this may not make much sense

I have not written much about how things are going with the adoption because...well, because I start crying every time I think about it. I will try to explain without going into too much detail. Because of the Hague Convention Treaty the adoption process for some countries, including China, has changed a little in the last few months. One of those changes is you now need a criminal and child abuse check from every state and country you have lived in since you were 18.

Our hold up has been trying to get a background check for Merritt from Colombia (because he lived there for two years on his mission). Because everything is so new no one has been able to tell us how to do that exactly. We have been in contact with the Colombian Consulate in San Francisco but they have not been incredibly helpful. They gave us the information we needed to send to them (which we verified several times) in order to get a pasado jucidicial (background check). We gathered what we could on the list but no one could tell us how to get the "certified copy" of Merritt's passport that they were requesting. The consulate told us it needed to be a notarized copy that was authenticated by the state secretary. But no notary had ever heard of notarizing a copy of something. After several weeks we found some information on the Internet that was somewhat related. We tried it and sent it off to the state secretary. It was returned saying it could not be done because of the wording. We fixed it and sent it again. Once we received it back we overnighted everything to San Fransisco hoping that everything was right.

We heard nothing for two weeks. We had been out of town and I was finally able to call to see where things were. The lady I spoke to said she was sending it all back because Merritt has to sign some form and be fingerprinted, and then that has to be sent to someone we know in Colombia who can take care of whatever has to be done there, then send it back to us so we can send it back to the Consulate in San Fransisco. And then from there I don't know if it still has to go to Colombia again. Confused yet?

I barely got off the phone before I started sobbing. What I have written here makes it sound like it took less time than it actually did. It has been many emails, many phone calls, frantic searching to find Merritt's ID card he carried his whole mission (and hasn't looked at for 9 years, I still can't believe he still had it and we found it), confusion, redoing and recopying everything several times because we were told different things by different people, and the frustration that no one seems to have the answers we need.

The new problem is that Merritt does not know anyone in Colombia anymore. It has been nine years. Who are we supposed to send it to? We have been trying to contact the consulate to get some more questions answered and all we get is an answering machine.

Also, because this is taking so long we will have to renew a lot of the paperwork (doctors appointments, fingerprints, etc) that has already been done. And once we do actually get the background check back it could still take another 3-6 months to hear back from USCIS (immigration) saying we can continue with the rest of the paperwork.

I know this came out disjointed and probably not making much sense. Sorry. I knew this would be a long process and that it would be hard emotionally, but I was not prepared for this. I just want to bring our little girl home. It is so hard to have no control and to just have to sit and wait for someone (who doesn't care) to do what needs to be done, hopefully in a timely manner.