I buckled and called AAI the other day. It seems that the “top of the list” thing that another staff member mentioned back in January that got my heart all aflutter actually referred to the top 20 or so people waiting for babies from Ethiopia. Hmmmm…. that is why we haven’t heard anything. We are currently "third" on this ever-changing list, but the other people above us have slightly different requests, so it could be anytime—a relative “soon.” There are numerous babies in the orphanage who are in the process of going through medical exams so that medical reports included with referrals are accurate. Quite a few babies came into AAI’s care very sick and malnourished; and AAI is working to get the babies stronger before referring them.
We have since learned through follow-up emails with AAI that many people submitted Dossiers to Ethiopia around the same time as us and that the wait for “August” folks (that's us) has been especially long. To compound this, some who submitted Dossiers before us requesting toddlers or siblings have changed their minds and are now requesting infants. sigh. So, I don’t know exactly what this means for D and me, but it at least satisfies the “why” behind the mystery wait. It reminds us how ever-changing the referral process is. Frankly, Donovan and I have never been hung up on the idea of a position in line because we know and respect that this whole thing is about making families more than referring babies in a particular order and, for this reason, we have tremendous faith in our agency. They’ve proven to be trustworthy of making really slam-dunk families. Ours is coming…
