THIRTY-ONE MONTHS
Thirty-one months ago our agency mailed our Dossier to Ethiopia. It still sits in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to this day. We still sit here... Waiting.
So today I emailed our family coordinator at our adoption agency. This is what my email said:
I've been talking with my husband and we've been looking at the "unofficial DTE list" which I know isn't entirely accurate, but I was wondering... Am I being unrealistic to hope for a referral within the next year? I know y'all can't really give a straight answer on that, but I have just been driving myself crazy and I think that a word from you might help me!
Thanks,
Abby
And this was her response... Which I found to be encouraging!!
Excuse the adoption jargon.
Hi Abby,
We are currently matching families once they've waited 36-48 months, families open to boys are being matched around 36-40 months right now so its been a bit quicker for male requests lately.
If wait times continue to stay the same you can anticipate a referral anywhere between August 2015-August 2016 (you will have been waiting 36 months in August). I would not anticipate you receiving a referral before August but I cant guarantee that wait times wont again increase during your wait.
The biggest thing that could affect your wait time besides how many babies we refer (making it on the shorter end or even longer than 48 months) will be how many families who have waited longer than you do concurrent family building, either going on hold or coming off of hold over the next year or so. At any point in time there are a lot of families who are on hold for various reasons in our program (either they let their I171H expire, are concurrent family building or other reasons). When many families are on hold or go on hold above you it makes it likely that you could be matched sooner and I have seen that affect a lot of families. I have also seen it affect families in the other way where all of a sudden many of our on hold families become eligible again and we then are going back up the list and matching those families. This is one of many reasons why its so hard for me to say with confidence what it will look like for you over the next year.
Let me know if you have questions or if I can help you think through anything else.
Blessings,
We are currently matching families once they've waited 36-48 months, families open to boys are being matched around 36-40 months right now so its been a bit quicker for male requests lately.
If wait times continue to stay the same you can anticipate a referral anywhere between August 2015-August 2016 (you will have been waiting 36 months in August). I would not anticipate you receiving a referral before August but I cant guarantee that wait times wont again increase during your wait.
The biggest thing that could affect your wait time besides how many babies we refer (making it on the shorter end or even longer than 48 months) will be how many families who have waited longer than you do concurrent family building, either going on hold or coming off of hold over the next year or so. At any point in time there are a lot of families who are on hold for various reasons in our program (either they let their I171H expire, are concurrent family building or other reasons). When many families are on hold or go on hold above you it makes it likely that you could be matched sooner and I have seen that affect a lot of families. I have also seen it affect families in the other way where all of a sudden many of our on hold families become eligible again and we then are going back up the list and matching those families. This is one of many reasons why its so hard for me to say with confidence what it will look like for you over the next year.
Let me know if you have questions or if I can help you think through anything else.
Blessings,
Basically it is all still a toss up, but the fact that we are on the cusp of baby boy referrals makes me very happy. We are 31 months waiting and boys have been referred to families waiting 36-40 months.
That's any time between August and December of this year!!
But I also understand that though it could be as quick as this year or early 2016, that we also may have to wait longer than that because adoption is so unpredictable.
Regardless, we cannot wait until the day we finally see our son's face!
Speaking of faces! Yesterday we celebrated ONE YEAR of sponsorship with Yeabkal through Compassion International. One year ago we fell in love with the little boy in this photo.
Now look how much he has grown...
What a difference a year makes! I know those pictures are blurry... Excuse that please.
We are also hopeful that while we are in Ethiopia that we will get to meet this little fella! My goal is to get a picture with him smiling 😊
And if you can spare 38$ a month, child sponsorship is well worth it!
Today was a good, hopeful day in this journey!
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