Paperwork and Questioning

After our initial meeting with Wide Horizons, I, as mentioned, knew that we would be in good hands. I also knew that this would be a scary journey to embark on. I didn't, however, know just how long it might take. Some people have told us that they waited years for a child to adopt and others said they waited about a year. Just how long would it take? We were about to find out.

Our first meeting was in mid-September on a Saturday. I remember waiting about a week to get a set of paperwork, later to find out it was labelled as Part A. That set of paperwork was actually very easy to complete and I raced through it in a week. We were then put in touch with a Social Worker- Christine. Thus began our home study. We also started on Part B of the paperwork.

I was able to complete the Part B paperwork within a couple months. By December we were also finishing our home study. Over Christmas we waited for Christine to write our home study report. This was completed by mid January. Then we began piling the paperwork for our dossier which would go to Russia. That paperwork would require a lot of notarizations and apostilles, or state authorization stamps. We needed to receive those from both Massachusettes and Connecticut. Finally, after much copying I was able to send out my 4 pound "baby" of paperwork- one original dossier set and one copy in March. I was ecstatic! Finally, my end of the paperwork was complete- or so I thought. Now I needed to wait for the referral.

We were told that a referral call could come any time from 1 month to 4 months. I often mentioned to Mike that if I didn't get the call by May I would get very cranky. Luckily I have a wonderful husband and he was very patient the whole time. I, on the other hand, am not quite so patient. But, during this process I had plenty of opportunities to practice patience. It is a virtue I am told. So, thus was the end of the paperwork, we thought, and thus began the wait for the referral. Wait, wait, wait!