An Adoption Journey

Welcome to the Collazo family adoption journey. This journey originally began a few years ago before our son Josiah was born. Of course we delayed during Wanda's pregnancy, and after Josiah and Wanda's complications we knew that "birthing" another was just not wise. In the back of our minds the subject of adoption was always there, and it really started to burden Wanda spring/summer 2008 and we began the process late summer 2008. So we (meaning she) researched it to death it seemed and we began the process to bring home a son. Lots and lots of doors closed concerning the countries WE had desired, but of course the Lord had a different plan. WE wanted a Hispanic child, however regulations and policies for Hispanic adoptions are lets just say, not so inviting. So we moved onto South Korea as I'm familiar with the culture, nope with Wanda being a diabetic we were instantly dis-qualified. God led us to Ethiopia, then we switched to domestic thanks to Catholic Social Services (original homestudy/placement agency) who sat on our paperwork for 6 months and did nothing but charge us for unnecessary services... After a lot of prayer, and switching to Lutheran Child and Family Services for our new homestudy, we still felt the burden of Ethiopia. Soooooo, after even more prayer, we added Wide Horizons for Children (placement agency) to our pool again and are back on the road to an International Adoption from Ethiopia.

Our paperwork is flowing like crazy all over the place. Our homestudy was completed in only a few short weeks (what did we pay CSS all that money for...) and we are working on all the paperwork gathering for our dossier.

Well I'm sure Wanda has much more to say about this process, I'm just the technical guy who set it all up. Look for more on our adoption journey from her.

Take care and God Bless.

Brian
(for the Collazos)