Adoption news

Our agency received a new Waiting Child list today. Our daughter probably isn't on this list (although there's a very slim chance she could be), but is very likely on the next list. We hope the next list will come around September - October. Read on if you want to delve into all the adoption lingo on what this means.

Our dossier was logged in by China on August 1, 2006 (this is our LID), for the non-special needs program. China refers children to families in order by LID dates. Referrals come in batches, about once a month. Once upon a time, China referred more or less a month's worth of LIDs every month, meaning the wait stayed steady. The number of LIDs per batch dropped dramatically in October 2005, however, and has stayed low ever since. The last batch of referrals, received in early June, covered early November 2005 LIDs. That means they are still nine months away from our Aug. 1 LID. It's likely that if things continue as they are, we would receive a referral sometime in 2009 in the non-special needs program.

Except...we submitted a medical conditions checklist (MCC) to our agency in January 2007. This is a form you fill out, checking yes, no or maybe to various medical conditions. Filling it out is a weird experience, let me tell you! We said yes to things that are not life-threatening, and generally do not require life-long medical management. Our yeses included cleft lip and/or palate, minor heart condition, malformed or missing fingers or toes, etc. Our nos included major heart conditions, Hepatitis B, etc.

The program works like this: China sends our agency lists of special needs children. The lists don't come at entirely predictable intervals, but every three months seems to be fairly common. They also vary in how many children are on the list (20-30 seems to be average), and the types and severity of the needs the children have. Our agency matches specific children to families using the family's MCC. Those submitted first theoretically get referrals first, although a family with a very conservative list may wait longer than a family with a more liberal list.

When we submitted our list in January, our agency told us our wait for a referral would be around 6-8 months. We're just now reaching the beginning of that window. They also told us there were about 150 families already on the list at that time. Well, they have made 95 waiting child referrals this year, so that means there must be roughly 50 families still ahead of us on the list. We don't know yet how many children are on the new list.

Like I said, I think it's pretty unlikely our daughter will be on this list, but I am now officially very excited and a little bit nervous.