Last month came with the news that our judge refused to open up and process our adoption case, stating that we had failed to meet her requirements for our documents. When all of our paperwork was handed back to us and the case closed, we were at a complete loss. Even though on that particular day it felt like we had just been hit by a truck, we immediately scraped ourselves up off the pavement and scrambled looking for answers and a way forward.
Phone calls, skype, emails, messages, running around... you name it, we were doing it. The one thing we knew for sure was that we had to find a lawyer that could help us through this. We had come as far as we could on our own and had now found ourselves in way over our heads. And when we went into details and explained all the nuances of our case to others (American lawyers, adoption agencies, international lawyers, Russian lawyers, etc.) they all gave the same advice. Our case was way too complex and complicated, we needed a lawyer to proceed further.
So, the hunt began. In Russia it's not so much what you know, but WHO you know that is important. Through friends and aquaintances we were put in touch with top notch lawyers who might be able to take on our case. It became clear to us that lawyer #1 was not our guy when, COUGH, he quoted his price at $45,000. We were then greatly relieved to meet lawyer #2 who was great. Very professional, helpful, trustworthy and was only asking for $10,000 (what a bargain!). We kept looking around and kept our ears open, but couldn't find any other options. Then, last week, a friend gave us another reference. We met with lawyer #3 last Wednesday. As soon as we left the meeting we knew we had found our lawyer. She was down to earth, kind, helpful, was easy for me personally to understand and talk to AND, drum roll please........was only asking for 40,000 rubles (roughly about $1200). Either way we didn't have a dime for any kind of lawyer expenses and knew that God would some how have to come through. We were confident that he would, but didn't expect for an immediate answer. An envelope with Maya's name on it was given to us a couple days ago by a young Russian family that are good friends of ours. When Zhenya and I went home and opened the envelope were shocked to find 40,000 rubles, the EXACT amount we needed for the lawyer! I still get choked up every time I think about it. We are so humbled by their love for us and their care for our little Maya, whom they've never even met. Not only that, but we have had family, friends and anonymous people give towards the adoption costs that have come up. So many people have already made sacrifices for our family and have been hard at work doing every thing they can to help bring Maya home.
During all of the chaos and craziness there was a very important piece of information that we found out.
FOSTER CARE IS AN OPTION!
What we didn't know was that Zhenya could apply to be Maya's foster parent AND it could be done without a court date or going through a judge! Which means we could actually bring Maya home while we continued to sort out the paperwork for the adoption process!! We already had almost all of the paperwork for it. So last week we started that process. Even though the process is pretty fast, there were 2 papers that we needed that could have take 5 weeks to get. Go ahead and ask....Did we get them in 5 weeks?? If you could hear me screaming and laughing, I would answer you with a big, fat, wonderful NO!! It took less than 1 week for both of them!!
Today we were able to turn it all in, to be carefully, painstakingly scrutinized by the appropriate personnel here. When she found everything in order and begrudgingly admitted that everything was fine, she sent us to be interviewed by the same nice lady who did our homestudy. And, if I do say so myself (well, actually my husband said this), it was my moment to shine! I was able to talk about Maya, our home, family and answer her questions. She now needs to write up a paper that we will take to another office to get their approval. Our estimated quess is that this will take a couple more weeks.
But ONLY a couple more weeks!!! Maya could be coming home very soon!!!
When I went to the orphanage today, Maya's doctor asked me if we still plan on adopting her after becoming her foster parents. OF COURSE!!! This is totally still the plan. The beauty of it is that she can be home no matter how long the adoption process will take. We are so excited and have been getting everything ready.
We aren't there yet, but this is HUGE!! Please pray for us these next couple of weeks that there will be no hitches in the fostering process and that Maya can come home.
Thank you for praying, for giving, for running errands for us stateside, for watching Ryan for us so we could run around, for asking, for laughing with us and crying with us.
We are so blessed to call you our family and our friends. We couldn't ask for better support.
The Shulgins
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