Trent Update: So we're pretty sure a mountain moved

So I say "pretty sure" only because something rather crappy happened a little over 2 weeks ago. We were contacted by our agency that the letter had been obtained by the social worker in BG, but that it was not yet in the hands of the Miskaye/Holt Ethiopia staff and that they would confirm when it was turned in to the courts. We were very very happy about this, but we chose to not tell the world until that letter was safely submitted to Federal Mowyca.

GOOD THING YA'LL

Because I got "that call" (and my agency never calls unless it is bad, I have learned this now 3 times)on Monday 3 days after, saying that no... there had been a miscommunication somewhere along the chain of 4 different entities translating information, and that our Regional letter had in fact NOT been released, as Regional BG office would not release it without a written notice from Federal MOYWCA... and guess what.. in general federal MOWYCA will not write such things.

STUCK AGAIN AT SQUARE ONE after a few days thinking we would be on a plane near the end of February. There was a big ugly cry.. and since I had not had a big ugly cry in over a year since seeing this child's face and writing a letter of intent, I would give myself that.

The next day, big girl panties came back on.

The next day we launched our great sourcing of medical evaluation letters from wherever we could get to send to Ethiopia to use as leverage to sway either the Regional Office to clear him on grounds of this new information necessitating international adoption OR using it towards Federal MOWYCA to give us a pardon for this updating of letter business. That is pretty much what we have been doing since then. Lots of emailing different doctors and thanking them for helping us. We have obtained 8 letters as of now from different specialists, including an Ethiopian (now living in the US) physician that works at Ted's hospital who was trained in Addis and can verify the abilities of the hospitals there regarding the ongoing care my child will need to succeed. He made some pretty serious points as someone who would know better than anyone what the Ethiopian medical system is and is not able to handle long term.

So there we were. We also got another unpleasant call from our agency yesterday letting us know of some developments reported from another family from Trent's orphanage whose daughter has been home for some time now and whose English is now good enough to describe her time there. There were some bad things being reported, and that is all I can say, because I was only given this information because my child is the only child from my agency who is still living under that roof in those conditions. There will be an investigation of sorts, but as my kid is stuck there and legally "married" somewhat to that center regarding his paperwork, there is nothing that I can do. Yesterday was a hard day. Not only were we stuck with no idea how long (or forever?) he would be stuck, but now there are allegations that he could be harmed or not kept safe WHILE being stuck. These are just allegations, but still. God and I had some silent words on this topic yesterday. It was not my finest hour, but I kept my composure and sent that energy where it needed to be sent.

SO ABOUT THAT MOUNTAIN MAYBE BEING MOVED...

So today I was better, having re-released my little man back to the hands of our sovereign God and re-released myself to the trenches of "cold turkey" potty training my 3 year old. I was engaged in a serious hour long "poop stand off" with said 3 year old when an email from my agency dinged into my phone.. and this was surprising because I didn't know of any specific thing I was supposed to be hearing back from them about after I just talked to them yesterday.

So, I will now tell you that our Regional letter was obtained!!!!

The only reason I say that with any kind of confidence, is because it was already submitted to Ethiopian court, who in turn gave federal MOWYCA a new deadline to produce positive comments (our clearance letter) of March 3rd. We have a really good chance of having our MOWYCA clearance at that time. A definite chance?? Heaven's no. This is Ethiopia. I have zero trust... but I DO know that they have already grilled my child's file (hence, making us update that regional letter technicality) and have already grilled us the Sibley's (made me submitted a new Power of Attorney fully authenticated that took a month back in November) and I already gave my agency an updated homestudy for this year so they can't get me on that. Is there a chance they will find another new and ridiculous thing?? YES.. but none of us can think what that would be at this point since we have already been audited.

