Hey, will I get to show my butt again?

Brandon and I are headed back to the doctor tomorrow to get our 2nd round of immunizations against Hepatitis. I can only hope that I get to flash everyone in the doctor's office again.

Other than that, we continue to put together our paperwork for our Russian dossier. Just to give you an idea of what is included for that, here is a quick list of the major items we need:

1) A medical review form filled out by our doctor. Must have 2 original, notarized copies for each of us.
2) Two notarized copies of our doctor's license. (If you ever want to get a really inquisitive look from your doctor, tell him you need a notarized copy of his actual doctor's license. The look is priceless.)
3) Two notarized letters from my company stating my position, how long I have worked there, and my salary.
4) Two notarized letters from our CPA stating that Brandon is self-employed and how much she made last year.
5) Two notarized copies of our CPA's license.
6) Color photo copies of both our passports. (Which I thought was illegal to limit counterfeits.)
7) Certified copies of our marriage license.
8) A completed home study.
9) State police clearance letters. (Part of our background check and clearance.)
10) Pictures of every room in our home, plus the front & back. Also pictures of our immediate family and us.
11) Copies of our tax returns for the last 3 years.

The most difficult thing to get has been the notarized copy of our doctor's license (he's a part of a large practice, so they had to track it down in the corporate files). We will be going to get the ball rolling on the state police letter in the next few days, so I hope that goes easier than it sounds (see previous posts regarding USCIS).

We hope to have most of this done by the end of this month so that we can get our dossier put together, sent to the state for authentication, and then sent on to Russia to get approved. From there, the long wait for being matched to a child begins.

Assume the position

So one thing I failed to mention as part of getting ready to travel to Russia, we have to get several immunizations. Two of these immunizations are the shots for Hepatitis A and B - actually I should say the SERIES of shots for them. In total, these two alone require 5 shots over a 6 month time span.

The nurse asked us if we wanted the first shot of each series in the arm or the thigh. Brandon went first and decided to get them in her arm. After seeing her wince in pain, and realizing that usually my arms ache a lot after shots, I decided on the thigh. Now before I go on, I must mention that (a) the doctor's exam room is very small, and the table is right next to the door, and (b) one of the other nurses was making some copies for us.

So the nurse in our room tells me to drop my pants, and bend over the table. After I have done this, and in the appropriate position, the other nurse (who was done making copies) decides to barge in without knocking. So there I am, with the top half of my butt being exposed not only to my wife and two nurses, but anyone who decided to walk down the hall at that moment.

I politely looked at the nurse, who was standing right next to my shoulder after entering the room with the door still wide open, and said "could you close the door? We're a little busy at the moment." Oh the joys that lie ahead of us on this great journey!

Home Study is Done

This past Thursday, a representative from Gladney came to our house to conduct our home study. She was there for a little over 3 hours getting to know about us, our reasons for adopting, our family, our relationship, etc. She also had a quick tour of our home just to see the layout, what each room was used for, and to make sure that there wasn't a glaringly obvious risks associated with a child living in our home. Basically, she was looking to see if we had a swimming pool, and if we did, was there a safety fence around it or did we have plans to put in one. Or, you know, was there a wild tiger roaming free in the hallways or if we had it chained up in the garage like good pet owners.

The questions she asked were fairly simple. She interviewed both of us together and asked about we know one another is stressed, and what we loved about the other person. She also wanted to know about our hobbies and what we liked to do in our spare time. She then interviewed each one of us individually and asked about each of our parents, and wondered which one we would be more like. She also asked if there was something about our spouse that frustrated us (of course, Brandon had a hard time selecting just one.....kidding).

It was actually kind of cool because we were able to share our story of how we met, what brought us to this point in our lives, and what our goals were. The cool thing was that I realized that even if nothing about my life changed from here on out, that I am already a very blessed man to have a great wife, wonderful family, and terrific friends.

