It all started on 14th September 2009 when hubby Steve and I were triggered by a documentary on television showing under privileged babies & children from Africa, the medical treatment they receive, the food and dirty water they drink the insanitary living conditions etc, watching the reality is enough to make you sit down and cry.
Steve and I have always talked about the possibility of an intercountry adoption but never really discussed it seriously as we were busy in our own lives creating a family of our own. We sat and talked about what a great gift it would be to help one of these babies/children and to be able to give them the quality of life.
After our discussion we brought the subject up with the children to get an over whelming response of how wonderful they all thought it would be. That was it! The decision was made all in one night, YES YES YES, lets pursue this!
I spend hours that evening, researching the internet for information in my excitement. I found a few things that disheartened me like:
- A lot of countries preferr a combined age of parents to be no more than 90 years! Gosh me being 43 and Steve 45 gives us only a window of 2 years!
- New Zealand law states we could not adopt a child any older than one year younger than our youngest. Our youngest Briana is almost 4. By the time an adoption could possibly take place she would be around 6, giving us a child to adopt of the age of 5 at the most.
- Most babies and younger children go to younger childless parents or parents with less dependants. Would we be able to get a child between the ages 0-5?
- Ethiopia, a country we first invisioned to adopt from, has no gateway to New Zealand, currently New Zealanders cannot adopt from Ethiopia. Our next favourable option is Russia, apparently they are the most relaxed with their restrictions but at this stage the paper trail is still being processed and not a possibility just yet, hopefully maybe in a year or so when we are closer to that next step.
- Another really good option for us is China. From what I have read we meet the required restrictions and they have a higher number of female orphans which if our preferrable gender. I also think the ages are younger between 18mths to 3yrs which is good.
So, I began to think 'Is this even possible for us?' Accepting a child that requires medical treatment is a possibility but not a road we would really want to go down if the illness was a serious one. Minor treatments or surgeries etc is fine but obviously one wants a child that is in good health if possible.
The following day I spoke to a very informative women from
ICANZ who talked to me about the whole process, what was possible and what wasn't, which countries would be an option and which not, overall the conversation was positive and I was left with a feeling that the whole idea could very well one day become a reality.
I then phoned
'Child, Youth & Family' and organised an information pack to be sent to me. We have taken the first step! I'm looking forward to it arriving in the mail.
My next post will introduce my family which we are prepared to grow! Here are a few pics I found on the net.
First pic from Ethiopia, second pic from Russia and third from China. All Orphans!
