The Eastern European Sibling Registry was created and is maintained by an adoptive mom to help connect siblings adopted seperately into US and other families. To register or get more information, email the administrator of the network at mom2russians@yahoo.com

Great Parenting Paradigm

If you have not yet heard of ³Beyond Consequences, Logic, and Control², known as BCLC, it is parenting towards a new alternative to behavior modification and understanding why consequences are ineffective. It is a wonderful paradigm for parenting adopted children with issues, from minor to extreme. It is love based.

The message board, stories and support are incredible.

It¹s worth a look for anyone with an adopted child who most likely has some trauma, or might have some trauma as the years progress.

Daily reflections sent are incredibly inspirational.

The website is:
http://www.beyondconsequences.com

AND join the group on yahoo and learn so much more.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DailyParentingReflections/

Sunday, April 25, 2010  WASHINGTON POST ARTICLE

By Darshak Sanghavi

Adopted Boy’s Return Highlights Problems in Russian Orphanages

“I no longer wish to parent this child.”

When 7-year-old Justin Hansen, whose name used to be Artyom Savelyev, was sent back to his native Russia this month with that note from his American adoptive mother, much of the ensuing criticism focused on the U.S. side of the matter. Some said that Justin’s adoptive parents were not equipped to care for an allegedly disturbed and violent child and that they had failed to seek proper professional help. Others blamed the questionable practices of some U.S. adoption agencies.

But there is no doubt that families adopting children from Russia face unique challenges. In particular, Russian orphans suffer from psychological disorders at much higher rates than do orphans in many other countries. Last year, sociologists reported in the journal Pediatrics that Russian and eastern European adoptees were three to seven times more likely to have mental problems than Chinese and Korean adoptees. Philip Cohen, one of the study’s authors, speculated to me that this might be because of high rates of fetal alcohol syndrome in former Eastern Bloc nations.

Yet at least some of the blame for the children’s problems must be placed on flawed child-rearing practices common in Russian orphanages. These facilities offer a time capsule of a medicalized approach to child-rearing that was popular in the Unites States decades ago, before the critical importance of children’s attachment to their caregivers was widely recognized and before we realized how damaging orphanages can be.

My colleague Richard Moriarty, a pediatrician and expert on international adoptions, recently traveled to an orphanage in Russia’s Pskov province, where he witnessed an odd scene. More than a dozen infants wrapped tightly in blankets were lined up in cribs, observed by staff members through a series of glass windows. The room was uncomfortably warm and eerily silent, since none of the babies bothered to make any effort at vocalization. Occasionally, Moriarty told me, the infants were taken out for walks in strollers, but even then each was positioned to face away from the person pushing him. Staff members almost never held or cuddled the babies. “They didn’t want the kids to get attached to people,” Moriarty recalled. The problem wasn’t that the children were neglected: They were kept fastidiously clean and were well groomed and well fed. The problem was that they were bereft of normal human contact.

 

Charles Nelson, a professor at Harvard Medical School who has studied and worked closely with Romanian orphanages for more than a decade, told me that although the caregivers he encountered there were well-meaning, they “raised kids in a way that was devoid of any affect.” And Lisa Albers, a pediatrician at Children’s Hospital Boston who studies international adoption, said that “Russian child welfare is still wedded to the medical model” — meaning that it focuses on nutrition and cleanliness, not nurturing.

Russian orphans don’t typically suffer from a deficit of medical care: If anything, physicians tend to overdiagnose them with dozens of labels, such as intestinal dysbacteriosis, pyramidal insufficiency and spastic tetraparesis, which have no meaning to my American colleagues (who, upon examining the children, often find them to be healthy).

All this would sound very familiar to observers of institutionalized children in the United States in the first half of the 20th century. Worried about the risk of infection, hospitals prohibited parents from visiting their ill children for more than one hour a week, and infants received minimal handling. In 1910, for example, homesick kids who cried too much at Massachusetts General Hospital were moved into isolation wards.

This approach wasn’t limited to hospitals; it went to the heart of beliefs about child development in the early decades of the last century. At that time, an accidental alliance — pediatricians trying to reduce infections and psychologists warning about overdependence — encouraged parents and other caregivers to treat kids just as today’s Russian orphanages do.

As Deborah Blum has written in “Love at Goon Park,” her history of psychologist Harry Harlow’s work on infant development, parenting books from the 1920s discouraged mothers from hugging children (the head of the American Psychological Association went so far as to recommend only one kiss per year). Parents magazine praised a psychologist whose books, according to Blum, foresaw “a baby farm where hundreds of infants could be taken away from their parents and raised according to scientific principles.”

