[thegoodwins297]

My husband and I have recently decided to adopt from El Salvador. Our dossier was originally registered in Russia a year ago. Due to the recent reaccreditation issues in Russia, a couple of the umbrella agencies our agency uses is still waiting for their certificate of reaccreditation (has been waiting for 6 months for it). Since all of our paperwork has expired and we have to begin the paperchase again, we decided to be one of the first families with our agency to journey through the El Salvador process instead. We are essentially their guinea pigs. I am sure it will be worth it.

If there is anybody who has already completed their adoption, please let me know about your experience.

Thanks,
Trudi

[maggie_va]

I recently met someone who brought their son home from El Salvador within the last 2 years. She said the process was very long and drawn out and she was only 1 of 2 families from their agency that stuck it out to the end and brought home a child. She said the process itself lasted almost 2 years from submitting the inital paperwork to bringing home a child.

Maggie

[JohnnaMJH]

We are a family who started with an agency's 'new' program in El Salvador in Oct. 2002 when our son was 1 year old. He came home just after his third birthday in Oct. 2004. If you are still considering it, I highly recommend you really think about whether you can handle a 1.5 to 2.5 year wait. Our son was worth it, but I would discourage anyone who wants to adopt from El Salvador. The various gov't agencies do not follow the laws in place for timely adoptions. Every single step of the process took months and months longer than it was supposed to.

Good luck,

[thegoodwins297]

Thanks for your post Johnna. After the year wait for Russia and still no hope, I believe no country is going to be ideal or smooth. I believe God has led us in this direction by closing the door to Russia for us personally and opening El Salvador.

I hope to be prepared for whatever God has in store for us for the new leg of this journey.

Thanks.

Trudi

[Cookie Monster]

Have you been asked for a pysc eval yet? We were just recently told we will need one. It is the last piece of the puzzle we need.

[JanetL]

Hi,
I think we are going to try El Salvador too. I am kind of concerned as an employee with the agency is the farthest along in the El Salvador process. So they don't have a completed one yet with their firm.
Maybe we can keep in touch and compare notes. We live in Central Florida and are using a local agency.

[Cookie Monster]

Right now our paper work (except for the phyc eval) is being sent to El Salvador to be translated. The phyc eval has not made it to the agency yet, but should be there by the end of the week.
We are getting very excited.

[saranbr]

We are considering El Salv. for our next adoption, please let us know how your experience goes and who you use.

Thanks, Sara

[Cookie Monster]

So far things are going smoothly.
We did need a phyc eval that we did not expect, but that was not much of a big deal.
Right now we are waiting for our paper work to be translated and then to recieve a referral. Best case scenario we should get our referral one month after the paperwork is translated, but since it is a new program I am not getting my hopes up for it to be that soon. (Still very excited that we have made it this far)
Jody-Ann

[Almita]

Hi all,

Do you think that flying down there is helpful to move the process along? Since I work in government, I always think it helps when someone is banging down my door for something v. patiently waiting and unseen. Just a thought.......

Almita
ps. just starting to research all this

[JohnnaMJH]

Hi there, I don't know if you are still considering this but yes, I think it helps. I didn't go down until the end, but we had been waiting from May to Sept for a court date with no news. I went down for my son's 3rd birthday and begged/pleaded with my atty to take me to the courts.

We waited and waited there, and finally he said, well, I have no info. They have a 'training' for the next two weeks and won't set any dates. But, in a typical fashion for that experience, on the taxi ride home he called and said, OK, they gave you a date in a week. Talk about an emotional roller coaster.

Also, I stayed after the court date and did the paperwork for the US Embassy. The original timeline for the new BC was 15 days, but we went back in a few days and begged, really, and they gave it to us later that day. I know, but this was just my inept atty, that he never would've returned early to check. So, we received our visa within 3 weeks of the court date which was amazing at that point. The other families waited almost two months to over three.

Good luck,