[hollywoodlisa]

Hi everyone:

I am fairly new to this board. I have been reading everyone's posts hoping it would help us in making a decision on where to adopt. For various reasons, we have been a little hesitant to pick a country because of different issues with each choice available. We are mainly considering Guatemala, Russia, and domestic adoption. I really think Russia is more desirable to us for certain reasons, and concerning to us for other reasons.

I would appreciate input from anyone as to why you chose Russia. I really think it would be helpful for me to read your outlook on the issue and why you chose this country. Please feel free to PM me if you would like to share your thoughts privately.

Thanks and I look forward to your replies.

Lisa

[nungesser]

I just sent you a PM.

I'm also eager to hear from some of the other regulars what about Russia attaracted them too.

[Kasey]

The countries we investigated were Korea (my cousin was adopted from there), Guatemala (we had friends adopt from there), Russia/Kaz (family member and friend adopted from here), Ukraine (DH's aunt is from Ukraine) and Rep of Georgia (we like the program and that the children were fostered). We made a pro and con list for each choice and ruled a couple out based on things like lenght in country, issues related to the country at the time.
We chose Georgia and it closed just as our dossier was complete, Russia was our second choice and we moved into that program. It was familiar, I liked the two trip idea, Russia is a fascinating country with a fascinating history.
So that is it for us, nothing major, it just worked out the way it did and the way it was supposed to.

[kretzklan]

We, as well, looked into a few options. For us, we settled on Eastern Europe due to the race issue. I know that may seem harsh - but due to the area in which we live and our solemn belief that an adoptive child (as they grow older) should be able to "choose" wheter to discuss adoption or not (we didn't want it to be an everyday intrusion in their life)...the looking like us issue became very important. I certainly don't want to make that sound like we are racist people...I hope you can understand there was much more to it than that. We had a failed adoption in the Ukraine 3 years ago but yet we came back to Ukraine or Russia. Our agency helped us decide with information they had and the fact they had a referal that matched our criteria on the day we dropped off our application check!

[his,mine&ours]

Michelle, you are not alone. We were the same.


We wanted a child that was closely aligned with our families traits. We have three children, and wanted the 4th (our first together) to be similar in ethnicity to the rest of us. With our family dynamics of steps and exes, it just seemed to be easier if there was one less difference for our newest addition to live with !!

[erickk]

We did not even know about the different international adoption programs until we went to an adoption seminar. It was easy for us to select Russia. My great-grandmother on my mother's side of the family was from Russia and I have always felt a close bond to my mother's side of the family. Also, they had pictures and videos of the orphanages. It was a little hard to see so many children waiting for homes. After the seminar we drove home in silence and did not talk about it. I think we both sort of needed to digest what we saw. We got up the next morning and almost said at the same time "Let's adopt from Russia." We never have questioned our decision and when we decided to adopt again it was implicit that we would return to the same orphanage. We developed close relationships with the people we stayed with and with people at the orphanage. We have developed a great love for the country where our son was born.
Karen

[jimpol]

We decided to adopt from Russia because we had a couple that we were friends with that had adopted from Russia twice. Both of their adoptions went seemlessly and the boys were great. We thought that if they had such a good experience that we would have a similar experience.

Second reason was because of the race just like the others mentioned above. We figured that it would be easier to assimilate into our community.

Good Luck!

[hollywoodlisa]

Thanks for the replies, if you dont mind, I would love to know what agency you chose, and what you thought of them - meaning would you use them again. Its probably more politically correct if you were to PM me with this information.

I have spoken with sooooooo many of them, after a while, they all sound alike.

Lisa

[waxhawfamily]

Get this ...

One of our main reasons for adopting from Russia was the speed in which the adoptions took place .

We are very imatient, and were told that Russia is typically 6 - 9 months, start to finish. Well, we're glad we moved forward with Russia, but our process took closer to 17 months .

Other than time, we too made a pro con list. During this process, we completely ruled out domestic due to open adoptions. We also ruled out Asia and S. America due to ethnic differences (if we were adopting an only child, it may not have mattered, but with a bio son already, we wanted them to be as similar as possible). This left Eastern Europe. We went with Russia because of our interest in traveling there, abundance of children, and another family member being born in Russia (adopted neice).

Good luck with your decision.

[LilyMoon]

We decided on Russia due to the fact that both my husband and myself have ancestry from Russia. I never considered any other country other than Russia....I just knew my child was there.

We are home 2 years now and I know I made the right choice. My daughter is everything I had hoped for and more.

Best of luck to you in your decision.

LilyMoon

[Schnooks]

Several reasons...

1. Through our church we have connections with Russia - missionaries, etc.

2. My DH will be teaching in a Moscow seminary.

3. My DH is pushing 50 - Russia is more age friendly.

4. Friends have had good experiences with Russia.

[Jim_in_PA]

Our original thoughts were around domestic from the state system. But there are many barriers, challenges and risks that we were not comfortable with relative to adopting school-aged children that way in our particular state. They are more concerned with "family reunification", even when there is clear history of multiple abuses, so foster-to-adopt is the only way to get there and the process can be many years to completion.

At that point, we started investigating IA. Our disinterest in adopting an infant more-or-less ruled out some countries, such as China, where the vast majority of adoptions are very, very young. We were also drawn to hosting which narrowed it down to Russia or Ukraine. Our investigation of agencies and programs further refined the choice to Russia...and here we are, waiting (on pins and needles) for what will hopefully a court date and the realization of our new, larger, family of four.