CNY parents want to bring son home
Melissa and Eric Littlejohn, of King Ferry
By Daniel Bernardi, staff writer
•
Tue, Jun 15, 2010
With Mother’s Day just passing and Father’s Day upon us, now is when most parents spend more time in the company of their children. But for Melissa and Eric Littlejohn of King Ferry, the only way they see their child is through pictures placed throughout their home.
The Littlejohns are among 65 American and Canadian families awaiting the arrival of their adopted children from Kyrgyzstan - the only family from Central New York.
The Littlejohns began the adoption process in 2008, but reached a roadblock when former Prime Minister Igor Chudinov called a moratorium on adoptions in February 2009, citing fraud and abuses of the system by government officials, orphanages and adoption service providers. Further, an overthrow of the Kyrgyz government and president in early April 2010 has added to the delay in resuming adoptions.
The two years have been especially painful for the Littlejohns, considering they were matched with their child more than two years ago.
“In early May 2008, we received a picture of an adorable baby boy who we had been matched with for adoption from Kyrgyzstan,” Melissa Littlejohn said. “It was love at first sight.”
For the Littlejohns, they compared the feeling of seeing the picture of the child to the moment first time expectant parents are able to view their baby on an ultrasound machine. The Littlejohns tried numerous fertility treatments to no avail, and accepted the fact that their first child would come through adoption.
“We had a peace about this because we knew there were so many children who don’t have parents who can take care of them and we are willing and eager to stand in the gap to be those parents to a child who needs a family,” she said.
They chose to adopt internationally and were attracted to adopting from Kyrgyzstan, because there were children available for adoption at a young age and the process from start to finish was typically under one year.
As the adoption process reached the final steps, the moratorium halted the procedure, leaving the Littlejohns in a state of worry and confusion.
“Right now, none of us know where we stand because the people have overthrown the government,” she said. “There is now no president and no parliament. We don’t know if our paperwork is safe. We’ve heard that the children are OK, but we don’t know if any of the paperwork was lost when buildings were burnt down by the protesting and government overthrow.”
The greatest concern is the physical and mental well-being of the Kyrgyzstan children.
“These kids are stuck in limbo and are suffering because the orphanages in Kyrgyzstan are overcrowded and they can’t get the individualized care that they need,” she said. “We are here and ready.”
The US State Department is aware of the cases and has told the families that the issue is of high priority, but as each day passes, their worry grows.
“Although we are all frustrated and at wits' end because nothing is in our control, our children are the victims here and it is a tragedy that these precious children are continuing to wait, year after year,” she said. “Every day they are forced to wait, is a day too long. They need a family now. We want what’s best for the children we now love who are stuck in ‘limbo’ and we are not able to turn our backs on them.”
The Littlejohns acknowledge the political unrest in Kyrgyzstan and hope order can be restored and the adoption cases resume.
“We support the Kyrgyz interim government’s goal of restoring human rights in Kyrgyzstan,” she said. “We believe that resolving our pending cases would be a step in the right direction and a great opportunity for Kyrgyzstan to show their commitment to restoring those rights.”
The country is currently trying to recover under an interim leader and a transitional government.
Kyrgyz leader Roza Otunbayeva acknowledged the 65 families eagerly awaiting their adopted children on Facebook.
Otunbayeva’s post read:
“To the 65 families that are waiting to adopt their children - thank you for your emails of support. We are working on the resolution of your cases to the best of our ability. We understand your concerns, but please be patient, your families will be reunited.”
As each day passes, the Littlejohns lose precious bonding time with their child.
“When a child is little, those first few years of life are so important for bonding and it kind of sets the mark for how you are going to relate to other people when you grow up,” Littlejohn said. “It gives you a sense of security to know that you are loved by your mom and your dad and these kids are not getting that.”
Monday, May 17, 2010
When will Ethan come home?
A blue and red backpack is stuffed. Among its contents: a sticker activity book, an Etch-A-Sketch and the popular children's book, “Gallop!”
But the book's spine isn't cracked, the Etch-A-Sketch doesn't have a scribble and the stickers are in place ready to be peeled.
The backpack belongs to Ethan, and it has been waiting for him for more than two years.
“We have everything he needs, but he's not here,” Stephanie Umberger said as she sifted through a pile of boys clothes — some still containing tags — at her La Quinta home.
Umberger and her husband, Jim, are among a group of hopeful parents dubbed “The Waiting 65.”
The American families are waiting to complete adoptions of about 65 orphans from Kyrgyzstan.
The adoptions have been on hold since late 2008, when the country — a former annexed territory of Russia west of China — placed a moratorium on intercountry adoptions because of reports of corruption and fraud.
The Umbergers have already adopted three children, a boy and a girl from Mississippi and another girl from Russia.
But their family won't be complete until Ethan arrives, they say.
The waiting hurts.
“When we go out to dinner, we feel like there's an empty seat,” Stephanie Umberger said. “Though it's hard to fathom the love you can feel for a child you've only met a few times, we do love him because he's our son.”
The Umbergers have been fighting to bring 4-year-old Ethan, whose birth name is Ruslen, to the United States since they met him for the first time on Feb. 14, 2008 — just months before the country decided to overhaul its adoption system.
According to the Umbergers, Ethan's mother died when he was a baby and there is no record of his father.
“Emotionally, it would be easier to just quit,” Stephanie Umberger said. “But we've thought about it 1,000 times and just can't do it. For this little boy, we're his hope for a better future.”
Stunted growth
The Umbergers said they were inspired to try for another intercountry adoption after watching their Russian-born child, Ariana, transform upon her arrival in the United States.
They learned firsthand how orphans in that region are stunted mentally and physically.
According to the Bucharest Early Intervention Study conducted on institutionalized children, children outside of family care lose one month of growth for every three months living in an institution.
The study has shown that institutionalized children generally lose one IQ point per month, diminishing intellectual performance to the point of borderline mental retardation, according to the Joint Council on International Children's Services. It is an advocacy group that lobbies for children's rights that conducted the study.
“We watched (Ariana) come to our home and transform before our eyes,” and wanted to be able to help another child the same way, Stephanie Umberger said.
“That experience made us realize that these kids are in institutions throughout the world and they don't have hope to have a normal life,” she said.
Jim Umberger said it was particularly important for them to adopt a child that was at least 3 years old. That's because they learned, during the adoption process with Ariana, “that once children reach the age of 3, they virtually have no chance of ever getting adopted because all the people adopting kids are always looking for babies.”
Then on Jan. 5, 2008, the couple received word that Ethan was available for adoption. Within a month, they were in Kyrgyzstan.
Broken ‘promise'
The Umbergers said they will never forget their first meeting.
In the midst of the “chaos” — children jumping and screaming, “Ruslen, your mama and papa from America!” — there was an adorable little boy that just looked like he fit in the family.
“Physically, we marveled at how much he looked like Alex and me,” Jim Umberger said of Ethan's resemblance to their oldest son.
But most striking, he said, was his tender and pensive demeanor.
“He seemed very compassionate and caring,” Jim Umberger said. “And when he played with his Lincoln Logs and Legos, he was really focused. You could tell he is a smart boy.”
After spending a week bonding with Ethan, “to leave him was so incredibly hard,” Stephanie Umberger said.
“We told him he would have a brother, a sister, a dog, and that we have a room for him, and that we love him and we want to be his parents,” she said, fighting back tears. “Now it's been over two years and we haven't been able to fulfill that promise. It's out of our control, but we broke a promise.”