Meeting the Pediatrician

Brandon and I met with a pediatrician that has experience with adopted children from Russia. We went over the list of potential ailments that we would be accepting of in our child. The list included everything from asthma and allergies to spina bifida.

It was a bit overwhelming to review the list and think about the treatments that go along with each one. But the good news is that the pediatrician was great. She helped us to determine what we would be up for, and what we thought would be too much for us to handle.

This process seems a little strange - kind of like we are filling out an order form for a child. But I guess that's just one of the differences in this process vs. having a child on your own. But the great thing about doing all of these things is that while you are filling out paperwork, meeting with doctors, or determining the next step in the process, you think that this is one step closer to what this whole thing is about: getting a child. So I guess in that way, we count ourselves lucky.

Referrals

Part of the application process is to get at least 4 written referrals from the following: a friend, a family member, an employer/co-worker, and a community member/neighbor. We were simply overwhelmed by the number of people who offered to write us a referral, even before we even considered who we wanted to do the official letters. For those of you who were willing to do this, we can only say thank you and that we are so very appreciative.

We did want to specifically thank the people that we did have write referrals for us. Of course, these are in no particular order.

Michael Campbell - Many of you who read this have met Michael at some point in time. For those of you who don't know him, he has been Phil's best friend for nearly 19 years. They met the week before they started college at UTA and have been inseparable ever since. He's always making us laugh with his quick wit and comebacks, but he really is a great listener as well. Thank you Michael for being such a great friend. We know that you will make a great uncle to our child.

Larry & Mollie Mims - Larry & Mollie are Brandon's aunt & uncle (specifically, Mollie is the sister of Brandon's Dad, Lonnie). We have always had such a great time when we hang out with them, especially when it comes to Texas Aggie football games. They have also become part of one of our favorite holiday traditions, which is to go to Cleburne for the Christmas Eve candlelight service at their church, and then head to their house for great food and fun. Guys, we cannot wait for the first Christmas Eve that we bring our new baby to your home.

Lisa Vasquez - Lisa was Brandon's first boss back at her days at the Dallas Chamber of Commerce starting in 2001. Since that time, she and Roger have become such close friends, and Lisa and Brandon still get to work with one another on occasional projects with their respective lines of work. We've been part of each other's weddings, and we have even been there to see them become parents to little Petey (who is a riot). It will be so cool to be able to bring home a playmate for Petey and to watch them go crazy in your swimming pool in the years to come.

Bob Yum - Bob is our neighbor from across the street and he is also our pharmacist. I can tell you that it is SO convenient to have him hand deliver our prescriptions, or for us to drive right up the street to his store to pick them up. But more than that, Bob is such a great neighbor and friend and we are blessed to have met him. We hope that our child doesn't need his services too often, just because that means the baby will be healthy, but it's good to know that if they do, Bob is on the case.

So that's our short tribute to just some of the support our friends and family have already given us. There are many more just like them that we could thank, but I am not sure the internet has enough space for us to lay out that many well wishes.

2 More Pieces of Great News

1) Brandon and I do NOT have Tuberculosis! Yep, that's right. We are living TB free! For those of you wanting the details, it's quite simple: we have to be checked out by a doctor, and then he submits a report on our health with our application. One of the tests was to see if we had TB, and I am glad to say that we are good to go.

2) Apparently, I was in the military! Another piece of info we have to submit with our application is the medical report for our pets. Not sure exactly why they need this, but I guess it's part of being thorough. So when Brandon got the reports today, I was copying them and glanced down at the names listed as owner. It has a place for Title, you know like Mr or Mrs. Well, my title was Captain. So I will now start signing my name as Captain Phil Rice, and I will expect people to salute me. Or, I may just go by Cap'n, dress up like a sailor and start posing for cereal boxes (Cap'n Crunch, for those who can't figure out who I am talking about).

