FCC-NEO Easter Hunt

We were invited to the annual Easter hunt of the local Families of Chinese Children of NorthEastern Oklahoma group. As a waiting family we couldn't bring our Chinese children but we brought baby bunnies. Very easy for us to distract the kids with bunny petting and photos while some parents hid eggs. It was really great connecting with in real life families to talk about pediatricians and other parent topics. I hope they don't mind me sharing some photos.

That's Eric in the blue shirt talking to the girls hunting in the sand pile.

Wait Wait Wait Wait

Wait!, a photo by Óli 270 on Flickr.

Still nothing moving forward to report. I contacted our agency and was told we would receive an email when we are finally DTC. Hopefully next week. Then we wait for China. Then China for more approvals. Then we wait for the USCIS again. Then we wait for China again.

The Steps to TA average stats have lengthened again changing our timeline to travel in the middle of October. But those are just monthly averages and can change either way at any time. I have no control over how long most of this takes. Not anyone to call or harass. No one to poke or prod. Just us knowing that faceless government paper pushers take as long as they take. From two different governments no less. I want so much to hurry this along. Our officer at USCIS told me (while waiting for I800a) that the I800 applicants move to the front of the line. "Once you have a match you will want your paperwork to be done first too." WHAT! We are matched already and Joseph and Jewel are waiting for us. But she said we don't have official matches until her paperwork was done first. Maybe its better that I can't call any of the other officials processing our case. I wouldn't want to say anything to make it take longer.

I try to have patience since I have no choice and think of the families in the non-special needs waiting line. When they had their started their paperwork the wait was around 9 months start to gotcha day. Then all of a sudden China brought the IA program to a screeching halt. Families with a LID of May 2006 just finished getting their referrals last month. Thats 5 years of waiting. China is referring NSN children so slowly that it takes 6 months in real time to take care of families LID in one month. So some of the families with LIDs of early June 2006 will be traveling with us in October. And LIDs of July 2006 will be waiting until 2012. That means that having a difference of 2-3 months in your LID is going to cost you another entire year of waiting, 6 years. Thats after taking in to account the families that dropped out of the program, changed to SN or decided to adopt elsewhere. There is some patience. I'm telling you I don't think I could do it. We were so blessed to find our children.

Thalassemia the Day to Day Life

I wanted to share this story of a childs special need. His mom, Nicole, is one of my online support group friends. There are 3 basic forms of B-Thalassemia. Major, Intermedia and Minor or Trait. Her son has the most severe, major. Trait does not require transfusions. Intermedia does but can be as rare as once or twice a year. At this time we do not know which form Joseph has. Several doctors have reviewed his file but until we can get him home and get some proper US blood-work done we won't know if it's intermediate or major. 

Thalassemia – We adopted our son at age 3. He has beta thalassemia major, also called Cooley’s Anemia. (In China this may be called thalassemia, b thalassemia, thalassanemia, or Mediterranean Anemia. The term they use seems to have no connection to the severity of the condition. ) Before I explain his form of thalassemia, I want to let people know that I was very, very worried that this condition would dictate our lives/overwhelm us. It does not. For basically 29 days each month we have a typical 4 year old child, and then the next day we go to the hospital for 4-5 hours for a transfusion and then back to typical life. It is just part of his life. Thalassemia is not a condition in which it is life threatening on any given day, as could be the case with diabetes, asthma, or peanut allergy. It’s not like that; instead it’s about making the best decisions and making sure we are compliant with his treatment schedule so that he will be able to live the longest and healthiest life possible. We have found this condition to be very, very manageable for us. (I have been dealing with my son's thalassemia major for one year now. And after a year I still feel that way!) With my son’s form of thalassemia, (which is the most severe), his bone marrow cannot make healthy/functional red blood cells, so he lacks hemoglobin, which carries oxygen through one’s body. He survives by receiving a transfusion of red blood cells every 3 or 4 weeks (depending on how quickly his hemoglobin drops). The transfusions supress his bone marrow from attempting to produce the defective cells. Each transfusion brings iron into his body, which the body has no way to get rid of. He must take a daily chelation medication (called Exjade, a pill which must be dissolved in juice or water) to help his body get rid of the excess iron. The main cause of death related to thalassemia has been cardiac arrest/heart attack due to iron depositing in the heart, and life expectancy PREVIOUSLY was around 20 years of age. With compliance with daily chelation medication, the goal is to keep the iron out of the organs. With the use of Exjade (came out around 2005), the belief by doctors is that life expectancy should be comparable to any other person without thalassemia. However, since it is a new medication and current thalassemia patients have not been on it for too long, the data is not in yet. However, there are people living into their 40s and 50s with thalassemia, and they did not have access to Exjade (they used an infusion pump system with a medication called desferal). We take our son once a year for a special MRI to determine the amount of iron in his liver (first organ to collect iron) and that is what the dosage of his chelation medication is based on.