But soon thereafter, things began to change. The psychoanalyst Rene Spitz produced sensationalist, disturbing movies of infants growing up in what amounted to solitary confinement in New York orphanages. Chicago pediatrician Joseph Brennemann discovered that babies sometimes died of what could only be called loneliness.

In Britain, the psychologist John Bowlby published his theory of infant attachment, which argued that a strong, affectionate tie to a caregiver is essential to a child’s mental health and development. And in Wisconsin, Harlow performed a series of cruel but dramatic experiments showing that lonely baby monkeys would repeatedly return to a lifeless doll he called the “iron maiden” for affection, even when the device was rigged to stab them or hurl them away or blast them with compressed air. Children, it became clear, desperately needed parental attachments for healthy development.

With these ideas gaining traction, Congress in 1961 created a federally funded foster-care program that shifted kids out of orphanages and into family homes. By 1965, only 4 percent of American orphans remained in institutions.

But attachment theory did not influence child welfare programs in the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc. And so, while Americans and western Europeans largely abandoned institutional care for orphans, Russians continued relying on it. At the time of a 1998 Human Rights Watch report, hundreds of thousands of children were committed to orphanages in Russia, while only several hundred lived in family-size foster-care settings.

Of course, many factors contribute to the plight of Russian orphans, including inadequate family-planning resources, underfunding of child welfare services and widespread alcoholism. And a culture of adoption has never taken off in Russia: Of an estimated 800,000 Russian orphans today, only about 15,000 are adopted each year, half of them by foreigners.

Child-development experts have long believed that foster care is better than orphanage care, but until recently, the data were lacking. Then in 2007, Charles Nelson, the Harvard professor working in Romania, published in Science the results of a groundbreaking study in which 136 infants were placed either in foster care or orphanages. Foster care produced significantly higher IQ scores, and the younger the child at the time of placement, the bigger the difference. “Institutional care is bad for kids,” Nelson told me. “The fact is that institutional care always does worse than family care.” (This may be one reason that adoptees from South Korea, which has a well developed foster-care system, have fewer mental disabilities than Russian adoptees.)

Washing, feeding and dressing needy children, it turns out, is the easy part. What child welfare institutions in Russia and other parts of the former Soviet Union still need help with is providing environments that nurture strong, loving attachments between children and their caregivers. As history shows, that’s a lesson that can take a long time to learn.

But recently, the glacial pace of transition to family-based care has thawed. Kemlin Furley, UNICEF’s deputy representative to Russia, sees increasing commitment from top officials to the principle that, as she said, “kids should be in families.” She points to President Dmitry Medvedev’s creation of a program that has promoted foster care in provinces such as Perm. As a result of these changes, tens of thousands of children have moved to foster care in the past few years.

Femmie Juffer, a Dutch sociologist who has reviewed studies involving hundreds of thousands of adoptees, told me that, across cultures, “pre-adoption adversity” predicts later behavior problems. Perhaps some good may yet come from young Justin Hansen’s story, if it highlights the adversity faced by many Russian orphans who have never known a family’s love.

 

Darshak Sanghavi, the chief of pediatric cardiology at the University of Massachusetts medical school, is Slate’s health-care columnist and a contributing editor at Parents.

The Italian DVD by Sony Pictures Classic Older Teen/Adult Film

* Running Time: 99 Min.* Rated: PG13

Synopsis  For most Russian orphans, the chance to be adopted is a dream come true. But six-year-old Vanya has other hopes. After discovering his mother is still alive, the abandoned boy teaches himself to read so as to learn her address from his personal files. Before a wealthy Italian couple can claim him for their own, Vanya sets off on a perilous journey to find his only remaining family. Pursued by orphanage staff and the police, the determined runaway must now face the most difficult challenges of his young life in this incredible story inspired by true events.