Things are Clicking Along

Lots of things to report this week:

1) We finally got a response from Homeland Security/Immigration Services and our case is in the pending file! We had been waiting to get word from them and finally they responded back to an e-mail Brandon sent last week to let us know that it is pending our Home Study (which will be scheduled very soon). So this lifts one concern we have had for the last 2 months or so - see previous posts for reasons why.

2) We are putting together more documents for our application, which includes a letter from my employer, a letter from our CPA (since Brandon is self-employed), reference letters, pictures of our home as well as a sketch of the layout, and copies of our birth and marriage certificates.

3) We went to the doctor yesterday to get our medical exam done. Basically they pulled 6 small tubes of blood from each of us in order to test for everything known to man, including STDs. Just in case you are wondering, I think we are both A-OK on that front. They also had to give us a shot to check for TB and we have to go back tomorrow for them to check our reaction to it. I felt so bad for Brandon because they had to stick her in 2 different places to get enough blood to test (which took a total of 20 minutes or so for her compared to 5 minutes for me - I'm a good bleeder I guess). Later that day, she had bruises on her arm and hand from the injections, and she wasn't feeling well (possibly due to the combination of a TB injection, them taking blood, and her allergies acting up). But she was a real trooper. I, on the other hand, had no problems. Funny how that works sometimes.

Next up, we have to meet with a pediatrician to find out what ailments we are willing to accept for our kiddo. We also have to determine whether we want to request a specific gender or leave it up in the air. I'll be back with details soon and let you know what we decide. I think we may already know, but I have to leave you with a cliffhanger or you may not come back to read the blog!

Well, we're waiting.....

It's been 3 weeks since US CIS received our application to adopt a child, and still we have heard nothing. We should have received a receipt of some type, which would tell us that they received it, that our case is pending, and what the actual case number is.

We have called the 800 customer service number and they can only help you if you have a receipt. I am not sure if you remember this or not, but just a moment ago I mentioned that THEY HAVEN'T SENT US ONE! We sent an e-mail to their customer service address and haven't heard anything yet. I think they have e-mailed us back 3 of the 4 times we have sent e-mail to this address, but it typically takes a few days.

Unfortunately, this process would try the patience of a saint. For those of you who know me, you know that my father was a minister, but I am not a saint. Very far from it, actually. So you know the top of my head is about 3 milliseconds from completely blowing off.

All we can do at this point is continue to work on our paperwork for the adoption agency. We also have to begin putting together our documents for our dossier to be sent to the Russian government. So at least we can keep our end of the process moving, even if the wheels in the rest of the process have ground to a complete hault.

I guess I should explain all the in's and out's of the application process in one of my posts. It might give you some idea of all the hoops you have to jump through when adopting a child. I'll try to get to that in the next few days.

It's Official

Today it hit us that we are really starting on an adventure to get our child. We turned in the first set of documents required for our application and paid for our initial deposit and home study. We also attended a meet & greet session at Gladney in Forth Worth. We got to meet some of the staff that will be helping us over the next few months/years, as well as hear from a panel of 6 families that have recently adopted.

It was absolutely incredible to see these families and the love they have for their children. There was at least one child from several of the countries Gladney works with: Russia, China, Ethiopia, and Guatemala. We also got to meet other couples that are ready to embark on the process like we are.

After the larger group meeting, we broke out into smaller groups based on the areas of the world we were adopting from. In this smaller group, we met a couple that is going through the process of getting their 3rd child from Russia. They were so incredibly helpful, and had plenty of stories to tell us. We exchanged information and I am sure we will be contacting them on numerous occasions to get more inside info on this whole experience.

Next up for us, we still have quite a few documents to put together to send to Gladney over the next 2 weeks. We also will probably have our home study schedule over the next month or so. Essentially, our home study consists of a social worker coming out to our house, checking out where we live, and asking us a ton of questions about ourselves and why we are adopting.

How much paperwork is involved?