Some of the things to really consider if you are thinking about adopting a child with thalassemia:

- how close are you to a hospital? We live 20 min from one and that works great for us. You would be going every 3-4 weeks for about 5 hours. (Warren Clinic has a hematology department that treats Thalassemia and has several patients at St. Francis.)

- can you take time off from work to take your child for a transfusion every 3-4 weeks? (Yes. And with Dustin on shift even he could take Joseph during his days off though the week.)

- Can you bring your child to one of the 9 thalassemia treatment centers in the U.S. once a year for a special MRI and a consultation with a thal. specialist? (Yes, however there is a non-CDC children's center in Dallas that has the equipment to test his liver iron level.) 

I want to mention that we live in a small state. Our son is the only thal. patient at our hospital. And yet, I know from our visit to a thal center and from talking to other parents with children with this condition that my son is getting the same level of care as he would at a major thal center!

Now this mom has a very positive attitude but the treatments she is referring to are not available in China. The lack of chelation allows deadly iron to build up in the organs. They do not have Exjade available even though it has been the standard of care here for the past 5 years. Chelation treatment in China doesn't even use the infusion pump. SOME (not all) thalassemia major kids in China are given chelation med (desferal) in an IV during their transfusion (Same medicine that is in the pump that people use.  The pump recommendation is 12 hours a day for 5-7 days a week.  So getting it for an hour each month is no where near the amount that would make a difference.) They also over transfuse kids to higher adult levels monthly, possibly waiting longer between transfusions. 

I want to point out that five years ago the Desferal infusion pump was the best we had to offer as well. That contributed to the non-compliance especially in teenagers. I can only imagine what a hassle they would have considered using the pump for 12 hrs a day. The silent iron buildup doesn't cause any symptoms or pain that would encourage compliance. Exjade is a oral pill taken once a day and compliance is expected to be much much higher. Many people take a daily pill to keep themselves healthy. Right now, there are two new medicines in human trials for future chelation use. This is not a common issue in the US but it is huge in other parts of the world. Some of these countries also have the resources to commit to finding treatments for Thalassemia. Our CDC sponsors several speciality clinics here in the US where research is being done as well. 

The saddest news is this. Chinese children are only eligible for adoption until they turn 14 years old. But there are no 13 year old children with Thalassemia on the shared list of over 2000 kids. And no 12 yr, 11 yr or 10yr olds. The oldest child I have seen is one 9 year old. Most of the Thalassemia kids ages stop around 7 years old on the shared list awaiting adoptions. This is most likely because of not using chelation medicines. The iron buildup does cause fatal organ failure. So it is of the utmost importance that the iron be removed. Treatment in the US would stop and reverse some of the iron buildup. The bottom line is life expectancy in China is in the single digits. Mushrooms, scorpian tails and fish soup doesn't cure Thalassemia. But with the medicines in the US they can live a full life here. 

We didn't know anything about Thalassemia when we were drawn to Joseph. It took a lot of research and learning to get to the point we are now. But as I pointed out in his story sometimes it's fate. We absolutely believe Joseph will lead a healthy and long life in our family. 

I800a

homeland_security_logo, a photo by Fingers SFV on Flickr.

I800a approval

I've been calling our officer for 3 days. I guess she got tired of hearing from me. The next step is taken and the Newport's are approved by the USCIS to adopt two children from The People's Republic of China. And just in time to beat the possible US government shut down. I'm sure if it happens it won't last long but I'm glad we won't we waiting for our US documents for however long the delay ends up being. I'm grateful for the speedup. If you remember we were not originally expected to receive I800a approval until April 18th. 