Jim Umberger said the last photo he took that first visit with Ethan waving goodbye from a window before they left the country has haunted him every day. “We just kind of feel we've let him down,” he said.
“I just think about him sitting there wondering: ‘Are they coming back for me? Did I do something wrong? Do they not want me?'” Stephanie Umberger said. “To Ethan, the minute we walked through the door we were the parents he had been waiting for. Our heart breaks that he continues to wait and we cannot get back to get him.”
In November 2008, Jim Umberger visited Kyrgyzstan alone to meet the Minister of Education and U.S. Embassy officials hoping for action, but he did not return with his son.
“All I kept telling him was that ‘Mommy and Daddy are going to come back to get you,'” Jim Umberger said.
That was the last time he saw Ethan.
Though still in Kyrgyzstan, Ethan has changed the La Quinta family members' lives immensely.
Alex, now 9 years old, often asks his mother when his little brother will be home to play.
Ariana, 4, prays: “God, he's my brother. Bring him home.”
And while Isla, at 9 months old, doesn't truly comprehend she has a brother in waiting, she sleeps in the crib that was once a daybed assembled for Ethan.
The mission to bring Ethan home has become a family passion.
“For us, we won't quit,” Stephanie Umberger said. “Even though this adoption journey has been horrible, we want him to have a chance at a better life.”
But the book's spine isn't cracked, the Etch-A-Sketch doesn't have a scribble and the stickers are in place ready to be peeled.
The backpack belongs to Ethan, and it has been waiting for him for more than two years.
“We have everything he needs, but he's not here,” Stephanie Umberger said as she sifted through a pile of boys clothes — some still containing tags — at her La Quinta home.
Umberger and her husband, Jim, are among a group of hopeful parents dubbed “The Waiting 65.”
The American families are waiting to complete adoptions of about 65 orphans from Kyrgyzstan.
The adoptions have been on hold since late 2008, when the country — a former annexed territory of Russia west of China — placed a moratorium on intercountry adoptions because of reports of corruption and fraud.
The Umbergers have already adopted three children, a boy and a girl from Mississippi and another girl from Russia.
But their family won't be complete until Ethan arrives, they say.
The waiting hurts.
“When we go out to dinner, we feel like there's an empty seat,” Stephanie Umberger said. “Though it's hard to fathom the love you can feel for a child you've only met a few times, we do love him because he's our son.”
The Umbergers have been fighting to bring 4-year-old Ethan, whose birth name is Ruslen, to the United States since they met him for the first time on Feb. 14, 2008 — just months before the country decided to overhaul its adoption system.
According to the Umbergers, Ethan's mother died when he was a baby and there is no record of his father.
“Emotionally, it would be easier to just quit,” Stephanie Umberger said. “But we've thought about it 1,000 times and just can't do it. For this little boy, we're his hope for a better future.”
Stunted growth
The Umbergers said they were inspired to try for another intercountry adoption after watching their Russian-born child, Ariana, transform upon her arrival in the United States.
They learned firsthand how orphans in that region are stunted mentally and physically.
According to the Bucharest Early Intervention Study conducted on institutionalized children, children outside of family care lose one month of growth for every three months living in an institution.
The study has shown that institutionalized children generally lose one IQ point per month, diminishing intellectual performance to the point of borderline mental retardation, according to the Joint Council on International Children's Services. It is an advocacy group that lobbies for children's rights that conducted the study.
“We watched (Ariana) come to our home and transform before our eyes,” and wanted to be able to help another child the same way, Stephanie Umberger said.
“That experience made us realize that these kids are in institutions throughout the world and they don't have hope to have a normal life,” she said.
Jim Umberger said it was particularly important for them to adopt a child that was at least 3 years old. That's because they learned, during the adoption process with Ariana, “that once children reach the age of 3, they virtually have no chance of ever getting adopted because all the people adopting kids are always looking for babies.”
Then on Jan. 5, 2008, the couple received word that Ethan was available for adoption. Within a month, they were in Kyrgyzstan.
Broken ‘promise'
The Umbergers said they will never forget their first meeting.
In the midst of the “chaos” — children jumping and screaming, “Ruslen, your mama and papa from America!” — there was an adorable little boy that just looked like he fit in the family.
“Physically, we marveled at how much he looked like Alex and me,” Jim Umberger said of Ethan's resemblance to their oldest son.
But most striking, he said, was his tender and pensive demeanor.
“He seemed very compassionate and caring,” Jim Umberger said. “And when he played with his Lincoln Logs and Legos, he was really focused. You could tell he is a smart boy.”
After spending a week bonding with Ethan, “to leave him was so incredibly hard,” Stephanie Umberger said.
“We told him he would have a brother, a sister, a dog, and that we have a room for him, and that we love him and we want to be his parents,” she said, fighting back tears. “Now it's been over two years and we haven't been able to fulfill that promise. It's out of our control, but we broke a promise.”
Jim Umberger said the last photo he took that first visit with Ethan waving goodbye from a window before they left the country has haunted him every day. “We just kind of feel we've let him down,” he said.
“I just think about him sitting there wondering: ‘Are they coming back for me? Did I do something wrong? Do they not want me?'” Stephanie Umberger said. “To Ethan, the minute we walked through the door we were the parents he had been waiting for. Our heart breaks that he continues to wait and we cannot get back to get him.”
In November 2008, Jim Umberger visited Kyrgyzstan alone to meet the Minister of Education and U.S. Embassy officials hoping for action, but he did not return with his son.
“All I kept telling him was that ‘Mommy and Daddy are going to come back to get you,'” Jim Umberger said.
That was the last time he saw Ethan.
Though still in Kyrgyzstan, Ethan has changed the La Quinta family members' lives immensely.
Alex, now 9 years old, often asks his mother when his little brother will be home to play.
Ariana, 4, prays: “God, he's my brother. Bring him home.”
And while Isla, at 9 months old, doesn't truly comprehend she has a brother in waiting, she sleeps in the crib that was once a daybed assembled for Ethan.
The mission to bring Ethan home has become a family passion.
“For us, we won't quit,” Stephanie Umberger said. “Even though this adoption journey has been horrible, we want him to have a chance at a better life.”
Thursday, April 29, 2010
When will Viktor come home?
Can you imagine being a little boy and finally meeting the parents you have longed to have? Can you imagine those parents telling you that they love you and will come back soon to take you home forever? Can you imagine still waiting, over a year later? Viktor is still waiting.
To see Viktor's story click on the Viktor Waits link on the right.
To see Viktor's story click on the Viktor Waits link on the right.
Monday, April 26, 2010
Associated Press article about Kyrgyz adoptions
US families persevere in seeking Kyrgyz adoptions
NEW YORK – Amid high-profile furor over adoptions from Haiti and Russia, about 60 American families are persevering with a two-year struggle to complete adoptions from Kyrgyzstan — an already emotionally draining quest further complicated by recent political upheaval.
The families were formally matched with the children — most suffering from serious medical problems — in 2008 and have grown deeply attached to them after visiting their orphanages and bringing back photographs and videos.
"I feel that's my daughter, and she's my responsibility. I can't let go," said Angela Sharp, a 36-year-old cosmetology instructor from Flint, Mich., who visited for a week in April 2008 with the now 2-year-old orphan she hopes to adopt. A room with a crib and children's clothes awaits the girl, already given a new name by Sharp — Mia Angelina.
The nearly completed adoption proceedings for Sharp and the other families ground to a halt in late 2008 when Kyrgyzstan said it needed to overhaul its adoption system because of suspected corruption. A reform bill was introduced but never finalized, an investigation launched but never finished, and Parliament was dissolved following a bloody revolt this month that ousted President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
Meanwhile, one of the waiting children has died and another suffered such severe neurological damage that her prospective mother in Florida — a pediatrician — shifted from trying to adopt to campaigning to help ailing Kyrgyz orphans get better medical care.
"These children in Kyrgyzstan รข€” their level of care is sub-par at best, and they've been waiting there now for two years," said Tom DeFilipo of the Joint Council on International Children's Services. "The commitment of the families to these children is astounding. Once they get attached to a child, it's their child."
Lisa Reickerd of Orange, Calif., the single mother of a girl adopted from Kazakhstan in 2003, is now trying to adopt a 3-year-old girl she met in an orphanage in Bishkek, the Kyrgyz capital, in August 2008.
"I knew she was meant to be with me," said Reickerd, who has served as the waiting families' main liaison with the State Department, which handles international adoption matters. "I feel no less love or compassion for this little girl than for the daughter I have now. We're all very committed to waiting this out."
However, recent events have compounded the frustrations of the waiting families. They noted that hundreds of pending adoptions of Haitian orphans by Americans were expedited after the earthquake in January, and they felt neglected amid the tumult this month that prompted Russia to freeze U.S. adoptions after a Tennessee woman sent her adopted son back to Moscow alone on a plane.
The families are now making two specific requests — that the State Department draw up a detailed plan to resolve the stalemate and that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton telephone the new Kyrgyz leader to raise the issue.
The State Department says it empathizes with the families, while noting that the new Kyrgyz leaders are struggling to restore basic government functions and may not consider adoption a high priority for the moment. The department also accepts Kyrgyzstan's position that its corruption probe must be completed before adoptions resume.
"The Kyrgyz authorities should urgently complete the criminal investigation into alleged adoption fraud and resolve the pending cases so that eligible children can be placed in loving homes," Michele Bond, the deputy assistant secretary for overseas citizens services, said Friday.
She stressed that many of the waiting children have serious health problems and that the U.S. families, despite the challenges, remain committed to adopting.
The families and their supporters say the Kyrgyz investigation appears to be stalled and are pleading for the pending adoptions to be finalized now.
"There is no legal concern over these pending cases, no concern whatsoever regarding these children's orphan status or their availability for adoption," said Chuck Johnson, chief operating officer of the National Council for Adoption.
Both Johnson and Reickerd suggested that U.S. officials have placed the adoption issue on the back burner while they try to make sure the new Kyrgyz leaders will let the U.S. continue using a strategic air base for the war in Afghanistan.
"The air base and oil are on the top of their minds; our children are not," Reickerd said.
One of the waiting Americans is Ann Bates of Bernville, Pa., who is not only persisting with her Kyrgyz application, but also trying to adopt a child from Russia — and thus is affected by Moscow's new freeze.
The Kyrgyz group initially numbered 65 families, Bates said, but four have dropped out to pursue adoptions from elsewhere, while Dr. Suzanne Bilyeu of Jacksonville, Fla., shifted to pushing for broader orphan assistance after the severe deterioration of the hydrocephalus-afflicted child she'd been matched with.
One couple, Kevin and Shannon Fenske of Reeseville, Wis., already have an adopted child from Kyrgyzstan — a boy named Esen who turns 4 next week. They were part of the first significant wave of U.S. adoptions from Kyrgyzstan, which increased from four in 2005 to 78 in 2008 before the delays began.
Eager to expand their family, the Fenskes were matched in July 2008 with a Kyrgyz baby girl afflicted with a severe cleft lip and palate. They hoped she could start corrective surgery this month, but the political upheaval forced cancellation of a mission to Kyrgyzstan by German doctors who were going to operate on her.
Meanwhile, Esen has been learning about his native country and the plans for him to have a sibling.
"It's hard for him to understand why the country he's from won't let his little sister come home," Shannon Fenske said.
A New York City couple, Drew and Frances Pardus-Abbadessa, had been hoping to adopt a child from Vietnam, but when corruption problems disrupted that system they turned to Kyrgyzstan.
The couple, both in their 40s, were matched in June 2008 with a newborn boy named Vladimir, and they've visited his orphanage several times.
"We think of him every day — when we're eating dinner, we're thinking what would he like to eat," said Frances Pardus-Abbadessa. "I can't imagine abandoning him at all."
"As time goes on," she added, "we get older and it gets harder."
NEW YORK – Amid high-profile furor over adoptions from Haiti and Russia, about 60 American families are persevering with a two-year struggle to complete adoptions from Kyrgyzstan — an already emotionally draining quest further complicated by recent political upheaval.
The families were formally matched with the children — most suffering from serious medical problems — in 2008 and have grown deeply attached to them after visiting their orphanages and bringing back photographs and videos.
"I feel that's my daughter, and she's my responsibility. I can't let go," said Angela Sharp, a 36-year-old cosmetology instructor from Flint, Mich., who visited for a week in April 2008 with the now 2-year-old orphan she hopes to adopt. A room with a crib and children's clothes awaits the girl, already given a new name by Sharp — Mia Angelina.
The nearly completed adoption proceedings for Sharp and the other families ground to a halt in late 2008 when Kyrgyzstan said it needed to overhaul its adoption system because of suspected corruption. A reform bill was introduced but never finalized, an investigation launched but never finished, and Parliament was dissolved following a bloody revolt this month that ousted President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
Meanwhile, one of the waiting children has died and another suffered such severe neurological damage that her prospective mother in Florida — a pediatrician — shifted from trying to adopt to campaigning to help ailing Kyrgyz orphans get better medical care.
"These children in Kyrgyzstan รข€” their level of care is sub-par at best, and they've been waiting there now for two years," said Tom DeFilipo of the Joint Council on International Children's Services. "The commitment of the families to these children is astounding. Once they get attached to a child, it's their child."
Lisa Reickerd of Orange, Calif., the single mother of a girl adopted from Kazakhstan in 2003, is now trying to adopt a 3-year-old girl she met in an orphanage in Bishkek, the Kyrgyz capital, in August 2008.
"I knew she was meant to be with me," said Reickerd, who has served as the waiting families' main liaison with the State Department, which handles international adoption matters. "I feel no less love or compassion for this little girl than for the daughter I have now. We're all very committed to waiting this out."
However, recent events have compounded the frustrations of the waiting families. They noted that hundreds of pending adoptions of Haitian orphans by Americans were expedited after the earthquake in January, and they felt neglected amid the tumult this month that prompted Russia to freeze U.S. adoptions after a Tennessee woman sent her adopted son back to Moscow alone on a plane.
The families are now making two specific requests — that the State Department draw up a detailed plan to resolve the stalemate and that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton telephone the new Kyrgyz leader to raise the issue.
The State Department says it empathizes with the families, while noting that the new Kyrgyz leaders are struggling to restore basic government functions and may not consider adoption a high priority for the moment. The department also accepts Kyrgyzstan's position that its corruption probe must be completed before adoptions resume.
"The Kyrgyz authorities should urgently complete the criminal investigation into alleged adoption fraud and resolve the pending cases so that eligible children can be placed in loving homes," Michele Bond, the deputy assistant secretary for overseas citizens services, said Friday.
She stressed that many of the waiting children have serious health problems and that the U.S. families, despite the challenges, remain committed to adopting.
The families and their supporters say the Kyrgyz investigation appears to be stalled and are pleading for the pending adoptions to be finalized now.
"There is no legal concern over these pending cases, no concern whatsoever regarding these children's orphan status or their availability for adoption," said Chuck Johnson, chief operating officer of the National Council for Adoption.
Both Johnson and Reickerd suggested that U.S. officials have placed the adoption issue on the back burner while they try to make sure the new Kyrgyz leaders will let the U.S. continue using a strategic air base for the war in Afghanistan.
"The air base and oil are on the top of their minds; our children are not," Reickerd said.
One of the waiting Americans is Ann Bates of Bernville, Pa., who is not only persisting with her Kyrgyz application, but also trying to adopt a child from Russia — and thus is affected by Moscow's new freeze.
The Kyrgyz group initially numbered 65 families, Bates said, but four have dropped out to pursue adoptions from elsewhere, while Dr. Suzanne Bilyeu of Jacksonville, Fla., shifted to pushing for broader orphan assistance after the severe deterioration of the hydrocephalus-afflicted child she'd been matched with.
One couple, Kevin and Shannon Fenske of Reeseville, Wis., already have an adopted child from Kyrgyzstan — a boy named Esen who turns 4 next week. They were part of the first significant wave of U.S. adoptions from Kyrgyzstan, which increased from four in 2005 to 78 in 2008 before the delays began.
Eager to expand their family, the Fenskes were matched in July 2008 with a Kyrgyz baby girl afflicted with a severe cleft lip and palate. They hoped she could start corrective surgery this month, but the political upheaval forced cancellation of a mission to Kyrgyzstan by German doctors who were going to operate on her.
Meanwhile, Esen has been learning about his native country and the plans for him to have a sibling.
"It's hard for him to understand why the country he's from won't let his little sister come home," Shannon Fenske said.
A New York City couple, Drew and Frances Pardus-Abbadessa, had been hoping to adopt a child from Vietnam, but when corruption problems disrupted that system they turned to Kyrgyzstan.
The couple, both in their 40s, were matched in June 2008 with a newborn boy named Vladimir, and they've visited his orphanage several times.
"We think of him every day — when we're eating dinner, we're thinking what would he like to eat," said Frances Pardus-Abbadessa. "I can't imagine abandoning him at all."
"As time goes on," she added, "we get older and it gets harder."
Friday, April 23, 2010
US families persevere in seeking Kyrgyz adoptions
By DAVID CRARY, AP National Writer
Friday, April 23, 2010 at 12:48 p.m.
NEW YORK — Amid high-profile furor over adoptions from Haiti and Russia, about 60 American families are persevering with a two-year struggle to complete adoptions from Kyrgyzstan - an already emotionally draining quest further complicated by recent political upheaval.
The families were formally matched with the children - most suffering from serious medical problems - in 2008 and have grown deeply attached to them after visiting their orphanages and bringing back photographs and videos.
"I feel that's my daughter, and she's my responsibility. I can't let go," said Angela Sharp, a 36-year-old cosmetology instructor from Flint, Mich., who visited for a week in April 2008 with the now 2-year-old orphan she hopes to adopt. A room with a crib and children's clothes awaits the girl, already given a new name by Sharp - Mia Angelina.
The nearly completed adoption proceedings for Sharp and the other families ground to a halt in late 2008 when Kyrgyzstan said it needed to overhaul its adoption system because of suspected corruption. A reform bill was introduced but never finalized, an investigation launched but never finished, and Parliament was dissolved following a bloody revolt this month that ousted President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
Meanwhile, one of the waiting children has died and another suffered such severe neurological damage that her prospective mother in Florida - a pediatrician - shifted from trying to adopt to campaigning to help ailing Kyrgyz orphans get better medical care.
"These children in Kyrgyzstan - their level of care is sub-par at best, and they've been waiting there now for two years," said Tom DeFilipo of the Joint Council on International Children's Services. "The commitment of the families to these children is astounding. Once they get attached to a child, it's their child."
Lisa Reickerd of Orange, Calif., the single mother of a girl adopted from Kazakhstan in 2003, is now trying to adopt a 3-year-old girl she met in an orphanage in Bishkek, the Kyrgyz capital, in August 2008.
"I knew she was meant to be with me," said Reickerd, who has served as the waiting families' main liaison with the State Department, which handles international adoption matters. "I feel no less love or compassion for this little girl than for the daughter I have now. We're all very committed to waiting this out."
However, recent events have compounded the frustrations of the waiting families. They noted that hundreds of pending adoptions of Haitian orphans by Americans were expedited after the earthquake in January, and they felt neglected amid the tumult this month that prompted Russia to freeze U.S. adoptions after a Tennessee woman sent her adopted son back to Moscow alone on a plane.
The families are now making two specific requests - that the State Department draw up a detailed plan to resolve the stalemate and that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton telephone the new Kyrgyz leader to raise the issue.
The State Department says it empathizes with the families, while noting that the new Kyrgyz leaders are struggling to restore basic government functions and may not consider adoption a high priority for the moment. The department also accepts Kyrgyzstan's position that its corruption probe must be completed before adoptions resume.
"The Kyrgyz authorities should urgently complete the criminal investigation into alleged adoption fraud and resolve the pending cases so that eligible children can be placed in loving homes," Michele Bond, the deputy assistant secretary for overseas citizens services, said Friday.
She stressed that many of the waiting children have serious health problems and that the U.S. families, despite the challenges, remain committed to adopting.
The families and their supporters say the Kyrgyz investigation appears to be stalled and are pleading for the pending adoptions to be finalized now.
"There is no legal concern over these pending cases, no concern whatsoever regarding these children's orphan status or their availability for adoption," said Chuck Johnson, chief operating officer of the National Council for Adoption.
Both Johnson and Reickerd suggested that U.S. officials have placed the adoption issue on the back burner while they try to make sure the new Kyrgyz leaders will let the U.S. continue using a strategic air base for the war in Afghanistan.
"The air base and oil are on the top of their minds; our children are not," Reickerd said.
One of the waiting Americans is Ann Bates of Bernville, Pa., who is not only persisting with her Kyrgyz application, but also trying to adopt a child from Russia - and thus is affected by Moscow's new freeze.
The Kyrgyz group initially numbered 65 families, Bates said, but four have dropped out to pursue adoptions from elsewhere, while Dr. Suzanne Bilyeu of Jacksonville, Fla., shifted to pushing for broader orphan assistance after the severe deterioration of the hydrocephalus-afflicted child she'd been matched with.
One couple, Kevin and Shannon Fenske of Reeseville, Wis., already have an adopted child from Kyrgyzstan - a boy named Esen who turns 4 next week. They were part of the first significant wave of U.S. adoptions from Kyrgyzstan, which increased from four in 2005 to 78 in 2008 before the delays began.
Eager to expand their family, the Fenskes were matched in July 2008 with a Kyrgyz baby girl afflicted with a severe cleft lip and palate. They hoped she could start corrective surgery this month, but the political upheaval forced cancellation of a mission to Kyrgyzstan by German doctors who were going to operate on her.
Meanwhile, Esen has been learning about his native country and the plans for him to have a sibling.
"It's hard for him to understand why the country he's from won't let his little sister come home," Shannon Fenske said.
A New York City couple, Drew and Frances Pardus-Abbadessa, had been hoping to adopt a child from Vietnam, but when corruption problems disrupted that system they turned to Kyrgyzstan.
The couple, both in their 40s, were matched in June 2008 with a newborn boy named Vladimir, and they've visited his orphanage several times.
"We think of him every day - when we're eating dinner, we're thinking what would he like to eat," said Frances Pardus-Abbadessa. "I can't imagine abandoning him at all."
"As time goes on," she added, "we get older and it gets harder."
The Associated Press
By DAVID CRARY, AP National Writer
Friday, April 23, 2010 at 12:48 p.m.
NEW YORK — Amid high-profile furor over adoptions from Haiti and Russia, about 60 American families are persevering with a two-year struggle to complete adoptions from Kyrgyzstan - an already emotionally draining quest further complicated by recent political upheaval.
The families were formally matched with the children - most suffering from serious medical problems - in 2008 and have grown deeply attached to them after visiting their orphanages and bringing back photographs and videos.
"I feel that's my daughter, and she's my responsibility. I can't let go," said Angela Sharp, a 36-year-old cosmetology instructor from Flint, Mich., who visited for a week in April 2008 with the now 2-year-old orphan she hopes to adopt. A room with a crib and children's clothes awaits the girl, already given a new name by Sharp - Mia Angelina.
The nearly completed adoption proceedings for Sharp and the other families ground to a halt in late 2008 when Kyrgyzstan said it needed to overhaul its adoption system because of suspected corruption. A reform bill was introduced but never finalized, an investigation launched but never finished, and Parliament was dissolved following a bloody revolt this month that ousted President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
Meanwhile, one of the waiting children has died and another suffered such severe neurological damage that her prospective mother in Florida - a pediatrician - shifted from trying to adopt to campaigning to help ailing Kyrgyz orphans get better medical care.
"These children in Kyrgyzstan - their level of care is sub-par at best, and they've been waiting there now for two years," said Tom DeFilipo of the Joint Council on International Children's Services. "The commitment of the families to these children is astounding. Once they get attached to a child, it's their child."
Lisa Reickerd of Orange, Calif., the single mother of a girl adopted from Kazakhstan in 2003, is now trying to adopt a 3-year-old girl she met in an orphanage in Bishkek, the Kyrgyz capital, in August 2008.
"I knew she was meant to be with me," said Reickerd, who has served as the waiting families' main liaison with the State Department, which handles international adoption matters. "I feel no less love or compassion for this little girl than for the daughter I have now. We're all very committed to waiting this out."
However, recent events have compounded the frustrations of the waiting families. They noted that hundreds of pending adoptions of Haitian orphans by Americans were expedited after the earthquake in January, and they felt neglected amid the tumult this month that prompted Russia to freeze U.S. adoptions after a Tennessee woman sent her adopted son back to Moscow alone on a plane.
The families are now making two specific requests - that the State Department draw up a detailed plan to resolve the stalemate and that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton telephone the new Kyrgyz leader to raise the issue.
The State Department says it empathizes with the families, while noting that the new Kyrgyz leaders are struggling to restore basic government functions and may not consider adoption a high priority for the moment. The department also accepts Kyrgyzstan's position that its corruption probe must be completed before adoptions resume.
"The Kyrgyz authorities should urgently complete the criminal investigation into alleged adoption fraud and resolve the pending cases so that eligible children can be placed in loving homes," Michele Bond, the deputy assistant secretary for overseas citizens services, said Friday.
She stressed that many of the waiting children have serious health problems and that the U.S. families, despite the challenges, remain committed to adopting.
The families and their supporters say the Kyrgyz investigation appears to be stalled and are pleading for the pending adoptions to be finalized now.
"There is no legal concern over these pending cases, no concern whatsoever regarding these children's orphan status or their availability for adoption," said Chuck Johnson, chief operating officer of the National Council for Adoption.
Both Johnson and Reickerd suggested that U.S. officials have placed the adoption issue on the back burner while they try to make sure the new Kyrgyz leaders will let the U.S. continue using a strategic air base for the war in Afghanistan.
"The air base and oil are on the top of their minds; our children are not," Reickerd said.
One of the waiting Americans is Ann Bates of Bernville, Pa., who is not only persisting with her Kyrgyz application, but also trying to adopt a child from Russia - and thus is affected by Moscow's new freeze.
The Kyrgyz group initially numbered 65 families, Bates said, but four have dropped out to pursue adoptions from elsewhere, while Dr. Suzanne Bilyeu of Jacksonville, Fla., shifted to pushing for broader orphan assistance after the severe deterioration of the hydrocephalus-afflicted child she'd been matched with.
One couple, Kevin and Shannon Fenske of Reeseville, Wis., already have an adopted child from Kyrgyzstan - a boy named Esen who turns 4 next week. They were part of the first significant wave of U.S. adoptions from Kyrgyzstan, which increased from four in 2005 to 78 in 2008 before the delays began.
Eager to expand their family, the Fenskes were matched in July 2008 with a Kyrgyz baby girl afflicted with a severe cleft lip and palate. They hoped she could start corrective surgery this month, but the political upheaval forced cancellation of a mission to Kyrgyzstan by German doctors who were going to operate on her.
Meanwhile, Esen has been learning about his native country and the plans for him to have a sibling.
"It's hard for him to understand why the country he's from won't let his little sister come home," Shannon Fenske said.
A New York City couple, Drew and Frances Pardus-Abbadessa, had been hoping to adopt a child from Vietnam, but when corruption problems disrupted that system they turned to Kyrgyzstan.
The couple, both in their 40s, were matched in June 2008 with a newborn boy named Vladimir, and they've visited his orphanage several times.
"We think of him every day - when we're eating dinner, we're thinking what would he like to eat," said Frances Pardus-Abbadessa. "I can't imagine abandoning him at all."
"As time goes on," she added, "we get older and it gets harder."
The Associated Press
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Newsweek article April 21, 2010
A Long Way From Home
After two years, prospective parents hoping to adopt children trapped behind bureaucracy and chaos in Kyrgyzstan are running out of hope.
By Laurie Rich Salerno | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Apr 21, 2010
When the news broke about Torry Ann Hansen, the Tennessee woman who pinned a note on her adopted son and sent him alone on a plane back to Russia, Pennsylvania pediatric nurse Ann Bates composed a one-word e-mail from her Moscow hotel room. It said: "Seriously?"
That was the most that Bates, who was in Moscow to meet the 18-month-old boy she was in the process of adopting, could muster. Thanks to Hansen, it looked as though Bates's Russian adoption was going to be suspended. But this was frustratingly familiar territory for her. She and 64 other U.S. families are already mired in an endless-seeming battle in Kyrgyzstan to bring home 65 orphans whose adoptions were nearly finalized almost two years ago but have since been held up by obstacle after obstacle. To wit: two days before the Russian announcement that Hansen had sent her son back, Kyrgyzstan toppled its own government in a bloody revolution.
"I was sitting in the hotel room just bawling the first night, worried about Bishkek and my friends there and the little girl I hope to one day call my daughter," said Bates, who started the adoption process for the Russian boy in 2009, after mounting obstacles left her fearing she would never be allowed to complete the Kyrgyz adoption. She still hopes to bring both special-needs children to the U.S. "The second night, I heard about the Russian thing. I just couldn't believe it." That's when she sent her e-mail to the other waiting parents in the Kyrgyz group.
In the days since Russia announced a temporary freeze on American adoptions, these 65 families have watched the flurry of media coverage and rapid U.S. government action that's followed: the State Department will send a delegation to meet with Russian officials on April 29 and 30 to smooth over the crisis. In response, many of them have echoed Bates's sentiment of "Seriously?" For all the attention being given to people who might have their adoptions frozen, lost in the noise is the struggle of the families adopting from Kyrgyzstan who have already spent almost two years stuck in a dark comedy of errors.
"I am absolutely supportive of [the U.S. State Department] doing those things [in Russia]. I feel for all those people," says Lisa Brotherton, a California woman trying to complete the adoption of a 23-month-old Kyrgyz girl with cerebral palsy with whom she and her husband were matched in June 2008. "But where's the white horse for our kids?"
It was right around June 2008 that Kyrgyz adoptions began falling apart. Up to that point, the number of American adoptions of orphans from Kyrgyzstan had been increasing for four years, with 78 in 2008, compared with just one in 2004, soon after adoption from Kyrgyzstan first became available. (In 2003 a Colorado woman working in a Kyrgyz orphanage petitioned the government to bring a toddler with severe facial deformities to the U.S. for reconstructive surgeries. After the successful surgeries, she worked with the government to formally adopt the child, opening the door for U.S. adoptions.) Ironically, many prospective parents who had been seeking to adopt internationally wound up in Kyrgyzstan because of the comparative ease of requirements and speed of the process.
After they were matched with and visited a child in Kyrgyzstan, many of the families were told that their adoptions would be completed within weeks. Then a quiet freeze took hold of the process. Scheduled court dates in late summer and early fall that were necessary to finalize adoptions were postponed again and again, but waiting parents were told that their cases would likely be resolved soon. "We all really believed that at the beginning of the year, things would turn around," says Suzanne Boutilier, a California advertising copywriter hoping to complete her adoption of a toddler.
Weeks pushed into months until Feb. 2, 2009, when Igor Chudinov, Kyrgyzstan's then–prime minister, called a moratorium on all international adoptions. He cited fraud and abuses of the system by orphanages and adoption-agency liaisons, and said his government would investigate these cases, work with UNICEF to start drafting new laws for such adoptions, and consider joining the Hague Adoption Convention, the international treaty designed to set consistent and transparent country protocols for international adoptions.
That's when the 65 prospective parents whose cases were stuck in the pipeline contacted the U.S. State Department for help. "I applaud them," Boutilier said of the Kyrgyz legislators. "I would never want to find out after the fact that I adopted a child that wasn't legally adoptable. Unfortunately, it's caused an incredible delay." Time is vital for many of the pipeline children who have disabilities and other special needs—everything from severe cleft palates to cerebral palsy—and the adoptive parents want to address these issues medically as soon as possible. They also fear that the kids will develop attachment disorders and other emotional and intellectual issues that commonly result from growing up in an institution. A study out of Boston's Children's Hospital, the Bucharest Early Intervention Project, found that children raised in orphanages had on average significantly lower IQs and higher rates of mental illness than those raised in family-type environments. "In my nightmares it's going to be another few years [before the adoptions are processed]," says Brotherton, "and we're going to get her home and we're going to have to deal with all the stuff that happened from the time we met her as a 3-month-old until then."
Although the State Department did not send a delegation, as with Russia, it did host a small group of Kyrgyz legislators in Washington and introduced them to some of the waiting families last May. In June it sent a U.S. adoption expert to the country to meet with Kyrgyz lawmakers. And then, after a few more months of inactivity, adoptive parents thought they got their big break.
Prime Minister Chudinov was headed to the U.S. for the U.N. General Assembly in September, so the waiting parents lobbied their respective representatives, asking them to press their cause with him when he was in the country. Both Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback and Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey met with the prime minister on behalf of the stranded orphans. According to Brownback's office, Chudinov declared that upon his return he would tell the parliamentary committee in charge of adoption legislation to expedite the 65 waiting cases.
Three weeks later, Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev dissolved his cabinet, forcing Chudinov to resign. The waiting parents were crestfallen.
Proposed deadlines for the Parliament to present and vote on new adoption laws came and went. This February three waiting parents, including Brotherton and Boutilier, went to Kyrgyzstan with an international-adoption advocate to meet with members of the Kyrgyz Parliament, the ministries of health and education, and UNICEF. They also saw almost all the 65 pipeline children in their orphanages in Bishkek and outlying regions, and were able to take pictures and provide updates to the parents waiting stateside. When they left, the four had little hope that their trip had truly changed things.
To their surprise, a month later, on March 19, the English-language news agency 24.kg reported that the Kyrgyz Parliament had passed the bill addressing adoption by foreigners. But two weeks later the rumblings of unrest that would eventually foment the overthrow of President Bakiyev and his administration began. As a result, the Kyrgyz Parliament and the entire administration, which had each spent nearly a year and a half working on the issue, were dissolved, and a new government is now being built, piece by piece.
A U.S. State Department official said that "we are working to determine the provisional government's stance on the pending cases, and the status of the bill and the related draft regulations. We will continue to urge the Kyrgyz government to resolve the 65 cases."
But the families don't know where the bill itself lies, whether it will be enacted by the interim government of former opposition leader Roza Otunbayeva, or whether they'll have to wait for what many are saying will be six months until a new government is elected. Or whether anything will happen at all.
After two years, prospective parents hoping to adopt children trapped behind bureaucracy and chaos in Kyrgyzstan are running out of hope.
By Laurie Rich Salerno | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Apr 21, 2010
When the news broke about Torry Ann Hansen, the Tennessee woman who pinned a note on her adopted son and sent him alone on a plane back to Russia, Pennsylvania pediatric nurse Ann Bates composed a one-word e-mail from her Moscow hotel room. It said: "Seriously?"
That was the most that Bates, who was in Moscow to meet the 18-month-old boy she was in the process of adopting, could muster. Thanks to Hansen, it looked as though Bates's Russian adoption was going to be suspended. But this was frustratingly familiar territory for her. She and 64 other U.S. families are already mired in an endless-seeming battle in Kyrgyzstan to bring home 65 orphans whose adoptions were nearly finalized almost two years ago but have since been held up by obstacle after obstacle. To wit: two days before the Russian announcement that Hansen had sent her son back, Kyrgyzstan toppled its own government in a bloody revolution.
"I was sitting in the hotel room just bawling the first night, worried about Bishkek and my friends there and the little girl I hope to one day call my daughter," said Bates, who started the adoption process for the Russian boy in 2009, after mounting obstacles left her fearing she would never be allowed to complete the Kyrgyz adoption. She still hopes to bring both special-needs children to the U.S. "The second night, I heard about the Russian thing. I just couldn't believe it." That's when she sent her e-mail to the other waiting parents in the Kyrgyz group.
In the days since Russia announced a temporary freeze on American adoptions, these 65 families have watched the flurry of media coverage and rapid U.S. government action that's followed: the State Department will send a delegation to meet with Russian officials on April 29 and 30 to smooth over the crisis. In response, many of them have echoed Bates's sentiment of "Seriously?" For all the attention being given to people who might have their adoptions frozen, lost in the noise is the struggle of the families adopting from Kyrgyzstan who have already spent almost two years stuck in a dark comedy of errors.
"I am absolutely supportive of [the U.S. State Department] doing those things [in Russia]. I feel for all those people," says Lisa Brotherton, a California woman trying to complete the adoption of a 23-month-old Kyrgyz girl with cerebral palsy with whom she and her husband were matched in June 2008. "But where's the white horse for our kids?"
It was right around June 2008 that Kyrgyz adoptions began falling apart. Up to that point, the number of American adoptions of orphans from Kyrgyzstan had been increasing for four years, with 78 in 2008, compared with just one in 2004, soon after adoption from Kyrgyzstan first became available. (In 2003 a Colorado woman working in a Kyrgyz orphanage petitioned the government to bring a toddler with severe facial deformities to the U.S. for reconstructive surgeries. After the successful surgeries, she worked with the government to formally adopt the child, opening the door for U.S. adoptions.) Ironically, many prospective parents who had been seeking to adopt internationally wound up in Kyrgyzstan because of the comparative ease of requirements and speed of the process.