Late last week, we received a couple of e-mails from the folks at Gladney (our adoption agency). Both of the e-mails had paperwork that we had to fill out as well as information like travel tips, specifics about their Russia program, etc. In total, there were 8 attachments and nearly 200 pages of stuff to look through. A little overwhelming to say the least.

The good news is that they provided us with a "roadmap" so to speak. They told us what forms they need now and which ones they will need in the near future. Our application is up first, which is about 8 pages plus supporting documents. It's a lot like a loan application, because we had to provide information about how long we have lived at our current house, our employment history, our financial picture, and whether or not we had been arrested or convicted of a crime. I knew I was okay on that last one, but you never know about that Brandon!

Other items that they need from us include:
- a letter from my employer (confirming how long I have worked there and what my salary is)
- a letter from our CPA (stating how much Brandon makes since she is self-employed)
- a letter from our doctor (showing our physical and mental health, and what prescriptions we are currently taking)
- a letter from my insurance carrier (confirming that our child will be covered from the day they get placed with us, which is the day we accept the child, not the day they arrive back at home with us)
- pictures of our house and directions to it (info needed prior to the home inspection that the agency will be conducting)
- medical records of our pets (showing that they are up on all their vaccinations - I know, kind of interesting, eh?)
- names & addresses of our referrals and our parents

This isn't a complete list, but it gives you an idea of what kind of information we have to pull together. Too bad that people who have children on their own don't go through this kind of review before they are able to have kids. Maybe then we wouldn't see sad news stories about parents leaving their kids in a car when it's 110 degrees outside, or that they had their 5-year-old smoke marijuana. I know, I'm preaching to the choir here.

So while this seems like a lot of work, we are keeping our eye on the end goal. And when you think of it in that way, this is really nothing. We also are encouraged every day by friends and family, which is incredibly helpful.

Rejected, Yet Again

So today marks the 4th, yes the 4TH time we have sent in the same info into stupid Homeland Security/Immigration Services. Mind you, we have not materially changed what we have been submitting, we have to keep sending it in until we get a person with more than one brain cell to realize that we have submitted literally EVERYTHING that we needed to.

The good news is that a woman who had responded back to an e-mail Brandon sent to their customer service told us that it was rejected in error, and that it was overlooked because she was out of town on vacation. This time we at least got a specific named individual to send it to rather than the generic "Special Orphan Officer" that we had been sending it to in the past.

So keep your fingers crossed and pray that they finally figure things out on their end.

On another note, I went to a Ranger game tonight and it made me realize how excited I am to be a Dad. One of the things my father and I shared was a love for the game of baseball. It's such a great game and I can't wait to instill that same love for the game into my child (boy OR girl).

Your Tax Dollars Hard at Work

So today marks the THIRD time we have mailed in the exact same information to Homeland Security to get the government's paperwork started for our adoption. Between my wife and I, we have 3 college degrees, so it's not like we don't understand basic instructions. We were asked to send in the following:
1) completed I-600A application form (a page and a half long government form with basic info: name, birthdate, marriage date, etc.)
2) copies of birth certificates or passport (we sent both), marriage license, etc.
3) form giving our permission for a background check
4) money order or cashier's check for payment of fees for the application fee and fingerprinting fee (our adoption agency suggested we send in 2 separate payments, one for each fee)

We got it back the first time with a standardized checklist form that appeared to suggest we didn't include the fingerprinting fee, even though nothing was checked stating what we had missed. I guess I made the mistake of clipping them both together, and not separate and the disgruntled federal government employee didn't take note of that.

The second time we got the info back, it had a three page document attached to it. The first page had instructions for mailing for several other forms, but not the I-600A which is what we filled out. The second page was illegible (bad copy), and the third page was the same standardized checklist they had sent before and again, NOTHING WAS CHECKED!