Now, when we have MOWYCA clearance, that is when the Sibley's will be getting jiggy with it and really preparing to fly and bring this boy home. That clearance is the child welfare of Ethiopia officially releasing him to be a Sibley. The US Embassy has already cleared him so they are ready for him to be a Sibley too. The last piece will be inviting us to court as the last piece of the puzzle. IF (big big IF) we get a positive clearance on 3/3, we are betting we will get to fly sometime in March depending on when they schedule our court date.

Then a beautiful Ethiopian adoption decree will get all laminated naming this kid Eskedar Ted Sibley and it will be awesome.

SO, YA'LL

Please keep our paperwork in your prayers. It ain't done until you are on that plane home with that piece of precious child clawing off your face and screaming (woohoo!!! It's a PARTY. A 16 hour long party over the Atlantic that you asked for btw).

******* But a moment to be serious********

Along with this exciting news on our court issues, we also got some not so nice news on our little guy. He is having some adverse reactions to the new seizure medication he was put on. He isn't eating (already failure to thrive!!)and is lethargic and bleeding out of his nose. He is was taken off of Tegretol and put on a different seizure medication. They will be monitoring his blood levels (we hope) and we really hope that he begins to feel better soon.

So not just that vague "bad stuff" I mentioned above about allegations against his care center, I have a little boy who really needs to get home to his proper pediatric neurologist so we can get his meds on track and his seizures under control.

******But what about those two little kids you are helping??******

They are still here and still precious. Their mom has made great strides and the plan is for the kids to return home next month. We really hope to be sending these kids back to a new apartment with their mother, but there is a chance that we won't be able to time things that perfectly. I don't like that, but at the same time, when we said yes to these kids it was an emergency yes where everyone knew our adoption could move at any time and that will be that. In a perfect world of orphan care/prevention, these kiddos will be in a stable space just before I need to hop on a plane. Pray for that ya'll. I love these little goobers and I want them to thrive.


So I really hope to have some MOWYCA clearance news in the next few weeks!! That will be a party. A party involving me never having to play with them ever again, as my last round with Ben was no party either. In the meantime, Trent will get here when he gets here and we will not lose our junk. We will play in the snow while Mom hides in the kitchen, admiring the cuteness of these other 3 goons who got here eventually too.

Trent Update: Waiting for some mountains to move

So I looked back tonight to see when I had last updated. Little has changed, but there are plenty of details that I should go ahead and record.

On the Retroactive Regional adoption clearance that they want "updated"

We are basically sitting in the same spot. Since my last update, the Regional office did open at some point. There is now a new regional director, a different person than the head person who decided Trent was internationally adoptable in early 2013. A slight positive, is that this person didn't outright say "No, I'm not writing you a new one" but instead said "I'm not signing off on something I haven't already reviewed myself". They wanted time to re-review his life in a file. It's not good for Trent, but it's good for his process, that he actually looks worse on paper now than he did then. His medical file is not fun to read, and it will be clear that he is definitely not reaching "normal" milestones of any sort. This is not the kid who will grow up to be able to push a plow and haul water and provide for a family and be a contributor to society there without major medical interventions on the dime of the Ethiopian government as he is an orphaned child on all accounts.

That was weeks ago. Please know, dear reader, that this little office on the border of a war zone of Sudan that is surrounded by refugee villages (A shout out now to the move "The Good Lie" that you need to see)is a two day journey from Addis Ababa where Trent has been since being adoptable in 2013. Someone from Addis has to travel out there to do this work for us. That person is the social worker of the orphanage (Miskaye) where Trent currently lives. Last Monday was Timket (Epiphany on the Orthodox calendar) so things were closed. Monday is apparently "the day" when you are most likely to have the right people in that office to help you so that is the day of choice. The worker is on there way there in just a few hours actually, as it is about 5am Monday morning in Ethiopia right now.

I decided to write an update tonight in order to distract myself from the hope that his case could actually move forward after 3 months of being stuck. I love a good, healthy distraction don't you?

and now, another possible avenue needs to be discussed about how Trent may get "unstuck".

The "Ethiopian Adoption Network": Who are they? What do they do? Why do we care?

