Surgery was a SUCCESS!

It's been another roller coaster of a day. Originally I had anticipated that our journey to Aria would be the easiest of our five kiddos. Boy was I wrong! Little Miss Aria is causing lots of gray hairs on her mama's head.

Shane and I slept at the hospital last night. Neither of us got a good nights rest. The nurses were checking on Aria throughout the night and each time gave me quite the fright. At 6:30 am we were woken to start prepping Aria for her surgery. Around 8:00 am, she was taken back to the operating room. 

We waited outside the OR hoping and praying that everything inside that room was going as planned. Dr. Dukhi was performing the surgery. He had said it would take about an hour. 9:00 am ticked by followed by 9:30. When the clock ticked 10:00 am, I was on the verge of a panic attack when the door opened and a nurse popped her head out and said, "Do you have a diaper?" Praise the Lord! Surgery was over and Aria was ok!

Aria has spent the day in the ICU. She is doing well although in quite a bit of pain. She tried and tried to eat, but her suck/swallow reflex is so poor that she barely got a drop of formula. She will be in the ICU until tomorrow at 10:30 am and then will be transferred to her room.

While our little bubs was resting, we've been hard at work on our latest major disaster, the US closing Guyana adoptions. This all started because, for some reason, Guyana decided to become a Hague Country. If they would not have done this, we would be fine. The Hague has extensive bureaucratic requirements and right now this bureaucratic BS is halting all adoptions. There are no issues with child trafficking or any other horrible corruption that has caused other countries to close. Instead, according to the recent statement released by the Secretary of State, "Guyana does not yet have implementing legislation giving authority to the designated Central Authority to carry out its responsibilities under the Convention." 

The Secretary of State statement also stated, "We are seeking to confirm whether Guyana will continue to process cases in which a U.S. citizen filed a Form I-600A, Application for Advance Processing of an Orphan Petition, or a Form I-600, Petition to Classify Orphan as an Immediate Relative, prior to June 1, 2019." This is our specific case. We were approved by the USCIS in April and have an approved I-600a. We are hoping to make our story known so that they choose the right course of action and allow adoption cases in process to be completed.

The US Embassy is right next door to Mercy Hospital so Shane walked over there today to ask them if they had any clarifying information for adoption cases that are already in process. Unfortunately, they told Shane that currently they are not processing any Guyana adoption cases. This is terrifying news, because although we can still adopt Aria, she will not be given US citizenship unless the Secretary of State issues another statement allowing those families with approved I-600a's to complete their adoptions.

I know of many cases in the past where other families were stuck in this exact same position. Some of them were able to get their children US citizenship with the help of a US Senator. We currently have Senator Hoeven's office advocating for us and hope to have Klobuchar's as well.

When Hopscotch originally told us of the ban, they blasted off email after email with a plan to move forward. We are still quite unsure on how this will work, but the current plan is for the Guyanese government to make us Aria's guardians. We will then be able to have full custody of her and can leave Guyana. They then plan to petition the US Government for a Medical/Humanitarian visa. This would be a temporary visa allowing Aria to enter the US for a certain time frame. They plan on us bringing her to the US and then returning to Guyana when they are able to move forward with the adoption. This seems like a shot in the dark, but we will give anything a try.

We would be so thankful if each of you would email the Department of State's Office of Children's Issues so we can bombard them with stories about our journey to our sweet Aria. She needs to be able to come home! Please email: adoption@state.gov

It's no coincidence that we plowed through the paperwork in record speed and received USCIS approval prior to the shutdown. It's no coincidence that we arrived in Guyana when Aria needed us the most. We are determined to do whatever we can to bring her home.

Please continue praying for us, for Aria's health, and for us to be able to bring Aria home where she belongs.