Well during this time, we contacted their customer service 800 number and of course, the person there was less than helpful, and obviously had no clue why they returned it to us. We called again and this time, the women said that we would get something back if it was accepted and to watch my bank account, and if the check cleared, then that was another indication it was accepted. She interrupted me several times and said that I must not be understanding her. Finally, I had to talk loud enough to interrupt her and state that she must not be understanding me. First of all, we had gotten EVERYTHING back TWICE with no reason as to why they didn't accept it. And secondly, since I couldn't make the payment with a personal check, how would I know when the payment cleared even if it HAD been accepted?

So basically, we have now mailed the info back in with an even more descriptive cover letter than the first time around, but this time we mailed it to the Oklahoma City office (because apparently, that's where the Dallas office forwards it anyway). In the meantime, we are out nearly $30 in additional FedEx fees, and have had two weeks of very frustrating delays.

By the way, these are the same folks that handle all immigration paperwork, so if you ever wondered why the US has such a bad immigration problem, we might have uncovered part of the answer. Sad thing is, all the people involved in this process probably feel like they are underpaid for the great service they are providing!

Homeland Security

So one of the first steps in the adoption process is sending in a form to Homeland Security, along with a fee. There are 2 potential reasons that I can think of as to why this is necessary:

1) They are so adept at counterterrorism that they can tell if a child either is, or has the propensity to become a terrorist. Amazing what the new DNA tests can tell you.
2) This is yet another way the government is able to wedge in some sort of "tax" on unsuspecting citizens.

If I had to pick, I would guess the latter vs. the former. The form and fees we sent in are actually for fingerprint checks from the FBI for us (to make sure that we don't have any skeletons in the closet, I guess), and to start the immigration paperwork for the baby.

One thing this did for us was kind of start the clock ticking. We are getting very excited about the reality of having a new addition to our family, and it now just seems like a matter of time, plus jumping through a series of hoops, to get it done. It's also hard to believe that sometime over the course of the next couple months, our child will be born without us even knowing it. Kind of crazy, huh?

Orientation Day

Today we had a phone meeting with the International Adoption representative from Gladney. All in all, it went very well but we learned one very important lesson - everyone in the adoption process has got to get paid! Literally everything we do will cost us something. I sneezed on the call, and I think it cost me 50 bucks.

But on a serious note, the meeting gave us a pretty good idea of what to expect during this process and about how long it will take. The most important piece of info was that the earliest we would expect to get our baby would be late 2008. It depends a lot on how long it takes us to complete certain steps in the process, which we will get in to more detail in future posts as we find out more about them.

One other piece of news we can share is that it looks like Russia is in the lead in our Baby Olympics.

- China is overwhelmed with applications and is pretty backed up
- The Vietnam program is not accepting applications because it took on the overflow of applicants once China got backed up
- Ukraine has instituted a new restriction that only allows 2 applicants per agency per month, so that is now a long wait
- Kazakhstan.....well, it's Kazakhstan. Not sure we want our kid to see the movie Borat some day and start asking too many weird questions! But no really, on a serious note, Gladney has just recently started this program and they literally have only matched up 1 child so far with a couple. That's kind of a short track record for us.
- The one thing about Russia is that the program is still needing re-accreditation from 1 more Russian agency before it can get back on track. So Gladney does have about 20-30 families in ahead of us, but hopefully the approval comes soon and the other families get matched very quickly.

More to post later as we start filling out all the forms.

And so it begins...

Many of you may be wondering what put us on the path of adopting. Well, the short version is that we haven't had any luck the old fashioned way and the thought of being medical test subjects in order to produce a child "naturally" didn't seem all that attractive to either of us.

The great thing about adopting is that there are countless children in numerous countries who need someone to give them a home, love, support, and a chance at a great life they may not otherwise get. We are very excited about the thought of one day bringing a child into our home and family. Introducing them to some of our friends, on the other hand, well....maybe we should wait a while on that! Just kidding....

We'll try to keep everyone updated on our page here as we move through this long process, and we thank you for keeping us in your thoughts and prayers.