Yup, adoption is frustrating!

More specifically the process to adopt is frustrating.

Or still better yet, the nuances of international adoption are slowly driving me insane!

Today, I am going to talk about the biggest challenge we’re continually facing with international adoption:

Navigating the adoption demands and requirements of 2 counties.

We’ve determined that no-one on either side of the border can produce a list to tell us exactly what documents they will need and when.  In my mind, a comprehensive list is a pretty basic organizational tool both for perspective adoptive parents but also for the agencies themselves. But evidently this is not something anyone else in a position of power seems to agree with.  Part of me is starting to believe their must be some conspiracy behind the lack of clarity and organization from everyone involved in adoption – maybe this stuff is about making adoptive parents suffer for months to prove we really want to adopt?  Or they do it to test what it takes to see an adoptive parent break down in frustration, sort of like a how much stress can they handle test?

Anyways, today we have been asked to produce a document for the USA side of our adoption. I’m getting really good at quickly producing unexpected documentation, so this isn’t something that regularly causes me frustration for two reasons. First, I’m very good at asking our agencies what they will require next, so I can start to get stuff together early and hand them organized files. I’ve learned the hard way to ask early and as frequently, because they always want something.  Second, I’m hyper organized so, unless it’s my car keys, I can find whatever is needed usually within a few minutes or at the very least a few days.

Today we were asked for a specific financial document that our agency in the USA and evidently our government required T4’s are not sufficient. Their request makes no sense to us, but we’ve learned that logic does not guide the adoption process so we both let that go right away and just started figuring out how we can comply with their request. Upon initial investigation we thought it would be manageable, and started lining up the people involved to get the paperwork in our hands. Of course, it can never be that simple and with the help of our accountant we’ve now determined that their request is literally impossible.

For the first time in my life I am left wishing I were an accountant so that I could better understand the technicalities of the situation.  (Thankfully, that wish passed very quickly, and common sense returned so I’ll let Mr. MPB and the professionals understand the details).

Even thought I don’t necessarily get he details, what I do know is that the document they requested simply does not exist in Canada and cannot exist due to our different financial and legal systems!  This is clearly going to make for an interesting challenge.  Right now, the two most probable options are to find someone in the USA who has no professional ethical convictions to sign something that they have no business singing for two Canadians, or we need to convince the agency that we cannot provide what they have asked for.  (Is it sad that I think it will be easier to find an unethical professional?*).

So, now once again we are left trying to figure out how to bridge two systems and wondering how much it is going to cost us to create the seemingly impossible. As we’ve learned that common sense will not prevail, we are guessing this is going to cost us a few thousand unexpected dollars.  Fun times over here in the MPB household.

Yup, just another day in the world of navigating international adoption.

This poster should be part of my adoption survival kit!

* Please note Mr. MPB and I will NEVER do anything unethical or illegal.  It’s just not the way we operate.

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