Empty Threat?

As if the adoption process wasn't emotional enough, today brought disconcerting news from Guatemala. There isn't enough room here to go into it all, but apparently (the facts are a little murky) the president of Guatemala, President Berger, has drafted an Executive Order halting ALL adoptions in Guatemala, even ones currently in process! Like us! As of right now, no EO has been issued and there is uncertainty over its existence, contents, and legal effect. Our agency has told us that things are continuing to process and there is no need to panic. Easier said then done!

Guatemala right now is somewhat chaotic with adoption, and we are used to reading websites that spread rumors. But this "threat" seems more serious then the average rumor. The plan was for the Executive Order to go into effect October 1. However, attorneys in Guatemala have said that the EO would just be ignored because it is contrary to current law, which allows for private placement of adoptions. The long and short of it is that there is a Hague Convention on Adoptions that the U.S. is supposed to "adopt" next year; Guatemala has taken many actions to be compliant with the Hague but in 2003 their Supreme Court ruled that they were not in compliance with the treaty. So...once the U.S. adopts the Hague it will suspend all adoptions with Guatemala until Guatemala correctly ratifies the treaty. We know that we are grandfathered in as far as the U.S. government is concerned, so that isn't a problem for us with Henry, although we probably wouldn't be able to adopt from Guatemala again. I don't know all of the provisions of the Hague, but it probably would move the adoptions into the public sphere and may cut off a lot of them (as has happened in Honduras, for example).

President Berger and the First Lady have long been opposed to international adoption, and they may be posturing for their Congress to act against it. There is no indication that that will happen. Also, UNICEF (remember the little coin boxes kids carry with them on Halloween) has long conspired with Guatemala and other countries to stifle adoptions. UNICEF reportedly has donated $28 million to a social department within the Guatemalan government with the catch that Guatemala cut off adoptions until there is Hague compliance. UNICEF stands for "United Nations Children's Fund," with a mission statement of "child survival, protection and development worldwide through education, advocacy and fundraising."

The U.S. State Department is saying that adoptions in process are just fine and that the EO, if there even is one, will not be acted upon and things will go fine. That is encouraging and we already knew that there is a lot of political posturing in Guatemala over adoption. We just pray that Guatemala arrives at an ethical adoption process that is realistic given their economic contraints. We don't want them to set up a great in theory, but impossible to meet in reality, system that leaves children without families.

Right now, we are staying positive and realize that every day that passes without any action prohibiting adoptions by the Guatemalan government means we're further in the process. Its a hard situation for so many and we ask for your thoughts and prayers.

Buenos noches...

DNA Match!!

We just wanted to let you know that today we got an envelope from a DNA lab in North Carolina which concluded that the birth mom is actually the birth mom to Henry. Well, they are 99.71% sure, so we'll take that as a yes! So, here is the revised case update (it's always good to include more dates):

Homestudy approval by Social Worker: 6-5-06
I-171H received (approval by U.S. govt.): 6-26-06
Josue Moises Morales born: 7-12-06
Guatemalan dossier completed: 7-17-06
REFERRAL OF JOSUE!!: 7-24-06
Referral paperwork completed: 7-28-06
Power of Attorney sent to Guatemala: 8-8-06
Birth mom & Henry DNA test: 8-25-06
DNA Match: 9-11-06
Approval by Guatemala family court:
Approval by PGN:
Travel date:
Return home!:

The race of Henry and the birth mom was listed as "Guatemalan". A very cute picture of our little guy was included as well, but we can't post it because he is sitting with his birth mom. Henry is spreading both of his arms out as far as he can and has a shirt with the number "34" on it. That's Kirby's number!

Case Update

Good evening! We got a monthly update from our agency on how our adoption case is progressing. At the end of each month, the attorneys in Guatemala City send case updates to our agency, who passes them on to us. We were getting very impatient waiting for our first update but finally received it late last week. We found out that our adoption dossier (i.e. our case file that will be reviewed by the Guatemalan government) was sent to Guatemala on August 2, and that our power of attorney was sent on August 8. Once the power of attorney made it down, the attorneys could officially start working on our case. A DNA test for Henry and Henry's birth mom was taken on August 25. So, I will update/revise our Type A timeline as follows:

Homestudy approval by Social Worker: 6-5-06
I-171H received (approval by U.S. govt.): 6-26-06
Josue Moises Morales born: 7-12-06
Guatemalan dossier completed: 7-17-06
REFERRAL OF JOSUE!!: 7-24-06
Referral paperwork completed: 7-28-06
Power of Attorney sent to Guatemala: 8-8-06
Birth mom & Henry DNA test: 8-25-06
DNA Match:
Approval by Guatemala family court:
Approval by PGN:
Travel date:
Return home!:

We think that it is good news that the DNA test occurred so quickly, a little over 2 weeks after our power of attorney made it to Guatemala, because the birth mom has to make an appointment to take the test and drive into Guatemala City for the appointment. Assuming Henry's birth mom has to work, getting into the city could have been quite a chore, but it appears to have gone smoothly. We also are hoping that our case has been assigned to a Guatemala family court. Once it is assigned, a social worker will interview the birth mother and the court will presumably find that she cannot support the child and will give approval to the adoption. We can't estimate how long that process will take because there are several family courts in Guatemala and they all move at varying speeds. Hopefully that is some information we will find out in our September update.

We also received a medical update on Henry Moises. On September 2 Lil' Henry went in for a checkup and he weighed in at 9 pounds 10 ounces (birth weight 8 lb. 14 oz., but had lost over a pound by his first checkup- 7 lb 12 oz.), with a length of 51 centimeters (46 cm. at birth). He was administered shots for polio, meningitis and Hepatitis B. Ah, I'll just quote verbatim from the report: "The patient presents a normal and adequate physical and mental development for his age; the patient is active asympotmatic, whith no evidence of any infectious disease at this time. Currently he has a good nutritional and neurological state, adequate for his age. The baby observes mobile objects. The baby has voiced an intense enthusiasm for the Minnesota Twins."

Okay, so I had to add the last sentence. But all in all, a good report. The report also stated that the foster mother is married and has three children, two boys aged 19 and 17, and a girl aged 12. It would be interesting to know if she is a regular foster mother or if this is her first foster child. We hope Henry doesn't keep the family up too late at night! No, he's perfect, right?

This posting had a lot of information in it. Our favorite times are when we receive information, any kind of information, on our child. We also love to show him off to others!

Growing Henry

Greetings to you all. We haven't been posting a lot lately as we've been busy "assisting" with our kitchen remodeling, but we were lucky enough to get some new pictures of our bambino. The interesting thing is that he has changed quite a bit from his earlier pictures. In these pictures, he is more awake and he is moving his hands and arms in some of them. He also has a little receding hairline (for the time being)! He also has some eyebrows coming in. What a cute little guy. It is nice to see him grow like this but it is a little heartbreaking as well, since we are missing it all.

We are also supposed to receive an update on how our case is progressing, and that should be coming any day now, so we will keep you updated. We are hoping that a DNA test has been taken at least!

The Pratts