Cast and Crew* Stars: Yuri Itskov, Mariya Kuznetsova, Dariya Lesnikova

* Director: Andrei Kravchuk

* Producer: Andrei Zertsalov

* Genre: Drama

* Studio: Sony Classics

* Sub: English (US), French (Parisian), Spanish (Latin Am)

Adoption Harmony Review:

Dreaming of being adopted is the norm for the Russian orphans in this movie, with one exception.  A young six year old boy has an Italian family interested in him when he finds out his birth mother is still alive.  Showing the living conditions and staff, as well as the children and their ploys to survive, the Italian will, as I’ve said before, force you to see where these adopted children are coming from.  The main character in The Italian, Vanya, struggles to search for his birth mother before the Italians can take him away from all he’s ever known.   He will have to learn another language and is forced to speak to these strangers through an interpreter.  He has no idea why they would come all the way to Russia to adopt him and their motivations are not offered.  The vulnerability of Vanya and all the children in this co-ed orphanage are realistic.  The neglect and shame given to the orphans by the society only compounds their isolation.  This is all very realistically shown throughout the film.  Bring your Kleenex’s!

 If you have adopted a Russian boy, and so many of us have, then you may see a child in this film that may look like your son.  The main character so closely resembled my son that I did not keep a dry eye for most all of the movie.  The movie has English subtitles but is spoken in Russian.  I watched this one several times, and have on my keep-safe shelf.  It is another must-see and ought to be a prerequisite for pre-adopters because it shows what we all see when we go to the orphanages, which can be haunting.  In any case, it would be a prep for what is about to come and a plea for all the older kids that are never adopted.  Vanya will capture your heart and not let go.  This is a Mission Possible movie for sure! 

Order this DVD by going to www.adoptionharmony.com/movies-all

 Adopted:  When Love is Not Enough DVD by Point Made Films

*Running Time: 80 minutes

*No Rating (preteen to Adult)

*Accompanied by Adopted-We Can Do Better

*Entire Series Time:  2 hours 12 minutes

 Synopsis:  About Adopted

Take the Rose Colored Glasses Off now!  The most important element in adoption is understanding  how to develop a Healthy Attachment with your new child no matter the age.  Many say, “Babies don’t remember anything or they are a blank slate.”  This is not true.  Their bodies do remember, and their brains have developed according to their past sensory input and emotional experiences by the time you meet them.  Be open to the fact that your new child has a first family or home or a beginning, and it was not with you.  They are with you now, and you must understand that their is nothing glamorous about the transition from the child’s old environment to your new one. 

As Dr. Ronald Federici, a well known post-institutionalized child specialist points out, “Structure equals Love*,” when a child first comes home.  Keeping the child’s world very small is recommended.  Choose a FEW age appropriate toys for them, and as for all those ones you may have already bought, well, put them up on a high shelf and introduce them slowly one at a time.  Make sure that the toys are not babysitters, but that the primary caregiver(s) are the focus and building the emotional experiences that are couples with sensory input to get that brain development into its highest functioning to make up for the gaps from institutionalization. 

Many adult adoptees say that the adoption, in an of itself, was a trauma because it shook their world upside down.  If a child feels they have no control, and they really don’t, then that is life or death in their comprehension.  This applies right down to the babies adopted at birth.   Their “wonderful new home” is a result of a loss.  Their inner selves, their brain development, has incorporated that feeling in many ways via their senses.  It may feel like fear,loss, frustration, pain, lonliness, neglect, sadness, deprivation of love, touch, verbalization, attention, and even food. 

Don’t expect them to act grateful, and if they do, then it will be a gift for you.  The honeymoon period WILL wear off, and when they child feels safe enough to test you and every boundary you ever thought about having, then you know they are probably making progress!  They trust you enough to test the waters.  Having a well thought out and consistent discipline plan that is proactive and a daily schedule with consistent structure are some of the most loving acts you show to your new child. 

*Help for the Hopeless Child: A Guide for Families, Dr. Rondald Federici

If you are considering adopting, please read the article titled: A Different Perspective…just imagine because it attunes you to the place your child will be in upon arrival.

A great website to read about bonding and healthy attachment comes from one of my favorite sites called RadZebra.org to find articles such as  What is Healthy Attachment?

Today is the day that the information stored

 in my head about my experience with

 international adoption, attachment and

 bonding, international adoption agencies

 and everything else that goes along with it

 starts pouring out. Witnessing my son

 develop, change, heal and grow healthy has

 been the biggest education and gift I could

 have ever imagined.  Be careful what you

 pray for!