Those are great questions that I had as well!! During our stuckness this last month, we were informed that this Ethiopian child welfare organization (beyond that, I actually don't know much)are lobbyists for HIV+, mentally disabled and physically disabled children who get "stuck". They actually reached out to my agency, as almost all children released for adoption prior to April 2014 are stuck just like Trent is, ESPECIALLY the disabled kids who were waiting to be assigned a family for a long time just like Trent. They said in paraphrase "Give us copies of your files for all of your disabled/HIV+ children. We are taking these cases directly to his Excellency Ato Almaw, who is the very head of MOWYCA in hopes that he will pardon these cases from the new regional requirement." The deadline to submit cases was 1/16 and we don't know when this group is meeting with him. They are basically harassing him with a "Hey, bro, remember that retroactive thing you did to slow down normal healthy little kids from leaving the country?? Here are all the handicapped kids that got screwed over when you did that. Wanna fix that hm?? Or will you be picking up the tab for these disabled children for the next 10 years?? Just checking". This would be another way that Trent could get unstuck at any time, if this plan works.

Us being annoying advocates because we have too much time on our hands and Trent's trip to the neurologist

So since this advocacy group was working on our case, I asked our agency if we could be annoying and get some of our professional people to write letters from a clinical standpoint based on evaluating the video footage we were given in October. I mean.. if we are writing letters and annoying people, why not get in on that action? It's what I do. We have a few letters/evaluations in the works that I will be getting authenticated like a dossier and sending directly to Ethiopia that can be tossed around for fun at key moments.

IF YOU ARE A PHYSICAL THERAPIST/OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST/MEDICAL DOCTOR (Sorry, Ethiopia isn't a fan of DO's, chiropractors, etc, we have learned) AND WANT TO WRITE AN EVALUATION FOR MY USE IN ADVOCACY, I WILL SEND YOU THE VIDEO FOOTAGE AND DIRECTIONS! It will be good times.

Trent was seen by an Ethiopian neurologist on Jan 13th and again on the 14th. Why this took 2 years to do, seriously, don't ask me... I'm not mad about it.. but he has been disabled a long time.. like.. I didn't realize that this was an option.. and now all of the sudden it's an option? That would have been some sweet info to have in his file back when no one wanted to be his mother ya know?? We still don't have the report yet. The report isn't actually even for us. It's ammo from someone who does not beneift from this child being adopted. An Ethiopian neurologist stating to an Ethiopian court confirming "This kid is messed up" will be a help to us. This is someone from their culture speaking to their culture about a kid in their culture and what would be best for him. We welcome it and we are thankful for it, just surprised this didn't happen in 2012?? Waiting for details on that.

So in the meantime....

We're just here.. hangin' out. Since we are stuck, we took in an emergency Safe Families placement the week of Christmas (ya know, for fun) of a sweet sweet SWEET 3 yr old little boy "D" and baby girl "I". They have been here a little over a month now and things are going very well. We are happy to be serving there mother who has recently gotten a job!! We will be taking care of these kiddos until we travel for Trent or likely in March, whatever comes first.

I mean look at them. You wanted this for Christmas too right?





I'm still training for the half marathon :-) I'm a beast now, in case you wondered. It suits me.

Here is some other stuff we did.

Jesus had a birthday....



Sam started working on new skills such as the toilet (at our house)and talking a bit better/chewing food without choking on it through therapy at Marian Hope Center.





Ben is dominating swim lessons due to his magical forehead powers.



Lucas received the Kindergarten citizenship award for the month of November. We were pretty proud. These are pictures from the assembly where he received it in December.



People got Mohawks





So someday this will all be in the past and we are choosing joy in our circumstance. We want to look back on this season and feel that we waited "well and did not lose our junk" as it says on my kitchen white board to remind me. God is near to the Fatherless and to the lonely and to the broken hearted and to the disabled children without voice. He will get Trenton Eskedar home in His good time or provide an alternative path for his welfare. I am sure of this. Our job is to sit here and eat chocolate until then :-)

Peace out and prayers for the staff worker enterring the regional office in Benishangul Gumuz in just a few hours in Ethiopia!!

