Road Block

I was really hoping to come back with some sort of good news but...no such luck. I can't really even put into words what craziness is going on. It is so hard to put into words because it just doesn't make any logical sense. Romania has to be one of the hardest places in the world to adopt children from. We had seen so many people adopt from here and go through years of turmoil before it was final and so we decided..."that isn't going to happen to us...we are going to do things the right way." :) Well, there is no right way we are discovering. We did what we thought was right, first you are accepted to adopt then you wait for your children. WE even asked our social worker..can we find our own child, she said yes just be sure and give her the name so she can make sure the child is truly adoptable. So, God brings us to our twins and we meet them thinking, mom is dead no dad on birth certificate that has got to be the easiest case scenerio here in Romania. Wrong again. We finally decided to go talk to the Child Protective services of Bihor county ourselves. We went with a Romanian friend who knows the adoption laws and cares about the best interest of the children of Romania. She couldn't even get through to them. All we discovered yesterday in our meeting was that each county of Romania interprets the law how they see fit and they are to proud to look at it in another light and let anyone try and show them another possibility. What they are saying about the twins is first of all that we shouldn't have even met them since they aren't adoptable yet...the problem in Romania is unless someone is interested in a child no one pursues having them declared adoptable so almost all cases of adoption are the parents taking in a child and then proceeding to have them delcared adoptable. Then she also tells us that a family from Bihor county will have priority in adopting them...we aren't too worried about this because there are not Romanian families lined up to adopt #1 gypsies #2 two at a time and #3 4 year olds. The next thing we learned is that they say the twins must be placed in the care of a legal guardian to be declared adoptable by the legal guardian which means moving from the only home they have ever known into another home when all this time they thought they were moving into our home. To make a long story short, our friend is taking this to Bucharest to see what she can do. It is so frustrating to see people working in child protective services who really don't care about the kids and really don't care to go and see what the kids really need or want. Our twins keep asking us when we are bringing them home. How do we explain to 2 4 year olds the laws that keep so many Romanian children from being adopted? I wish the law makers would be required to go spend time in institutions and asking the kids what they think.
Please pray for our twins...they are becoming more emotional when we leave them. Pray for Cati as she goes to Bucharest next Tuesday.