Week 20

I thought that she would be home by now. I thought that she would right now be strapped to the snuggly on my chest or I would be feeding her a bottle. It is ok though. I promise, my friends, things are progressing. Slowly, but surely, they are progressing. There is not much I am at liberty to discuss on the public internet but the program is moving and we are soon to get a referral - I am sure of it. By soon I mean within the next 3 months. So, at the beginning of week 20, I am quite positive.


I received a comment a few weeks ago by someone who was wondering about the Zambian Adoption process and I thought that I would post a little something about the technical details of the whole thing. The timelines are my experience only. So,


1. I guess the first step is completing the Ontario home study. The study includes getting together all the police checks, fingerprints, reference letters from friends and family, educating ourselves, working with an adoption practitioner by answering an obscene amount of questions, getting the world notarized by a lawyer, pictures of our home and family, passports, medical report from our doctor, letter from employer, notice of assessments for both Darryl and I.


2. Send the completed homestudy to our agency (Imagine Adoption) who will then forward the document to the ministry of Ontario for approval.


3. Approximately 4-8 weeks later, you will receive approval - hopefully. The homestudy process to this point if you are really on top of things is about 2-4 months.


4. Once the homestudy is completed, it is back to paperwork because Zambia has their own requirements. So, we wrote a letter to the department of social welfare stating how much we wish to adopt and how we feel we will be as parents. This letter was the hardest thing I have had to do. How do you write a letter to someone you don't know explaining something as HUGE as this? I know how things came come across on email or letter and I wanted to make sure that Zambia know how much I love their country and how much I will love our child. So hard.


5. The paperwork from the homestudy and the paperwork for Zambia together is called a dossier. The Dossier is sent to the Federal Government for approval. This stage takes about 2 weeks.


6. Once the Federal government stamps their approval the Dossier makes the trek to Zambia. - another 5-10 days


7. Receive approval from Zambia


8. The TORTUROUS wait for our baby begins. (wait is approx. 2-6 months although no one from Canada has actually adopted from Zambia so these are real guesses and we just had our first Canadian referral in July and to my estimation that family was waiting at least 6 months) - this is the stage Darryl and I are at at this point. AHHHHHH the torture!


9. Once the Referral is given, you wait for a court date - which is about 2-3 months away.


10. You must travel to Zambia to go to court and then stay for an undetermined amount of time to receive your immigration paperwork and passport for the baby. This is the best part because this time spent in Zambia is to be used to experience the culture, bond with your child, spend time as a family. In Zambia you must stay in an approved location - Guest House.


Ok, hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions...
Oh, and here is the link to our Adoption Agency. They have much more information on there.
http://www.kids-link.ca/