And we’re off!

On Thursday, June 2, 2021 Ryan and I left our home into the unknown and what would be the biggest decision and adventure of our life.

We arrived at the Winnipeg airport with everything in order, Negative Covid-19 tests in hand only to find out that 15 min prior to boarding our documents for our Covid-19 tests were  not meeting the minimum requirements.  We were missing the date the sample was collected, our documents only stated the date the results were received.  Thankfully our sister-in-law Leona works for the company who did the tests for us.  We called her in a panic and she was able to have a person in her office resolve it quickly.  The plane was starting to board, when finally the email came through with the amended document.  We owe all the thanks to Leona for helping make this happen or else we wouldn’t have been allowed to board the plane!

From there the trip was pretty smooth sailing.  The biggest challenge was wearing our masks for about 24 hours straight.  Whether you were in the plane or at the airport, masks had to be worn at all times.  The only breaks from wearing your mask was if you were eating or drinking.  So we took advantage of meal time by eating extra slow.  The flight from Toronto to Frankfurt was empty, literally only a handful of people, so it was really nice being able to stretch out and get up to walk around with ease.

Once we landed in Kiev our facilitator and translator Inna was waiting for us just outside the airport doors.  From there we were headed to a Notary’s office to sign some additional paperwork for the application to adopt.  Then finally we arrived at our apartment in downtown Kiev overlooking the Maidan Square.  It was beautiful and we were excited to finally get some rest.  By this point we were running about 30hrs with little to no sleep.

Over the next couple of days Inna walked us through our next steps of the adoption process and what to expect.  These days of waiting for our appointment at the ministry office were a flood of emotions, nervousness and excitement all at the same time.

 I can’t believe how quickly time is flying by and already we are at the end of March which is the expected time we will receive notification of when and where we are flying to for our first trip over to the Ukraine.

The first trip is so exciting for us as it will be the first opportunity we will meet our children.  At this point in the process, all we know is that the children will be 2 to 12 years of age, and that they will be siblings.  We should be receiving notification from UAS, our adoption agency, any day now which will disclose to us when we will be travelling and to which part of the Ukraine we will be going to.

With not knowing anything really about our children at this point, it has made preparing our home a bit challenging.  Much of what we will need to purchase will need to wait until we get back from this first trip.  A 2 year old would need a different sized bed than a 12 year old, so we can’t even buy a bed yet for example.  I am really excited for when we get back to put everything into high gear and purchase all the necessities once we finally know more about our children.

After this first trip, it will likely be about 2 months before we can bring them home to Canada, but we may be required to make an additional trip in between.  That part is unknown at this time.

Ryan and I have been busy these last few months working on a few more renovations before our travelling will begin.  Excited and anxious for this next step in the adoption as we have been anticipating it for so long now.

One of the recommendations we received from the agency was to prepare a small photo album of family and friends to share and leave with our children after the first trip over.   We collected pictures from everyone and compiled them in a photo book.  We also included pictures of our house, yard, and local playground so they can see all the things to look forward to here.  I cannot wait to show the kids these books and introduce them to all of the important people that will be a part of their life!

The outpouring of so many people have shared with us since we started sharing our journey publicly has been so amazing to see.  Many sharing their adoption journeys with us and similar circumstances of infertility has been so heartwarming and encouraging to us as we push through this last leg of the adoption process.  Thank you to all of you who have reached out to us with your kindness and support – we appreciate all of you so much!

We are soooooo close!!

Today we had our official adoption signing appointment at the UAS adoption agency office.  This was one of the most exciting days for us as it means the next step is for our documents to be sent to the Ukraine.  After many revisions of our documents, and sleepless nights, we are now officially onto the next stage in our adoption process!

The feeling of signing the 24 pages today felt similar to the feeling you experience when you sign at the lawyers office for your first home.  You feel excited for this next stage in your life, your hand is sore from signing, and the feeling of the best is yet to come!  With every signature I felt a commitment to our children being made.  Overwhelming love with every stroke of the pen to each page.

Oleg once again walked us through the next phase that we are in and answered our many questions we had about the details of what to expect.  I am amazed at the amount of paperwork and time Oleg and his team at the UAS office have put into our file.  The patience of dealing with international adoption requirements should not be overlooked.  I cannot speak enough about how amazing it has been to work with UAS and the support Oleg has been to us throughout.  We are blessed to have found this adoption agency.

Driving home from the appointment, Ryan and I were both feeling overwhelming joy and excitement as we enter this next phase.  Today was officially the day that can be written in our history book.  January 19th, 2021, the day Ryan and Mandy made the official commitment to become parents.  I believe wholeheartedly that our children are already chosen for us, waiting for us to arrive, meet them, and eventually bring them home. 

While we have a few months still to wait for the day we get to meet our children, we are overjoyed that time is moving very quickly now.  The best is yet to come!