Trent Update: A "Retroactive" MOWYCA ruling for old cases

So here is that blog post that I have been avoiding writing this week.. because then I'd have to.. ya know.. talk about it.

I received an update within a few days of my blog post back before Thanksgiving and more since then. A few days after Thanksgiving, MOWYCA did finally have our "comments" letter. Our agency had been going to the office bugging for our comments every day. The issue? We received a "negative" comment. This about sent me through the roof until I understood what they meant by "negative". A better description would really be "incomplete file with new regulations we just implemented and made retroactive to old cases".

So what does that mean?
The "regulation" MOWYCA rolled out which effects all children that were considered internationally adoptable before April 2014 (Trent hit that clearance in April 2013 before we even traveled for Sammy) is an additional letter to the Regional MOWYCA clearance from the village of his birth stating that there is no domestic way to parent this child in Ethiopia. This new regulation is now effecting a lot of people, especially those of us that are matched with children from "waiting child" lists that have been waiting for families to step up for awhile. I am not in this boat alone.

The day after our agency got that news, Trent's current orphanage, Miskaye in Addis Ababa where he has been in "holding" since becoming internationally adoptable in 2013 created the needed letter and this letter as well as a social worker flew to Benishangul Gumuz Region, on the border of Sudan, to his birth village of Assosa to file this request with the region of his birth to obtain the new piece of "file" that will satisfy the new regulation.

Of course, that week was a national holiday and the office never opened. Turns out the office wasn't open last week either. No one knows when it WILL open for us to file our request. Good times huh? Our agency is hopeful the office will be open again this week and we pray that his birth region will produce this for us so we can move forward. Once we produce what Federal MOWYCA wants (isn't it fun that federal MOWYCA and state level MOWYCA are the ones trying to appease each other?) we should then have "positive" comments on his adoption file and be able to have the interview that should have occurred back on 10/22. When that is done, we will be in business to fly.

So yeah.. quite the string of bummer news.. but these are the things that happen in international adoption. It's not done until you are on the plane home.. and we veterans know that is really just the beginning of "intense rehab" for a little person that has been through too much.

THIS IS HOW YOU CAN HELP ME: Do not be negative at me about this process!!! Complaining about the Ethiopian government and pity parties for my son are not helpful. This doesn't change anything and it really just brings down the person who is choosing joy in this process (me). Things will be much harder while we are engaging him in his grief and adjusting to our new normal when we are home. Right now, my kids go to bed every night and my husband and I can go on dates. As a family of 5 we are in a great place and we are determined to enjoy it. Maybe after a year of 5 different foster children in our home, maybe we NEED this peaceful Christmas with our children. Do I want Trent home?? Of course I do. Can I do anything to change the situation? Nope. My job is to be faithfully preparing to be his mother and that is what I am doing.

I would love an update from my agency to hear that the BG office is moving this week. Let's pray for that! In the meantime, this is what we are doing around here.



We picked up our giant tree after Thanksgiving and saw Santa too!



We went for an extra special trip to "Build a Bear" where we made some new Rudolphs!



I also survived "cooking decorating" night.



Moving forward, please pray for Trent's case. We shouldn't be held up too long waiting for the new document as long as everyone is reasonable to work together. We are praying for news, and of course we are always praying for his spirit and his development and health. Please join us in prayer for our son to be able to come home.

Trent's case still on hold: Waiting for MOWYCA's recommendation letter....

Shortly after I wrote the previous update last month, we got notice from our agency that the court had given MOWYCA a second deadline to have their comments written and ready for the courts. This was November 8th. Our staff went to MOWYCA to pick them up and they were still not done.

