We're in Florida for a while and many people have asked how long we need to stay and why, exactly, we can't come home yet. This post is more of a technical post about the inner workings of adoption. While it's possible I'll miss some pieces of information, below is how I understand the legalities of international adoption in Florida. From my understanding, adoption practices vary from sate to state, just like they do from province to province back home. The process in Florida could be completely different in any other state.
For the purpose of this post, we'll skip everything that happens before the baby is born... Or I'll be here all day. :-)
Step 1
Baby is born
Step 2
The birth mother or birth parents relinquish their parental rights. This can only be done after the baby is 48 hours old and the birth mother has been discharged from the hospital. For us, this was done when Cassie was 3 days old. The birth mother relinquishes her rights to the adoption agency. While we will be the baby's parents eventually, we must first "prove" we are suitable parents. I use brackets here because we've already been through hoops to prove our desire, ability and financial capacity to care for Cassie, but the state requires post-placement evaluation to make sure we are as awesome as we appeared to be on paper. :-) That's why the baby is relinquished into the agency's care and not ours.
Step 3
When Cassie got her discharge at 6 days of age, we signed documents indicating our desire to adopt her as well as agreeing to care for her even though the agency has legal guardianship. The agency has given us the authority to make all decisions regarding Cassie's care and well-being. It's also important to note that this step can't be made before the baby is discharged from the hospital. We were lucky as Cassie had a relatively short stay in the hospital... But imagine adoptive parents who's baby has to stay weeks or even months. :-(
Step 4
Cassie is an American citizen. She was born here, to an American mother. We, on the other hand, live in Canada. While Cassie is crazy adorable and will surely be able to mesmerize most people with her gorgeous face, we can't guarantee she'll be able to win over the Canadian customs agent on charm alone. Cassie still needs a passport. But how does one get a passport without a birth certificate? Also, what customs agent will let her through with people who aren't legally her parents? This is where our awesome adoption agency comes in and does their magic... actually, they do an infinite amount of things for us, but getting us home is one of my favourites. The agency gets a court order to allow Cassie to get a passport without waiting for a birth certificate. They also get a second court order indicating we can take her across the border. These court orders can take a few days if we're lucky or several weeks if we aren't. It isn't the middle of summer so we're going to hope luck is on our side.
Step 5
Once we have the court order, we can get Cassie, the world traveler, her passport. Sidebar - Cassie will have the most adorable passport in the history of travel! Ok, end of sidebar. To get an expedited passport, you need proof of travel within 2 weeks of your appointment with the passport agency. That means booking the morning of your appointment and hoping you give yourself enough time to get the passport before travelling. Most of the time you get the passport within a few days, but things can go wrong. So the trick is booking your flight late enough to give you some leeway, but not so late that you end up staying longer than you need to.
Step 6
Travel to Canada and hope Cassie doesn't have a massive poop-plosion mid flight!
Step 7
Once we're home, our local social worker will do two post-placement evaluations. Again, this is to evaluate our awesome-ness. Once Cassie has been in our care for 90 days, a court order is requested for her adoption. That's when a judge decides she is legally ours and we all live happily ever after. :-) According to our agency, 99.9% of the time the court hearing is done over the phone and we don't have to travel again.
Step 8
Once the adoption is approved, we can apply for Cassie's Canadian citizenship. This can take some time, but once it's done, Cassie will have dual citizenship.
So there you go... this is why we are "stuck" in sunny south Florida for the time being. Seriously though, we are extremely lucky to be in such a wonderful place waiting out our sentence. So many international adoptive parents don't have the same luxury we do. We speak the local language, have access to a gorgeous touristic area and are soaking up the sun with our perfect little girl. Life is good. :-)