[duaneamyjo]

My agency just sent out info on the new procedures for infants to be adopted. According to their VN coordinator after a newborn is abondoned she will have to stay in the hospital for a month while they send out announcements and notes in the newspaper to find the family and see if anyone will come back and get her. If no one comes then the baby is sent to the orphanage and they also have to attempt to find family by sending an article to the newspaper. If after another month no one claims her, she is declared an orphan. It will take about another month to get the paperwork done to put the child on a referral list. So the youngest age of referral is 3 months. According to the adoption center, they have 4 months to process your case after you are assigned a child. So the youngest age of the children could be 7 months old when coming home.

[drmalcolm]

Hi Amy,
Do you know anything about the ages available--is it anticipated that there will be mostly infants, or are toddlers commonly available, too?

Thanks in advance!
Christina

[SingleMiamiMom]

I was hoping for younger...but as long as it's under a year, I'm okay with it.

[tlgfoster]

Please don't despair about the age of an infant being 7 months. I know in some other countries you can get a child that is practically newborn. However, for most countries that isn't the case. We adopted our son at 9 months old from Vietnam and, at the age of 5, he is fabulous, well adjusted, and has bonded extremely well. We couldn;'t be happier. He was fabulous at 9 months old as we enjoyed his desire to try foods, facial expressions, various sounds coming out of his mouth, etc. We were able to celebrate his first birthday together, his first tooth, and his first steps.

[duaneamyjo]

Christina, I believe there are many toddlers available too! We are getting a 2 year old and on the waiting list with our agency there are mostly toddlers available. I wonder if Vietnam being closed for a few years has created more toddlers being available because as infants they were not adopted.

[erin_fl]

Our agency has said that mostly infants and older children are available from Vietnam. I have personally spoken with another couple adopting through this agency who received the referral last month when their soon-to-be daughter was only 1 month old. I wonder if the differences among agencies are due to the differences in the orphanages they work with? Also, even if your child is 7 months old when you pick him or her up, as tlgfoster pointed out, you will still be able to share the vast majority of important milestones with him or her.

Best wishes on your journey!

Erin

[duaneamyjo]

Our agency also told us that some infants may be younger because if the child is relinquished to the orphanage by the family then they do not have to go through the process of finding the family and can refer the child sooner.

[drmalcolm]

Thanks so much for all of your wonderful responses, guys!

If anyone would recommend their agency, would you mind PM'ing me? We are currently using a China-only agency, so I know I would not be able to use them again if we wanted to adopt from Vietnam.

That is great about the fact that there are toddlers available. Since China has some restrictions about waiting a year to start the process again, a toddler-aged child would be perfect by the time we're able to do this (that is, if I can sweet-talk my husband into a 3rd child!).

Thanks again--this seems like a very sweet group of people in this forum.

Christina

[mebe24]

What do you think? My homestudy said that I am requesting a child from 0-2 years. In my letter of intent I requested a child 0-12 months. Do you think that I will get a referl of a child under 12 months. I really would love to get a child under 12 months since this is my first child. I would love to be able to celebrate that first birthday with them. I am only 28 years old so I do not know if that will be a factor. But just in case they are closer to two I purchased a convertable crib and a large car seat.

Sherri in Alabama