Usually when this happens, the courts don't assign a 3rd deadline. They just wait for MOWYCA to catch up. So for now we are just hanging and waiting for this important piece of paper. Although there are very few cases being processed by my agency right now, it sounds like the other agencies in Ethiopia are experiencing the same delay. MOWYCA was in a lot of trainings and people just weren't in the office working so there is a big backlog. Luckily, they don't do Thanksgiving over there and Ethiopian Christmas isn't until January (different calendar again) so holiday season doesn't seem to be an issue moving forward.

So basically, we just wait. Until we have that letter, we can't get assigned a new "important interview" date for people from Trent's past, and until that interview happens we can't get our date to fly. As much as I would have loved to have him here with us at Christmas, and there may be some tears on that fact from me during the holidays, there is some peace that the current citizens of America Sibley boys can enjoy a holiday with Mom and Dad's full attention.

Lucas, Ben, and Sammy have had a year of 5 different homeless children up in their personal space for long periods of time. They have been brave and have literally shared everything they have, especially their Mom and Dad's energy.

Our most recent little man went home on November the 18th (sob). We miss him, we love him, and I found a little present he left me this morning jammed into our printer. He was a bit obsessed with our printer in a rather inconvenient way. This isn't the forum to talk openly about that case, but we loved him and his sister and we loved them and advocated for them well for 4 months. We did everything there was to do and now we release them to their biological families and Jackson county to move forward, hopefully toward a healthy and nurturing home life. Holy goodness, I miss them.

Sob.

So for now we pray for those that have been part of our family only temporarily and we pray for those yet to get here.



We are hopeful for more news on our case in the next few weeks. Until then, we will enjoy this holiday season and continue to prayer to be the best parents possible for Trent.

Ethiopian courts re-open, interview assigned, and we hit a delay

Ethiopian courts re-opened on October 6th. We received a wonderful email a few days later that Trent's case was assigned an interview date on October 22nd. The interview is a repeat of the same investigation that was done with the embassy in July, except this time instead of the American embassy investigating, it is the Ethiopian court process due process.

We kept busy and began to really plan for our trip to Ethiopia, as it was always possible we would be traveling soon after this interview took place and we did not want to be caught surprised.

We waited or news of the interviews success on 10/23 but successful news we did not receive :-( The court was unwilling to hear our case or accept our agencies supplemental documents because the Ministry of Women's Youth, and Children's Affairs (henceforth called MOWYCA) had not prepared their letter of consent for the court. No need for shock and horror. This happens a LOT. It happened in Ben's case as well as about half of my friends cases. The difference, is that this past fall and spring while my friends were going through the process, the courts were allowing cases to be heard still, and they would give MOWYCA a deadline to turn in their stuff. Usually MOWCYA got it done about a week later as best I can tell from many of my friends timelines.

But they changed the rule.

Now MOWYCA must have their stuff there BEFORE our case can be heard. MOWYCA was on trainings through last week, so starting Monday my agency has promised to pester them, letting them know this child's case is sitting there until they write their letter that was due before 10/22. Even if we get the letter in the next few weeks, it is likely this will cost us about a month of processing time. We need to get the letter and then re-apply for our case be heard again, and those things tend to be scheduled a few weeks out. We are really hoping this can happen in November and that I can hopefully travel sometime in December.

This stinks for Trent, and it stinks because it is also pushing me into holiday airfare time and means I will likely miss out on holidays with the boys, but it does give us some really good time to prepare our home, hearts, and physical bodies for the task that lies ahead, and it is a big task.

So now... we wait. We just wait for the email that says we have our MOWYCA comments and a new court date to go with it.

This is what we have been doing while we wait, besides ordering a whole lot of stuff on amazon to prepare our home.

We did handstands

We sent people to school

We visited the Ozarks with some very special friends

We ran some races and hunted pumpkins too!!

It was even possible for me to sneak away for 2 days to the beach of Galveston, TX to collect myself before the tasks of the Fall really set in.


Please keep us in your prayers in the next few weeks as we wait for news on the letter from MOWYCA, and you will know as soon as we know that our case can move forward for little Trenton, holding steady at 30 lbs!