Welcome to our New Blog!

If you're reading this, thank you for making the switch with us. And, you're probably wondering why....

To provide some much needed background, our family (along with 3 (now several others) decided to leave our first agency in the beginning of April. We left due to the fact that the agency was having some real issues in terms of getting referrals and we knew this would not be in our best interests to wait around with them for a (seemingly) infinite period of time. After doing some much needed research, several truths came to light regarding the real possibility that this agency would likely continue to have problems delivering referrals for the families in its Vietnam program. These truths were confirmed by the head of our agency. Our agency was actively touting a program that was in its infancy and taking on WAY more families than it could provide referrals in any reasonable length of time.

To elaborate, from the time we joined the agency in mid- June 2006 and the time we decided to leave, April 4, 2007– we saw a TOTAL of less than 10 families bring their children home with our agency. During the same time, our agency had amassed a list that has well over 100 waiting families (150 families from some informal/conservative estimates that we have gathered). The agency had not seen a referral since late January 2007 and had not moved up the ‘list’ since. We were stuck at approximately #13, WAITING and we were getting upset. And according to the agency, we were one of the ‘lucky’ ones as we were at the beginning of the list for a baby girl.

To us, this was NOT a ‘lucky’ place to be. So, we decided to look around a bit. Coincidentally, most of our group (later to become some very close friends) was set to meet on Saturday for dinner as we periodically had done during our wait. We all discussed our growing dissatisfaction and felt a bit better getting all of this off our chests. Independently, we continued to gather research on our various options. We met again on Tuesday of that week for dinner and decided to apply to our new agency. We were all accepted as a group and our dossiers were subsequently transferred to the new agency.

Fast forward to today—
Since joining our new agency, there have been 13 referrals (10 last Monday, July 2nd alone). The first three of these 13 referrals are currently being picked up in Vietnam as I write this. Their G&R (Giving and Receiving) ceremony took place without a hitch on Monday (the 9th) and the families will be headed to Hanoi shortly to complete the rest of the adoption process. The other 10 families with referrals just got their travel dates (yesterday) are set to travel in late July and early-mid August.

Where does that leave us?!

NEXT!!!

That’s right– our group of 5 (4 original families and one more (very special) refugee family from our former agency) adopting families is NEXT in line for a referral. That’s right- NEXT!!! We are VERY pleased with this news and are told that our referrals will likely come VERY shortly. After referral, our time to travel is also anticipated to be very short.
We fully expect this to be the case!

Thanks again for following our journey!!
-The Gustins