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My husband and I are adopting from Haiti. We started the process in August 2013. It's now September 2015, and we still are not even matched with a child. Our paperwork is sitting in the Haitian social services offices and we really have no idea how much longer it will take. I'm losing patience, hope, faith that all of this is going to work out. My family is starting to think our process/agency is a scam. I just don't know what to do. Any advice or stories from others?? I really want to continue, but we have no other children and have been waiting to be parents for many, many years.
International adoption is a slow process under the best of conditions; and Haiti is not the most stable, transparent of countries, to put it mildly. So I can't say I'm terribly surprised that it's taking so long.
Have you talked with your adoption agency about this? Assuming that they have prior experience with Haitian adoption, they should be able to give you some idea as to how normal your situation is, and how much longer your expected wait time would be.
Are you open to changing countries? If so, I would discuss that with your agency as well. Good luck to you.
Haiti is, and has been for awhile, a very long process country. Unfortunately, it seems to be crawling after becoming Hague even though people were hopeful it would speed things up.
To answer the title question, I've never adopted internationally. However, I know a ton of people who have. The amount of time depends on the country. Serbia is now about 4-6 months. Ukraine tends to be about 7-9 months. Many countries are about a year to a year and a half (Bulgaria, China, Taiwan, Armenia). Lithuania seems to run about 9 months to a year. Many Latvia adoptions are done in a year to a year and a half, but the kids come home on the first trip (about six months in). Colombia tends to run about 9 months. Peru is definitely a year and half to longer. Hong Kong tends to be about a year and a half. South Korea is running close to 2 years. India is highly variable.
These times are all for "special needs", though, and a "traditional" referral will add several years onto the process.
My husband and I are adopting from Haiti. We started the process in August 2013. It's now September 2015, and we still are not even matched with a child. Our paperwork is sitting in the Haitian social services offices and we really have no idea how much longer it will take. I'm losing patience, hope, faith that all of this is going to work out. My family is starting to think our process/agency is a scam. I just don't know what to do. Any advice or stories from others?? I really want to continue, but we have no other children and have been waiting to be parents for many, many years.
We adopted our daughter from Russia back in 2006. Altogether it took us about a year and a half (had to switch regions). In your situation, I would first check the Dept of State site for Haiti to make sure your agency is registered to provide adoption in Haiti. If it is then I would contact your congressman's office to look into it. Just their interest via a letter would likely get things moving for you. Good luck and don't give up!
Thanks for all the replies and suggestions. We may look into contacting our congressman if we don't have any movement by the end of the year. Our agency has said to us and all the other families waiting that it's the Haitian social services that is holding things up. We have invested a lot of time and money and don't really want to back out of the process now.
I don't think your congressman is going to be able to help. It is Haiti that is making things crawl. I don't know of anyone who has completed an adoption since it became Hague because of just how ridiculously slowly things are moving there.
I don't think your congressman is going to be able to help. It is Haiti that is making things crawl. I don't know of anyone who has completed an adoption since it became Hague because of just how ridiculously slowly things are moving there.
The OP started their process before Haiti became a Hague signatory. The key question is, did they file their Form I-600A before April 1, 2014? If so, and if they met several other criteria, then their adoption should be able to proceed under pre-Hague conditions. But if not, then they are bound by the Hague process.
Here's some information from CIS about Haitian adoption:
It's kind of scary to think that no adoptions have come through in the past year and a half, which is when Hague took effect for Haiti. OP, you might want to ask your agency about that as well, just to give yourself an idea of how long things have been dragging out.
The OP started their process before Haiti became a Hague signatory. The key question is, did they file their Form I-600A before April 1, 2014? If so, and if they met several other criteria, then their adoption should be able to proceed under pre-Hague conditions. But if not, then they are bound by the Hague process.
Here's some information from CIS about Haitian adoption:
It's kind of scary to think that no adoptions have come through in the past year and a half, which is when Hague took effect for Haiti. OP, you might want to ask your agency about that as well, just to give yourself an idea of how long things have been dragging out.
That's a good point about the pre-Hague thing. They should be completed then, or at least have a referral. They should have someone make sure they're actually in and waiting for a referral instead of lost.
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