It’s now been a year since we completed our home study, and just as Marla had predicted, now you wait for about a year.  She was bang on.  Throughout the last year all we have been working on is providing the appropriate paperwork to get our adoption in order.  Every ask of documentation requested, so specific, and so detailed.  One slight variation, or error would result in having to redo documents.  The other challenge experienced was documents expiring as the Ukraine would have a 6 month expiry on all paperwork.  This also resulted in us having to redo paperwork 2-3 times or in some cases even more.  The medicals for example, had a specific form for the Ukraine, written in blue ink only and very detailed in nature.  I think in the end we redid this paperwork 5 times and had to go through bloodwork and physicals twice.  In the end we had a binder full of paperwork we had provided the agency including things like, RCMP background checks and finger printing, land title documents, property tax statements, financial documents, employment letters, real estate information, marriage certificate, birth certificates, are only some of the documents we had to provide.  It’s basically a forensic assessment of your full life.  I can only imagine how many families would be denied the right to have children if all had to provide the information we had to.  But, there is good reason for this.  I appreciate the fact they require all of this background information on us as they are completing due diligence to ensure these children are provided a good home.

Earlier this week we had a meeting with Oleg, the director of our adoption agency, UAS to review our next steps and to answer any questions we may have.  This was so informative and helped answer a lot of burning questions we had as we wait for our next steps.  We are expected to visit his office next week to sign the official paperwork and provide all of our original documents.  This means our file will likely be sent to the Ukraine in February with our first trip likely in May of this year.  The first trip will be the trip where we get to meet our children for the first time.  From there, we fly back home and about a month later will have our second trip .  For now, the second trip can be completed either in person in the Ukraine or via online.  About a month after this trip, we would be back over to the Ukraine for the 3rd and final trip to bring our children home.

This last year has had so many unknowns for so many as we all found ourselves adapting to life in a pandemic.  We found ourselves many times feeling emotionally and mentally drained, not knowing what the future may hold.  Many times I would find myself in the kitchen cleaning after dinner, feeling discouraged.  I would look out the kitchen window only to find yet another rainbow forming in the field in the back yard.  Night after night, month after month, rainbows would appear.  I think in the end we captured 6 different instances of rainbows in our field.  One even made it into the 6pm evening news which someone else captured.  Every time we found ourselves running in the back yard giddy like children, feelings of joy and hope would engulf us.  We are not alone, God is always with us, and truly does have his hand over this situation.  We have full faith as we go through this journey together.

One of our first activities in the process of adoption was to attend a 1 day educational seminar  in October 2019, which covered a variety of topics to help prepare us for the journey of adopting.  We heard from social workers, on some of the things we can expect as well as tips and tools available to us to help prepare us mentally in addition to preparing our home.  The most memorable moment of the day was meeting a family who had adopted 3 children from the Ukraine.  They brought their children into the room and immediately I felt my heart flutter.  The children shared some of their experiences from the orphanage and then some of the activities they did once they arrived home in Canada.  These children were so well spoken and had a joy about them that I cannot describe.  They then opened it up to questions and open discussion.  There were 2 other couples with us in the room attending the seminar.  The youngest boy leaned back in his chair, arms folded, and said, “so, how many children are you all adopting?”.  His expression was so cute, innocent, and curious. 

We left the session with so many notes and great takeaways. Things we needed to start working on to prepare our home, our hearts, and our minds.

Next step shortly after was the homestudy.  I don’t know why, but this was the part of the process I was feeling most anxious about.  I guess because my perception was that our lives would be put under a large judgement microscope and left for someone else to make the assessment.  All of my preconceived ideas and feelings turned out to be completely wrong.  We were assigned our social worker Marla and she began by asking us to complete our personal biographies in writing.  A template of about 4 pages of points that would need to be addressed when writing your autobiographies was provided.  The topics were of a wide variety talking about our families, upbringing, beliefs and plans on how would we raise children.  We spent days writing our individual bios and both found the exercise very therapeutic and interesting to put our thoughts in writing.  Ryan and I thought it would be a neat idea to write our bios individually, not discussing or sharing with each other anything we were writing until we were both finished.  Once complete, we sat down in our kitchen and read each others bio aloud.  It didn’t take long before the tears started to come.  Hearing the beautiful thoughts we each shared and how in synch we both had been was yet just another indication we were more ready now than ever for this journey.

The written exercise was then followed by 3 in person sessions with Marla.  The first 2 at her office where she ran through similar questions with us and shared stories of other couple’s experiences.  The 3rd session she came to our home to finish her assessment including a tour of our home and community.

It was about a month later we received Marla’s written homestudy assessment which was also the first time we were reading our reference letters that our family and friends had provided supporting us in our decision to adopt.  Again, we found ourselves overwhelmed with emotion.  The homestudy and beautiful words shared by all left us feeling so loved and supported.  This journey we know won’t be easy, but one thing is for sure, we are not alone.