I have a son adopted in 2006 at the age of

19 months via Russian adoption from a

well-known adoption agency. As with most

 adoption agencies, I asked for “as young as

 possible” and “healthy with minor

 correctable diagnoses.” He was a beautiful

 boy who I fell in love with at first sight. My

 adoption agency was excellent and was not

 my first one. My son’ referral wasn’t the

first.  But this blog is not about my son. I’ve

learned FROM my son and our

international adoption experience what

many people might really value knowing

about international adoption issues and

adoption agencies before they adopt or

after. I’ve heard some great international

 adoption stories with happy endings…only

 one had been worse than mine, until I

 opened up and start digging for answers on

 why my son acted so differently from the

 biological children around me.  In the

 adoption arena, I have found the answers I

 needed.  Along with information came the

 warmest, proudest parents of adopted

 children who were kind enough and brave

 enough to tell me their stories.  Now I know

 how to place my own adoption experience

 in the correct perspective.  My case is not

 anything extraordinary.  I just didn’t know

 that I was asking the wrong questions. 

I work and live among many adopters and

adotees from countries all over the world.

Many of us are members of FRUA. They are

 the ones who’ve helped me learn the ropes,

 but few knew of the nightmares that went

 on at home behind closed doors between a

 new mom-a single mom, and an adopted

 non-English speaking toddler, especially if

 that child is atypical, which most from

 orphanages are, at least at first.  My son was

an extreme case of “feral cat syndrome“, in

other words he had never had a primary

caregiver and had no sense of attachment at

all.  This was all learned later on out of

desperate measures to attach and parent.

When Two Souls Collide: A Mother’s Story of International Adoption

You will find our story by Karasel Kid at

AdoptionHarmony.blogspot.com.

to learn the twists and turns that happened

 with us, and much much more coming from

a friend who’s been down the road of

international adoption and come out on the

 other side with a rich and deep

 appreciation of our children, their nations,

 birthfamilies and our relationships.  

My hope is to provide a comprehensive site

 that will lead you to information about

  international adoption in general and in

 depth, and adoption agencies, as well as all

 my other resources that are helpful.

 Combining an informational hot spot that

 also has links to the actual products I have

 found useful makes my website at

 AdoptionHarmony.com a unique place to

 visit and learn and enjoy.  The new site is

 being built and added to daily.  My motto

 is…I will tell you everything that your

adoption agency won’t and more.

As I am in the process of another Russian

 adoption myself as I produce this site, you

 will find that the information spans from

 2005 to the present. My hard knocks

education is the most practical one & comes

from books as old as the seventies in study

of the Russians themselves as a culture, to

the latest adoption medical terms in

Kazakhstan, to Nepal’s government, to

Bulgaria’s natives and special needs, and to

Brazil’s grassroots movement to aid their

orphans.  

I post the information as it comes out and

weed through the tons of articles, books,

websites, agency info. and resources to

report what I feel will help adoptive parents

 in all stages of adoption (pre and post) to be

 educated and prepared to be proactive

 parents the most.  It’s free.

  As so many international adoption

 websites give you the general scoop, I am

 comparing prices and doing research on the

 stats for myself and sharing with you. I

 can’t even tell you how many hours I’ve

 spent viewing the international photo

 listings and special needs programs, as well

 as the Russian data bank that lists the 

children available for adoption in Russia in

 Cyrillic!  I use an online translator. That’s

the fun part. Knowing what to have handy

 in your index of adoption knowledge

 tools can expand by visiting with someone

 who’s already been down the road you

are imparting on and using the connections

 of one whom wishes you all the best. Feel

free to use me and this blog or my website

AdoptionHarmony.com in that regard. I can

 be reached at

adoptionharmony1@gmail.com.

Karasel Kid, BS, MA, LPCi, Adoptive Parent!

Haiti Adoption Hope Page from AdoptionHarmony.com

AdoptionHarmony.com is not an adoption agency, but rather a site that gives the scoop on all international programs and agencies, information to adoptive parents and adoption products.

  HAITI ADOPTION

Adopting Haiti Earthquake Orphans 

Dept Of State Alert: Haiti – Children Affected By Natural Disasters and Conflict

Jount Council on Int’l Children’s Services, JSCIS

Yesterday a list of Haitian orphanages including their location and approximate number of children was presented…  

Did you know:

• Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere?
• Haiti’s unemployment rate is over 60%?
• Haiti’s literacy rate is under 50%?
• Haiti’s life expectancy is 57?
• Haiti’s infant mortality rate is 12% (ten times higher than the US)?
• Many Haitian parents can’t afford to raise their children and choose to leave them at a local orphanage, or crèche, for basic care and ultimately adoption?  -excerpt from Chinese Children Adoption International Agency for China and Haiti Adoptions 

Haiti is the second largest Caribbean Island, and it is situated 77 km southeast of Cuba. Haiti occupies the western third of the island it shares with the Dominican Republic and has 1530 km of coast line. Mountainous land between the Atlantic Ocean in the North and the Caribbean Sea in the South, Haiti also comprises several islands surrounding the main territory: La Gonâve, la Tortue, l’Ile-à-Vache, la Navase, etc.

