the clock begins again.  This applies if it is a grandmother, uncle or anyone that dropped the child off at an orphanage. 

                The second requirement that may be changing is that the adoptive family may need to make an additional trip to Haiti making a total of 3 trips before the adoption can be finalized.  For some families this is not a problem but for many this will be.  This could also keep many families from choosing to adopt from Haiti when looking at costs and travel plans.  Not only does it affect jobs and biological children but think about the children in Haiti that must meet, love and bond with their parents 2 times and then be ripped apart and watch them leave.  It’s heartbreaking!  Bonding and building trust could be increasingly difficult after breaking that 2 times before. 

                Let me take a moment to say something about my heart and our adoption (I know this is long and I apologize).  Every psychologist and counselor tells me that having a background on our child will help them greatly in their future but I have a secret fear.  I am fearful that I will be in Haiti to adopt our child and in will walk the mother or father of our child….and I will break.  (Stay with me now).  You see my heart is to help a child who does not have a parent to love on them.  I never want to take a child from a mother or father.  If the parents cannot afford to raise them I would rather spend my life helping the parents and keep the family together (family preservation programs) than see a family ripped apart!!  BUT, if a parent, grandparent, uncle or whatever family member does make that unbelievable selfless decision that they cannot possibly care for this precious child and they want them to have a better life then it should be a simpler process.  I believe we should honor that decision.  That grandmother who may have watched her daughter die in childbirth and carried her grandson to an orphanage should not have to travel three times to the capital to complete 3 interviews after signing over the rights as the only known relative.  Can you imagine making that incredibly hard decision to give up your child only to find out it took them 4 years to actually be adopted into a family? Or sometimes even longer if the interviews or paperwork is a problem?  I would be SO upset to miss time with my child AND know they missed a family as well.  Or if someone is left with children to care for some relatives may find it easier to turn the children over as child slaves (restavac’s) instead of turning them over to orphanges for adoption.  In a country that poverty is so high and people are willing to almost sell their children for a better life we need to be very careful to protect the children against child trafficking.  Yet, we cannot hurt the adoption process in the meantime and keep our orphanages full of children that need to come home.  It is a delicate balance.  I am just a mother stuck in this process with a little one stuck in it too.  Only prayer will break through these walls. 

                Satan is trying to get to God’s children.  Let’s not let him.  Matthew 25:40:  “The King will reply ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’”