An Emotional Week

This week has been so full of emotions... fear, sadness, confusion, anger, relief, hope and many more. 

Receiving an e-mail that your agency is going out of business and not having a way to get immediate answers is a very scary thing, especially when your future child is involved.  For nearly 24 hours after receiving that e-mail on Monday evening, we were confused and worried about what was going to happen.  On Tuesday evening we received an e-mail letting us know which agency had agreed to take our case.  Friends on the Buglaria adoption board on FaceBook who had used the agency were very supportive and had many good things to say about the agency, so we felt very comfortable with the change.  We filled out the transfer form and sent it over on Wednesday morning, and we heard from the new agency later that same day. 

On Thursday morning I woke up to an e-mail from our travel coordinator in Bulgaria.  Although she was contacting me about something else, hearing from her was still comforting.  We're so happy that we'll still be working with the same NGO in Bulgaria because I really can't imagine anyone else greeting us when we arrive in Sofia.  On Thursday afternoon I received an unexpected phone call from our former caseworker.  I hate having to use the word "former" when talking about that relationship.  We've been working together for almost five years.  She helped us bring our first son home and has done so much to help with our second adoption.  For that, we are so grateful and I'm so glad I got that chance to talk to her one last time.

I was also able to speak with our new caseworker on Thursday evening.  She's very personable and gave me such a positive feeling.  We aren't going to lose any money (from this adoption) and are able to keep the same fee schedule.  The new agency does a lot of waiting children adoptions, so it sounds like we'll fit right in.  I've been working my way through the new contract and other paperwork and hope to finish it up this weekend.

I've also been in touch with my social worker at our home study agency.  She'll be printing us a batch of new home studies with the new agency's name in place of the old one and also taking care of the inter-agency paperwork that needs to be filed. 

I still need to figure out a few details about dossier and immigration paperwork, but it sounds like this transition shouldn't be too difficult.  Although it's very sad that the agency had to close due to the ban on adoptions from Russia, everyone has come together to make this transition as smooth as possible.  We will most likely lose our last post-placement deposit, but at least we have Nikolas.  Some parents lost their future children, Russian orphans lost their chance to have a family and a great group of people lost their jobs.  Compared to their losses, we don't have anything to complain about.

Thanks to everyone for your prayers this week.  Now it's time to move forward...