The Scoop on Haiti Adoption Programs: 

There is likely no other country in the Western Hemisphere where the need for assistance to orphans and vulnerable children is more obvious. Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. 10,000 children are thought to be living on the streets, mostly in Port-au-Prince. An estimated 200,000 children reside in orphanages across the country.

Children Available: Thousands of infants are available, as well as siblings, toddlers and school age children.

Parent Qualifications: There are no ‘government’ orphanages in Haiti. The children who are cared for in orphanages are done so by humanitarian or religious groups. Due to the latter, there are numerous orphanages who will not adopt to a non-Christian family. However, there are no religious or upper age requirements for adoptive families, and single women are welcome. Looking for the ‘right’ adoption agency/program is very important. Please do not be deterred from adopting a child from this country because you may not meet the requirements of a certain agency. Keep looking….these kids need families desperately.

Travel: Both a short travel time and the ability to escort the child to the US are available.

Timeline: Referral time is short, but the wait for a final adoption decree can be as long as 12 months. During that time, parents may visit their child in Haiti if they would like to do so.

Featured Agency:  Haiti Adoption & International Child Foundation
January 22, 2009 ~ It is our understanding that the President of Haiti will provide presidential waivers for families with up to two biological children.

Haiti is an island country located in the Caribbean, east of Cuba. It shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic. It is considered the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, with over 85% of the adult population unemployed. Most are of African descent.

International Child Foundation works with three adoption programs/orphanages in Haiti — Creche de l’Enfant Jesus under the administration of Chances for Children, Foyer de la Nouvelle Vie under the liaison team of Barbara Walker and Vera Valdivia and also Foyer de Sion. We are happy to discuss the difference between their programs so that you can choose, according your preferences and needs.

Adoption from Haiti is a bureaucratic process. The differences between the programs are minor but distinctive. Creche de l/Enfant Jesus is located outside of Port-au-Prince in Timache, and the orphanage has a wing for families to stay when visiting. Families are welcome to visit at any time at Foyer de la Nouvelle Vie and are assisted with lodging and transportation. Foyer de Sion’s three orphanages are in Port-au-Prince, and families travel only in escorted groups to visit their children or volunteer at the orphanage. Port-au-Prince is not a safe city for wandering about alone, so orphanages inside the city exercise extra caution.

A little history may help you understand Haiti… The Taino Amerindians were the residents of the island when it was discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492. Over 25 years, the indigenous population was virtually extinguished. In the early 17th century, the French arrived, and in 1697, Spain ceded the western third of the island to France, and this portion later was renamed Haiti.

The French colony relied on harvesting lumber and growing sugar cane, through the importation of African slaves, and became one of the wealthiest colonies in the Caribbean. Environmental degradation was rampant and widespread, however, so by the time Haiti’s half million slaves revolted, the island was nearly a wasteland, and the poplulation relied largely on scanty subsistence farming.

In 1804, Haiti became the first black republic to declare independence. The auspiciousness of independence has been marred by poverty, political violence, deforestation and natural disasters. The UN has assisted with sponsoring democratic elections, and Haiti inaugurated a democratically elected president and parliament in May of 2006. Haiti remains, however, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, with 80% of the population living under the poverty line and 54% in abject poverty. Due to this, there are many beautiful children relinquished for adoption.

Most of the children have dark skin, black hair and dark eyes. Most are infants and toddlers under age 3, but families may request to adopt an older child or sibling group, as well. The children reside in orphanages, rarely in foster care, and Creche de l’Enfant Jesus also provides educational programs.

Married couples and single women may adopt. Both prospective parents in a married couple should be over age 30. Couples should be married for ten years, or very close, with ability to prove that they cohabitated for a minimum of ten years total. Single women must be over age 30, preferably between the ages of 35-45. All adoptive parents will be asked to provide a reference letter from a pastor or minister. Parents can adopt more than one child at a time.

