[sak9645]

It is never a good idea to plan on a certain time of year for completing an adoption, as things almost always go awry. A judge can go on vacation, a local official can become ill, the central government can impose some new rules, or there can be an outbreak of measles at the orphanage. All of these things can delay approval and travel. And once in a while, though unfortunately rarely, things can happen more quickly than expected.

Adoptions happen "on God's time". The best you can do is to be flexible and good humored. When your child is ready, he/she will come home, and not necessarily during your three-month wait after taking the bar exam, or during a certain season when travel is cheaper.

While there are some countries, such as China, that have a Waiting Child program for school-aged children and children with special needs that is faster than the regular program, most countries do not.

With countries like Ethiopia and Haiti, your agency will deal with a specific orphanage, which may be small. You won't be able to get a referral until there is a child of the right age, health status, gender and so on available -- which could be one month or one year from now.

If the agency does not ban gender selection, almost any orphanage will have fewer families requesting boys, so requesting a boy could mean a speedier referral, if any of the children meet your age and health status requirement. In general, toddlers are requested more often than older children, so if you were willing to adopt a school aged child, and especially a school aged boy, referrals could be faster. And if you were open to some moderate special needs, you might also get a referral slightly faster.

But then you will have to go through the country's process of approving either the adoption or the sending of the child to the U.S. under a decree of guardianship. All sorts of things can affect the length of that process -- from a revolution to new foreign government requirements to bad weather to a clumsy secretary who drops your file behind a cabinet, where it languishes for weeks.

In general, countries with the longest-established, biggest programs tend to have the most predictable timeframes, but even then, things can be very variable.

And do remember that delays can start even before your paperwork goes to the foreign country. Homestudy social workers vary considerably in their availability. Some may make the mandatory number of visits very quickly; others may take months. Some states require homestudies to include the completion of preadoption classes, which can slow the process down. Some USCIS offices process I-600A applications in a few weeks, while others take several months.

And depending on the dossier requested by the country, going through initial document acquisition, notarization, certification, and authentication can be fast or slow. A lot will depend on the states where your documents originated.

Some people manage to get a homestudy completed in a month, USCIS clearance in 2 months afterwards, and a dossier through the process in another month. Others, unfortunately, take a lot longer. And that is before their documents went to the foreign country and the process of identifying and adopting a child began.

Nowadays, it tends to be pretty rare for adoptions to occur in less than a year from homestudy to homecoming. It can happen, but a wait of 12 to 24 months seems to be more and more common, and some countries take even longer.

Sharon