A new understanding...

As of right now this is our understanding of what is happening with our adoption. The US and Guatemala have been going through negotiations to introduce new laws to meet the Hague Treaties regulations. At this point they have opened Central Authority in Guatemala (01/01/08) in order to process adoption applications that were received before 12/31/07. These applicants have been “grandfathered” in under the old laws.
Any and all applications that were received after 01/01/08 are required to follow the new laws. That’s us. Our Dossier is complete and our agency has received our packets, as stated in previous posts. We have completed 7 out of 11 of our Orientation courses and are expecting our 171H approval in the next few days.
So with that being said, the next step is to send an application, our completed Dossier, POA’s (Power of Attorney) and our Orientation Certificate to Central Authority. The US Central Authority will be located in Washington but will not open until April 1, 2008. When we are approved, Central Authority will then issue a certificate. This will be sent to our agency and the Embassy in Guatemala.
After these documents and certificates have been received in Guatemala we are unsure of the waiting time. We have been told that a child will be identified for us; we then have 10 days to send a written acceptance letter for the child. Once that letter is received, we are now required to make 2 trips.
The first trip will be to meet the baby, “a bonding period”, an estimated 3 day trip. While we are there we will be interviewed by a social worker in Guatemala, to ensure that Marissa has bonded with us. After we have met her we will come back home. During this time the adoption will go to the courts, and the process will begin to be finalized. We are unsure of the time line between all of this. At this point we will be waiting for a call to inform us of when we are authorized to travel. Our second trip, this time 5 days, Marissa will technically be ours, we will apply for her visa and birth certificate in order to bring her back to the US.
These laws have not been set in stone. This is all that our agency has been able to tell us at this point. It seems that each day there are new developments. There are a lot of mixed emotions; it is frustrating and exciting all at once. We just have to be patient and trust that everything will work out. Before we know it she will be home, in our arms and in our hearts FOREVER!