After they were matched with and visited a child in Kyrgyzstan, many of the families were told that their adoptions would be completed within weeks. Then a quiet freeze took hold of the process. Scheduled court dates in late summer and early fall that were necessary to finalize adoptions were postponed again and again, but waiting parents were told that their cases would likely be resolved soon. "We all really believed that at the beginning of the year, things would turn around," says Suzanne Boutilier, a California advertising copywriter hoping to complete her adoption of a toddler.
Weeks pushed into months until Feb. 2, 2009, when Igor Chudinov, Kyrgyzstan's then–prime minister, called a moratorium on all international adoptions. He cited fraud and abuses of the system by orphanages and adoption-agency liaisons, and said his government would investigate these cases, work with UNICEF to start drafting new laws for such adoptions, and consider joining the Hague Adoption Convention, the international treaty designed to set consistent and transparent country protocols for international adoptions.
That's when the 65 prospective parents whose cases were stuck in the pipeline contacted the U.S. State Department for help. "I applaud them," Boutilier said of the Kyrgyz legislators. "I would never want to find out after the fact that I adopted a child that wasn't legally adoptable. Unfortunately, it's caused an incredible delay." Time is vital for many of the pipeline children who have disabilities and other special needs—everything from severe cleft palates to cerebral palsy—and the adoptive parents want to address these issues medically as soon as possible. They also fear that the kids will develop attachment disorders and other emotional and intellectual issues that commonly result from growing up in an institution. A study out of Boston's Children's Hospital, the Bucharest Early Intervention Project, found that children raised in orphanages had on average significantly lower IQs and higher rates of mental illness than those raised in family-type environments. "In my nightmares it's going to be another few years [before the adoptions are processed]," says Brotherton, "and we're going to get her home and we're going to have to deal with all the stuff that happened from the time we met her as a 3-month-old until then."
Although the State Department did not send a delegation, as with Russia, it did host a small group of Kyrgyz legislators in Washington and introduced them to some of the waiting families last May. In June it sent a U.S. adoption expert to the country to meet with Kyrgyz lawmakers. And then, after a few more months of inactivity, adoptive parents thought they got their big break.
Prime Minister Chudinov was headed to the U.S. for the U.N. General Assembly in September, so the waiting parents lobbied their respective representatives, asking them to press their cause with him when he was in the country. Both Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback and Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey met with the prime minister on behalf of the stranded orphans. According to Brownback's office, Chudinov declared that upon his return he would tell the parliamentary committee in charge of adoption legislation to expedite the 65 waiting cases.
Three weeks later, Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev dissolved his cabinet, forcing Chudinov to resign. The waiting parents were crestfallen.
Proposed deadlines for the Parliament to present and vote on new adoption laws came and went. This February three waiting parents, including Brotherton and Boutilier, went to Kyrgyzstan with an international-adoption advocate to meet with members of the Kyrgyz Parliament, the ministries of health and education, and UNICEF. They also saw almost all the 65 pipeline children in their orphanages in Bishkek and outlying regions, and were able to take pictures and provide updates to the parents waiting stateside. When they left, the four had little hope that their trip had truly changed things.
To their surprise, a month later, on March 19, the English-language news agency 24.kg reported that the Kyrgyz Parliament had passed the bill addressing adoption by foreigners. But two weeks later the rumblings of unrest that would eventually foment the overthrow of President Bakiyev and his administration began. As a result, the Kyrgyz Parliament and the entire administration, which had each spent nearly a year and a half working on the issue, were dissolved, and a new government is now being built, piece by piece.
A U.S. State Department official said that "we are working to determine the provisional government's stance on the pending cases, and the status of the bill and the related draft regulations. We will continue to urge the Kyrgyz government to resolve the 65 cases."
But the families don't know where the bill itself lies, whether it will be enacted by the interim government of former opposition leader Roza Otunbayeva, or whether they'll have to wait for what many are saying will be six months until a new government is elected. Or whether anything will happen at all.
Texas Family Waits
Local couple waits as foreign government investigates adoption processes
By Kathleen Thurber
Staff Writer
Published: Sunday, September 20, 2009 11:58 PM CDT
After glancing down at her wristwatch to determine the date, Karla Kahler looked up and smiled slightly as she turned her head toward her husband Mike.
On the 21st — Monday — the boy they’re waiting to adopt from Kyrgyzstan will be 18-months-old.
He’s now about twice the age he was when they expected to bring him from the orphanage where he lives to their Greenwood home. Much older than they thought he would be when they introduced him to their three biological children who only know they must keep waiting to meet the boy they’ll call their brother.
“In our heart he’s ours but legally he’s not ours,” Karla Kahler said.
The Kahlers are one of at least 65 U.S. families continuing to wait for their adoptions to be finalized after the government in Kyrgyzstan stopped processing international adoptions in early 2009.
The U.S. State Department first alerted Americans to be wary of applying for adoptions in Kyrgyzstan in November of 2008, just weeks after the Kahlers were supposed to have their court date that would’ve allowed them to bring the boy to their home in December. They plan to name him Asa.
The review of adoption procedures by Kyrgyz government officials is meant to ensure the system is free of the rumored corruption Asian news agencies reported on earlier this year. It’s a review process, according to Jackie Semar, CEO and Director of International Child Foundation, Inc. — which processed about four of the pending adoptions — that is encouraged and not at all unusual.
But, she said, the difference in this country’s move has been the suspensions placed on families who’d already filed paperwork, passed standards and met the child they planned to bring into their homes.
For the Kahlers and others the process also is understandable, they said, but frustrating as they try to continue their daily routines.
“We want the Kyrgyzstan government to have the best adoption system in the world but not at the expense of 65 children who have homes,” Karla Kahler said.
Stepping in Faith
The Kahlers, who’ve lived in Midland County about nine years, said they’ve known they would adopt since they were married 12 years ago.
“Adoption is a perfect picture of the Gospel,” Mike Kahler said, explaining just as they’ve been adopted into God’s family so too God calls his children to take in others.
And though the couple said not everyone’s response to God’s directions needs to include adoption, for them they’ve always thought it would.
So after having three children of their own — Bethany, 10; Josiah, 5; and Judah, 2 — they started researching.
The two said they were drawn to the former Soviet countries and while they’d never heard of it before, eventually agreed on Kyrgyzstan. The international adoption program there was relatively new and typically could be completed within a year. In places like China the process can take closer to five years.
“That was one of the attractive things, that we could finish it rather quickly,” Karla Kahler said.
After completing a home study and other steps, the Kahlers traveled to Kyrgyzstan, which is located between Kazakhstan and China, in August of 2008 to finish paperwork and be matched with a child. After returning home, they were told the Ministry of Education, who must provide final approval, had shut down and would not re-open until late September.
When Christmas had passed without the re-opening of the ministry, the Kahlers returned to the country in January to see the boy they’d been paired with.
They were among the last allowed to see the child with whom they’d been matched before visitations were stopped altogether.
“From our perspective this makes absolutely no sense,” Mike Kahler said. “We have to trust in the character and the goodness of God. Whatever happens in this situation he is directing it and we trust him.”
