We got our monthly update from our agency this past weekend. Within that update, they quoted some pretty disheartening numbers. Basically, China has a "backlog" of about 30,000 families who are waiting to be referred a child. The most the CCAA has ever referred in a year is estimated to be 14,000 which was several years ago. In recent years, they have been averaging 7-8,000 babies a year. Most recently, they are referring about 600/month. Do the math. 30,000... of those probably 20,000-25,000 are ahead of us... if we estimate a continuation of 7500/year, we're looking at 4 years from now - 2011. More math - that's the year that Jack will turn 9, Elliot will turn 7 and PJ will turn 6.
The hope, if you can call it that, is not everyone will wait it out. Some rumour sources quote attrition to be as high as 25%. Attrition may be due to people deciding not to adopt either by their choice or by unfortunate life circumstances, choosing to adopt from another country and withdrawing from the China line, or switching from the NSN line to the line waiting for special needs children. I'm not sure that I understand how people jumping lines could speed things up, but if people are dropping out altogether, that inches us closer.
So again, we revisit our options.
We have briefly looked into switching to another country ourself...
The pros: likely a shorter wait.
The cons: the same uncertainty in the process, the loss of heart/time/money invested to date, the less likelihood of finding a daughter (most other countries have boys available)...
We have briefly looked into a domestic adoption of a child who is in the custody of the Crown...
The pros: possibly a shorter wait (could very well be longer as well), paid for by the gov't.
The cons: the wait is unpredictable - when/if a child needs a family like ours, we may be matched... if none such child is waiting, we will not receive a child, the children are removed from their birth families because of neglect, abuse, etc and much more likely to be struggling with physical, emotional, intellectual obsticles, drug/alcohol exposure, etc., we're concerned that the b. parents may resurface to claim the child or to create problems since the child was removed forcefully...
We have discussed the option of giving up on this process altogether... if we wait this long, will we want an infant? will it be fair to the infant to be so much younger than her sibs? would it be fair to the kids we have now to bring in a high needs infant? Do we revisit our choice not to have a child biologically?
These questions make me sick, actually... it seems that this blog is heavy with my doubts. Forgive me for my cynical approach, I find it helpful to write it all out to see where we are. Within the doubts, though, remains the certainty that a child is out there. Strangely, even with the uncertainty of whether we will ever be offered a child, any plan to look into adoption elsewhere feels like one to be done "in addition too" to close the gap between PJ and Anna.
So, the resolution? I need a mind set that is permanent and long term. We've been logged in for nearly 9 months, most of that time we've been faced with changing expectations. I need to know what's going to happen, I need to know the plan and the contingencies. There's no way to know what's going to happen with CCAA, so we need to assume the worst case and plan around that. SO for now, the plan is to stick it out in China - we've already invested heart/time/money there, and while we continue to invest heart, there is no further time/money invested until we receive a referral - nothing to lose (except an intact heart, if that counts). Worst case, the CCAA will close the IA programme and we will not receive a child from China. Should that happen, we'll look at another country and apply for an older child - preschool to school aged, close in age to PJ. Better case, our adoption comes through before the end of 2010. Lots of families have one child younger than the others, right? The extra time will give us time to save money, prepare ourselves, spend time with our children. The extra difference in age will allow us to provide her the attention she needs to become healthy again.
Does it sound like I'm trying to convince myself?
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