Wait time increased....:(

Yesterday, there was a conference call between my family coordinator and Ethiopia.  I had the chance to listen to the conference call, but sadly I got the time wrong and missed it.  My Family Coordinator is in the process of sending me a recording so that I can hear everything that was said.  One thing that I did learn is that they increased the wait time in Ethiopia from 10-15 months, to 24-28 months.

These numbers took my breath away when I first saw them.  This is a very long time!  This is the wait from the time that all of our paperwork is filed(about 4 months from now)  to the time we get referred a child.  It can take up to a year after the referral to actually bring our children home.

I know that God is in control.  I know that his timing is perfect.  It makes the news less heart breaking to know that God is doing this for our good and His glory.  I was in tears as I realized just how long it will take to get them home.  Even though we have not seen their faces, we still feel a connection to our children in Ethiopia.  We feel like one or  more of our kids are over there without a family to love them and it breaks our hearts.

We are taking a class about adoption where we are learning about orphans who are institutionalized and how they develop because of lack of interaction and love they receive.  Children should not be left alone in a crib to entertain themselves.  I can not stand the thought of our children being lonely even though they have a family right here ready to love them.

This time increase is due to a new level of clearance that children need to go through to be adoptable.  This clearance can take anywhere from one month to one year.  Our agency is going to monitor the situation for a few months and then get back to us on the wait time. They said it could either get a lot longer or shorter.  We will be praying daily that Ethiopia is able to quickly process these kids cases and place them in loving homes.  We also pray that God will being us the rest of the money we need to file our paperwork so that this wait will not increase for us. Meanwhile we will find peace in the fact that God is collecting our tears in his bottle.