Dossier submission

Last week we finally sent in the Dossier to our adoption agency.  Upon their approval it'll be sent to Armenia to be translated into Armenian.  I feel a huge weight lifted off my shoulders having that all taken care of and sent in.  The packet I sent into the agency was literally 2 inches thick.  I was nervous to put it in the mail because if for some reason it didn't get where it was headed I promise I would have cried like I had lost my first born.  Okay, maybe that is an exaggeration.  However, that was hours and hours of hard work.

I get a lot of questions, but mostly people just want to know WHEN we will be getting her.  I sure wish I knew!  It's very frustrating having so little information.  My children are getting so excited to have her in our family.  They pray for her.  She is constantly in our prayers.  We pray for her caretakers as well.   We pray that they love her and are taking good care of her.

I have been thinking a lot about how this will affect her.  When you start looking at the waiting lists of all of these children without parents and living in orphanages, you think about how much you could change their life by bringing them in.  I found myself wanting to save them and how much these poor children are looking for a place to live and people to love them.  It wasn't too long ago that I had the thought that really, they know no different.  There is a good chance that she will not want to leave her orphanage.  There's a chance that she has fallen in love with her caretakers and her friends there.  I have worried that she will resent us at first, that she won't like us because we are taking her from everything she knows.  You know what?  I really wouldn't blame her!

I remember when we did foster care growing up.  My parents would take in these children who had been abused in every way imaginable.  They didn't know when their next meal would come.  They were not living in great environments.  They were each different in their own way, but they had one thing in common- They all wanted to go back to their parents, no matter how they were treated or where they lived.

That's my concern for our sweet girl.  She may not see us as "saving her from an orphanage", but rather a couple of weirdos who are ripping her away from where she is comfortable, from friends and other people she loves.  It is very possible that it'll take a while for her to adjust.

I feel so blessed to have so many people in my life who I KNOW will love her like their own.  I only hope that she will feel that love.


That's all for now!  Hope to have an update soon.  I wouldn't count on it though ;-)