Once we receive our I800a approval from immigration our agency will be working to get us DTC (dossier to China). Its more complicated than putting it in the mail. All our documents we have been working on have to be:

1. Notarized (if not already). It does make a difference what state the notary is commissioned in on the next step. The notary has to have at least 9 months remaining on their commission as well. 

2. Then the notary's commission has to be state certified confirming that the notary who signed your documents is a valid, legal notary registered with the state by the Secretary of State which holds their commission (so maybe more than one SOS depending on where the documents where notarized). 

3. After that they have to be couriered (so as not to get lost) to the Chinese Consulate in Houston, New York or possibly Washington D.C. The Chinese Consulate authenticates that those are the official legal Secretary of States seals. 

4. THEN, our agency sends our dossier to China. 

Why are you doing all these steps anyway? Well, if you just write up a document and mail it to China, how do they know it's valid? It's not even from their own country. So first, you notarized each document. Then you state certified each document. The Secretary of State verified that the notary who signed your documents was a legal and valid notary at the time of signature.

But that's still not credible enough for China. The state's stamp of approval isn't enough to validate the document in a foreign country. So, you have to send your state certified documents to the Chinese consulate here in America to that the Chinese consulate can verify the validity of your state's stamp! Crazy, right? But that's the process.

There are 5 or 6 Chinese consulates in America (I forget the exact number). Each consulate validates documents only from certain states. First, you need to figure out which consulate has jurisdiction over which states.

(Thanks Courtney for the great website, china-adoption-online.com)

Steps to TA

Thanks to chartkeeperqueen for keeping this updated every week. Being able to see how long the next step takes and see other online adoptive friends making their way to the top to get "pinked" really helps to feel like we're accomplishing something besides just waiting. The bad news is this chart comes in three sections (A, B and C). Right now we are on the "C" chart at the bottom. Our online name is growingfamily and we are 2nd from the bottom. The chart lists our two babies waiting for us and next weeks update will have their provinces listed too. One day, not to long from now, we will be "pinked" to go to China too. If you want to see this chart larger there should be a view tab on the top line of your computer that will zoom in

. 

This is our last chart as we paperwork our way to China. 

We expect it to take 3-4 weeks for us to be DTC. As you can see after DTC it's only taking about 10 days to LID from China. Then we get to skip the LOI and PA steps since we have already sent and received those. So in about 5-6 weeks (middle of May) we will hopefully be on chart B waiting for our 2 LOA's. Remember there is an abbreviation list on the left side of the blog if you need it. 

Steps to TA 04052011_1c, a photo by chartkeeperqueen on Flickr.

Guess what China got you for your 38th birthday?

D & D at WDW, a photo by mail.adoption on Flickr.

通 知

中国之爱收养组织:

你们递交的DUSTIN 和 JENNIFER 收养江西(省、市、自治区)抚州市社会福利院儿童福婧心的申请已收到，经过对该家庭的基本情况及其为该儿童制定的医疗康复及抚育计划的审 核，中国收养中心同意在该申请文件到达（截止日期2011年10月01日，含当日）后，按照收养特殊需要儿童的 程序处理，特此告知。

中国收养中心         

2011年04月01 日       

This means we have received pre-approval to adopt Jewel from China!!! Now both of the children's paperwork is moving along. 

Band Camp

Dalton doesn't usually want to do different activities and has to be encouraged most of the time. Imagine my surprise when he said he wanted to go to Band Camp. This is the first year he is able to attend with camp. The grades going vary from 6th all the way to 12th. He needs to raise $345 which means he needs to sell 670 candy bars at $1 each. (the band only gets $.50 profit from each sale.) Or he can have cash donations that count towards his total needed at 100%. (Hint: Granny & Grandma you don't have to purchase candy bars)




PA for Joseph

Pa Pa, a photo by the_mel on Flickr.

Pre-Approval was received from China for our new son, Joseph this past Thursday. We are still waiting on Jewel's PA. Joseph is named after his Granddad, Joe. However, I think we will be calling him Bo, at least at first, since that is part of his chinese middle name that he will be familiar with.

Here's to hoping the possible government shutdown is not going to happen. In the past the visa offices have been one of the closed offices. We are still waiting for our I800a approval to adopt two children from China and that would cause us to be delayed. I was hoping we would get our approval by April 18th. The government is saying they might shut down on Friday the 8th if a new budget is not passed.