Monday, April 16, 2012

The US Side...

When your foreign adopted child comes home on a IR3 Visa (Don't worry there won't be a quiz on this later.....) It basically means they are a US Citizen when your plane touches down on US soil. Now, you may think after killing at least a forest of trees with adoption paperwork, you are finally done! Wrong!
Even if you child is a US Citizen there are still some remaining hoops.
  • Preparing 4 Post-Adoption Reports (PARs) over the next 3 years
  • Filing for the Adoption Tax Credit
  • Securing Your Child's Certificate of U.S. Citizenship
  • Applying for a Social Security Card
  • Applying for a U.S. Passport
  • Applying paperwork to USCIS to for the return of your original Visa packet (you know the one they warned you if you opened your eyeballs would burn out of your head, your fingers would be chopped off if you opened?)
  • RE-ADOPTION!
Now after years of paperwork, I'll be the first to admit, those things on the list are the last thing on your mind. PARs and Social Security Cards are a necessity, unless there is problem their citizenship documents come automatically, but the rest.....ahhhh....things you can't bring yourself to do when you feel like if you have to have one more thing notarized YOU.WILL.JUST.DIE.

So, I waited a year. But now it's time to get crackalackin'

Tax credit- done. Just waiting to see if we get a check or an audit letter.....

Passport- Pictures done, forms filled out, documents gathered, appointment in a few hours. It's scary because you have to send the ORIGINAL documents in the mail. You know the ones that if you loose you have to go to Russia to replace? Gulp.

The return of the original Visa packet from USCIS custody- signed, notarized, mailed. And we all know about my relationship with USCIS. No? You can read about it HERE or HERE or HERE or HERE. I could go on....but needless to say if something will go wrong with this fairly straightforward request it will. I am still convinced I am on some kinda wanted poster in their office. Time for returning the original packet? 2 months TO TWO YEARS. Really USCIS? Can't you do a little better than that? So most likely in 2014 we should be getting Charlie's documents back. :)

Re-Adoption- There just isn't a lot of good information out there on this topic. It's kinda vague and cloudy. I've googled it, researched it, and I don't know what else to say other than I should do it. I could hire an attorney to do it (for several thousand dollars) or in our State, do it myself for like $200. I feel I can do it myself. So I put my law firm cap back on and got to work. Drafting a Petition, Summons, Verification, Cover Sheets, marking exhibits. Praying I don't screw up a court proceeding because I am cheap broke. This is the clear reason why I should do it:
  1.  We will have a US Birth Certificate in English. (No translations, no funny looks when you shell out pages of Russian documents that CANNOT be replaced to do something as enroll your kid in little league.) With this comes ease in applying to college, college scholarships, marriage licenses, if he ever wants to adopt children of his own, etc.
  2. If When we loose a birth certificate we can pay $5 to our local vital statistics office instead of $5000 for a return trip to Moscow.
Now the hazy facts:
  1.  There have been tales of orphanages being shut down for ethical reasons and as a fall out, those adoptions under their reign, being brought into question. Now, I haven't been able to find any facts about these cases or what happened to those children. But that scares the CRAP out of me. Not saying our orphanage was anything but wonderful, but what if someday it ceases to be wonderful? What if, what if, what if. Peace of mind is worth $200. 
  2. Inheritance issues- why wouldn't he be able to inherit the $567 we leave him? I don't know.
  3. Ease in duel citizenship/renunciation issues. 
So, we're (I'm) going for it. It's all ready to go and I'm going to have it clocked at the Clerks office on later this morning. Deep breath and pray I'm not screwing something up!

15 comments:

  1. I've been reading your blog for over a year. We adopted a 2 year old from Russia in Dec. 2010. I did a PA readoption on my own and it was actually the easiest thing I did. I had to do it directly with the county. Hopefully, your is just as easy, but I'd be glad to tell you about ours.

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    1. Hey Mommy Blogger! Everything went well today....they did say when we go in for our hearing that we would need to provide a proposed Order for the Judge to sign making everything official. I am searching the web now for a sample. Is that something you may have in your paperwork? THANKS!!! -Sarah

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    2. I have our signed court order from the judge. It's a pretty simple one page form. I can black out the details and send it to you if that helps.

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    3. Thank you so much....But our domestic attorney (who has 12 adopted children!!!!) sent us one from our county today. But thank you so much. When I'm done I'm going to post a "readopt for dummies post" with all these stinkin forms!!

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    4. That's a good idea. It seems like constant detective work and every time you think you're done, you find something else you missed. Good luck!

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  2. You can get the USCIS papers back? I always thought that those were gone forever. I will have to check the websites that you posted later today! Thanks

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    1. YES!!! email me and I'll send you the form and instructions. It was easy,one form, copy of your drivers license and passport, get it notarized and send it regular mail. I'll be happy to send you the link!
      sdeetz1023@gmail.com

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  3. Just finished our 2nd Russian adoption in December. Working on that same list myself except...."Applying paperwork to USCIS to for the return of your original Visa packet"? Huh? What?Please tell us more? What's in there that they send back? Feel like we might have dropped the ball on this one.

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    1. YES!!! email me and I'll send you the form and instructions. It was easy,one form, copy of your drivers license and passport, get it notarized and send it regular mail. I'll be happy to send you the link!
      sdeetz1023@gmail.com

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  4. I'm surprised your state requires readoption. In Texas we file a simple Recognition of Foreign Adoption and the court and state recognize the foreign adoption and you can then obtain a State of Texas Birth Certificate.

    Also with our second son, I was so suprised to receive his Social Security card with his Certificate of Citizenship instead of having to go down and apply for it, as we had to with our first son.

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    1. They don't require it, we just want to do because of the whole US Birth Certificate thing mainly. I think it will make his life easier as he gets older. Did you all have to go to court? We do. Only 15 minutes, but we still have to go (with me acting as our Pro Se Attorney....yikes....) That was the only thing making me nervous. But I know a lot of attorneys and, I don't want to say I'm smarter than them....But lets just say I have a personal interest in this case! And I don't think I'll be thrown out of court for not having court savvy. Lets hope not anyway!
      Wow you got the SS in the mail? I had to sit in the office for hours to get Charlies!
      Funny how every place is so different.
      PS- Love your blog! Been reading for years!

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  5. I had no clue on the USCIS papers. Yikes. Need to research!

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    1. YES!!! email me and I'll send you the form and instructions. It was easy,one form, copy of your drivers license and passport, get it notarized and send it regular mail. I'll be happy to send you the link!
      sdeetz1023@gmail.com

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  6. I'm tempted to apply for the return of our brown packet. It would be nice to have a second set of documents. Especially another official copy of the adoption decree that's actually still sewed together. My one fear is that we'll lose the one set we do have with a military move. I'm hand carrying everything on this move in my carry on and hoping for the best. It would definitely give me peace of mind. We're also going to do the re-adoption but can't since we were moved right before we would have been able to do it (have to have at least 2 post placement reports done or two visits). So now once we get settled we'll have the social worker come out twice and do the re-adoption then. Thanks for the link to the document/form and instructions. Makes it SO much easier to find!! Can't wait to hear how long it takes for you to get yours back.

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    1. You should do it! It's only one form! Compared to what we've filled out its a walk in the park!
      My next post will take you right to the form and directions. I can give you some more info if you want to email me:
      sdeetz1023@gmail.com
      Best wishes! Love your blog....very informative. I had no idea about the private adoption thing!
      -SARAH

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