The Waiting Game
In February, the U.S. State Department formally advised citizens not to consider adopting in Kyrgyzstan as Kyrgyz officials had formed an adoption commission to draft new policy and legislation and, for the moment, ceased international adoptions. Once new policies are approved by Parliament and the Kyrgyz president, it will take at least three months to implement the new rules, according to U.S. State Department officials.
Department representatives said , along with the families, it is their hope the 65 adoptions in process will be grandfathered in. But, officials said Friday, the Kyrgyzstan government still has given no indication as to when and if that will be allowed.
Several adoption agencies with families in limbo said they too are pushing for help in these situations, but prefer not to comment further on the situation.
Government officials from the U.S. and Kyrgyzstan as well as families waiting to adopt met in May in Washington, and a U.S. adoption expert also has been sent to meet with Kyrgyz officials. The Kyrgyz Prime Minister is scheduled to visit the U.S. this week, Semar said. Officials at the Kyrgyz Embassy in Washington were not available to comment on the situation or confirm the visit last week.
Hoping
These steps, the Kahlers said, give them and the other families hope the process will start moving. However, after waiting for months, Semar said some families have relinquished their match to apply for adoptions in other countries.
For the Kahlers and many others, though, they say that’s not an option. Instead, Karla said, when one family struggles, the others are there to lift them up, share information they’ve learned and help them keep moving.
“This is an incredibly hard experience but we signed up for it,” Karla Kahler said. “Those children didn’t sign up to be in an orphanage.”
With adoptions halted, Semar said the government-run orphanages are becoming crowded. The children’s basic needs are being provided for, but several of the children are in need of surgeries and medical care the country may not have the resources to address.
Kids like the boy the Kahlers are waiting for, they said, are missing out on personal attention and developmental support they easily could receive and may not be able to make up for later.
U.S. Department of State officials said Kyrgyzstan, after electing a new president this summer, is set to review international adoption policies during the current session of Parliament. Whether that leads to a homecoming for the child the Kahlers have carved a place in their lives for remains to be seen.
Regardless, Mike Kahler said, they will continue to wait.
“There’s a God who’s ruling and reigning over things. None of this has caught him by surprise,” he said. “Our prayer is that this will work out in a way that brings God the most glory.”
— — —
Kathleen Thurber can be reached at kthurber@mrt.com.
By Kathleen Thurber
Staff Writer
Published: Sunday, September 20, 2009 11:58 PM CDT
After glancing down at her wristwatch to determine the date, Karla Kahler looked up and smiled slightly as she turned her head toward her husband Mike.
On the 21st — Monday — the boy they’re waiting to adopt from Kyrgyzstan will be 18-months-old.
He’s now about twice the age he was when they expected to bring him from the orphanage where he lives to their Greenwood home. Much older than they thought he would be when they introduced him to their three biological children who only know they must keep waiting to meet the boy they’ll call their brother.
“In our heart he’s ours but legally he’s not ours,” Karla Kahler said.
The Kahlers are one of at least 65 U.S. families continuing to wait for their adoptions to be finalized after the government in Kyrgyzstan stopped processing international adoptions in early 2009.
The U.S. State Department first alerted Americans to be wary of applying for adoptions in Kyrgyzstan in November of 2008, just weeks after the Kahlers were supposed to have their court date that would’ve allowed them to bring the boy to their home in December. They plan to name him Asa.
The review of adoption procedures by Kyrgyz government officials is meant to ensure the system is free of the rumored corruption Asian news agencies reported on earlier this year. It’s a review process, according to Jackie Semar, CEO and Director of International Child Foundation, Inc. — which processed about four of the pending adoptions — that is encouraged and not at all unusual.
But, she said, the difference in this country’s move has been the suspensions placed on families who’d already filed paperwork, passed standards and met the child they planned to bring into their homes.
For the Kahlers and others the process also is understandable, they said, but frustrating as they try to continue their daily routines.
“We want the Kyrgyzstan government to have the best adoption system in the world but not at the expense of 65 children who have homes,” Karla Kahler said.
Stepping in Faith
The Kahlers, who’ve lived in Midland County about nine years, said they’ve known they would adopt since they were married 12 years ago.
“Adoption is a perfect picture of the Gospel,” Mike Kahler said, explaining just as they’ve been adopted into God’s family so too God calls his children to take in others.
And though the couple said not everyone’s response to God’s directions needs to include adoption, for them they’ve always thought it would.
So after having three children of their own — Bethany, 10; Josiah, 5; and Judah, 2 — they started researching.
The two said they were drawn to the former Soviet countries and while they’d never heard of it before, eventually agreed on Kyrgyzstan. The international adoption program there was relatively new and typically could be completed within a year. In places like China the process can take closer to five years.
“That was one of the attractive things, that we could finish it rather quickly,” Karla Kahler said.
After completing a home study and other steps, the Kahlers traveled to Kyrgyzstan, which is located between Kazakhstan and China, in August of 2008 to finish paperwork and be matched with a child. After returning home, they were told the Ministry of Education, who must provide final approval, had shut down and would not re-open until late September.
When Christmas had passed without the re-opening of the ministry, the Kahlers returned to the country in January to see the boy they’d been paired with.
They were among the last allowed to see the child with whom they’d been matched before visitations were stopped altogether.
“From our perspective this makes absolutely no sense,” Mike Kahler said. “We have to trust in the character and the goodness of God. Whatever happens in this situation he is directing it and we trust him.”
The Waiting Game
In February, the U.S. State Department formally advised citizens not to consider adopting in Kyrgyzstan as Kyrgyz officials had formed an adoption commission to draft new policy and legislation and, for the moment, ceased international adoptions. Once new policies are approved by Parliament and the Kyrgyz president, it will take at least three months to implement the new rules, according to U.S. State Department officials.
Department representatives said , along with the families, it is their hope the 65 adoptions in process will be grandfathered in. But, officials said Friday, the Kyrgyzstan government still has given no indication as to when and if that will be allowed.
Several adoption agencies with families in limbo said they too are pushing for help in these situations, but prefer not to comment further on the situation.
Government officials from the U.S. and Kyrgyzstan as well as families waiting to adopt met in May in Washington, and a U.S. adoption expert also has been sent to meet with Kyrgyz officials. The Kyrgyz Prime Minister is scheduled to visit the U.S. this week, Semar said. Officials at the Kyrgyz Embassy in Washington were not available to comment on the situation or confirm the visit last week.
Hoping
These steps, the Kahlers said, give them and the other families hope the process will start moving. However, after waiting for months, Semar said some families have relinquished their match to apply for adoptions in other countries.
For the Kahlers and many others, though, they say that’s not an option. Instead, Karla said, when one family struggles, the others are there to lift them up, share information they’ve learned and help them keep moving.
“This is an incredibly hard experience but we signed up for it,” Karla Kahler said. “Those children didn’t sign up to be in an orphanage.”
With adoptions halted, Semar said the government-run orphanages are becoming crowded. The children’s basic needs are being provided for, but several of the children are in need of surgeries and medical care the country may not have the resources to address.
Kids like the boy the Kahlers are waiting for, they said, are missing out on personal attention and developmental support they easily could receive and may not be able to make up for later.
U.S. Department of State officials said Kyrgyzstan, after electing a new president this summer, is set to review international adoption policies during the current session of Parliament. Whether that leads to a homecoming for the child the Kahlers have carved a place in their lives for remains to be seen.
Regardless, Mike Kahler said, they will continue to wait.
“There’s a God who’s ruling and reigning over things. None of this has caught him by surprise,” he said. “Our prayer is that this will work out in a way that brings God the most glory.”
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Kathleen Thurber can be reached at kthurber@mrt.com.
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