The Process

Most families complete their home study and prepare their dossier in 2 to 3 months. Once your dossier is submitted for translation, a referral is given within 2-4 weeks. Parents specify the criteria the orphanage will use in selecting their child. The orphanage selects a child and then sends photos, medical information and the child’s story to the agency. Families are asked to give the referral careful consideration. If they accept the referral, they are asked to sign an acceptance letter. If they decline, another referral will be made within a month.

ICF provides complete instructions with respect to the dossier document requirements and will advise your home study social worker as to the composition of a home study for Haiti adoption.

Once prospective parents have their dossier submitted to Haiti, it takes approximately 10-20 months to complete the adoption; timeframes are difficult to predict and delays due to legal or political problems are not uncommon, in Haiti or any country of adoption.

The adoption is finalized before the parents travel. If you choose to travel to Haiti to visit with your child before the adoption is finalized, your child will come to the US on an IR-3 Visa, which confers automatic citizenship. If you meet your child after the adoption is final, your child will come home on an IR-4 Visa, which requires that you apply for your child’s citizenship after your child is home in the US.

Parents are not required to travel to Haiti to complete the adoption; however, we suggest that both parents travel if possible, as it provides a special bonding time with your child. Most parents consider their travel to Haiti a unique and culturally enriching experience and try to take as much home with them as possible.

Special Note regarding Medical Information: Many people express concern about the possibility of their child having AIDS or being HIV positive. The best lab in Haiti carefully screens each child before they are accepted into the orphanage. The children are screened for HIV, Hepatitis B, Sickle Cell Anemia, Tuberculosis, and other communicable diseases.

ADOPTION FEES & ESTIMATED EXPENSES

Haiti Adoption

Application: $300

Home Study: ICF Home Study Fee is $1,000 or as set by your home study provider; there is no home study review fee if another agency prepared your home study

USCIS Fees: I-600A fee is $750 for the applicant including applicant fingerprints plus $80 per person for your spouse or other adult(s) residing with you to be fingerprinted.

Agency Fees: Total of $5,800; this is broken into two payments, the first is $2,800, which is paid with the Adoption Agreement, and a 2nd payment of $3,000, which is paid when the dossier is started.

Foreign Fees:

Foyer de la Nouvelle Vie/Creche du Ciel Bleu: $10,000 for the adoption of one child; in addition, there is a fee of $300 per month child care subsidy after acceptance of referral; an additional $350 is required if a presidential waiver is needed for a family with biological children; and $535 for a DNA test, if required by the US Embassy.

Creche de l’Enfant Jesus: $16,000 for the adoption of one child; fee reduced for the adoption of a sibling; this does not include translation and document authentication fee of $375 ($225 for Haitian Consulate certifications, $30 postage and $120 for translations)

Foyer de Sion: $8,000 for the adoption of one child; $5,000 for the adoption of a sibling; this includes translation and document authentication.

Paid upon approval of the Home Study by the Orphanage Liaison

• Half of the fees due to the orphanage/liaison team; plus translation and authentication costs, if paid to the liaison rather than directly by the family

Paid upon acceptance of Referral

• Balance of Foreign Fees

• DNA test fee, if required by the US Embassy

Paid in Haiti

• US Embassy Child Visa Fee: $400 (plus $670 for each non-related child you adopt)

• US Embassy Medical Fee: approx. $30; if adopting an older child, fees for vaccinations may be added, approx. $200

Travel Costs vary widely. Airfare is about $550 per adult, and you may pay a reduced rate for your child, depending upon the airline. Lodging in Haiti varies with the locale.

Adoptions involve several months of time.
Fees and estimated costs are subject to change.

International Child Foundation
http://www.childfound.org/haiti_adoption.html

 For more international adoption agencies placing in Haiti and around the world, go to www.adoptionharmony.com

 

Haiti News and UPDATES 

HAITIAN ADOPTION EARTHQUAKE

                                                       What to do?  Click the link above.

On Behalf Of
Heather T. Forbes, LCSW,

Beyond Consequences & Post Institute
January 21, 2010
Subject: Double Traumatized Children from Haiti

In response to the crisis in Haiti, you’re invited to listen to a special
audio interview. I invited my colleague, Dr. Ronald Federici, to join me in this discussion in order to provide a much needed resource for parents
bringing children home from this disastrous situation.

These orphans have literally experienced double trauma.
We want every parent bringing home their children to be prepared with the knowledge and resources they need to make their adoptions as smooth and successful as possible.

Simply click here to listen in on this discussion: