In my post, Reasons to Adopt from Guatemala, I discussed several advantages to adopting from Guatemala. I also put together a separate post about how impressed I was with the mandatory DNA testing to ensure that the woman placing a baby for adoption is, in fact, the child’s mother. What I did not know is that some of the biggest challenges in adopting from Guatemala arise out of these same advantages.

I spoke with "emmasmom," an adoptive mother from the United States who adopted her daughter from Guatemala, and asked her about her biggest challenges in adopting from Guatemala. Her response was the court process and accompanying paperwork. I have been told that international adoptions are much more paper-intensive than domestic adoptions because you have to complete the required paperwork for two countries.

DNA Testing

From what emmasmom describes, it sounds like there is quite a bit of paperwork involved to ensure compliance with Guatemalan laws, such as mandatory DNA testing. Here were emmasmom’s comments about the mandatory DNA test requirements:

You wait for the "perfect" time for the DNA to be taken, when all parties can be in one location at the same time. This can be very difficult, especially if your birthmother lives outside of the city in the mountains. After getting the DNA results, then you go through the US Embassy for pre-approval.

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Required Information about the Placing Mother

I stated in Openness in Guatemalan Adoptions how impressed I was with the level of information that is provided to adoptive families about the birthmother. This information comes at the cost of even more paperwork. Here was emmasmom’s experience:

Our wait in the Embassy was horrible! We entered the Embassy the last week of February 2005, and didn't received pre-approval from the Embassy until June 24, 2005. The problem was that they issued an I-72 notice, wanting more information about our birthmother.

Lack of Communication in Paper Shuffling

Whenever you deal with a governmental agency, you run the risk of paperwork getting “lost.” Emmasmom struggled with this in her adoption:

We got into a situation where the Embassy was telling us that they had never received the papers they requested, the attorney was telling our agency that they handed them in and then re-handed them in. Then our agency was telling us that the Embassy had lost our papers and this was normal in Guatemala. We finally had to contact our local congressmen and tell them about the situation, before we ever got the truth about our case. We found out that the papers were never received by the Embassy.

Guatemalan Attorneys and Facilitators

Hiring a good Guatemalan attorney and working with a good facilitator can make all the difference in getting your adoption to run more smoothly. If you hire the wrong ones, then your adoption can be delayed. Emmasmom learned this the hard way:

In a nutshell, one of the biggest challenges of adopting in Guatemala, is who your attorney is and what is their reputation in Guatemala. Our attorney used a "facilitator" during our whole adoption process. Our agency didn't tell us this information in the beginning, and I wound up meeting my facilitator when I visited in Aug. 2005. In the end, we found out that our facilitator was the problem in why our adoption took so long. She lied a lot to our agency about where we were during the process. In order to finish our process, our agency had to hire an outside person to follow behind her to make sure what she told them about our status was the truth.

Additional Challenges

You never know where something can go wrong or be delayed when you are shuffling so many papers. Emmasmom really struggled with this as she waited to bring her daughter home:

We were told in 2005 before Thanksgiving, that we had our birth certificate (BC), and were waiting to be submitted for PINK (this is a pink slip of paper issued by the Embassy with your appointment date for your pick-up interview with the Embassy). Then on Dec. 2, 2005, we got that "horrible" phone call..."emmasmom, we have found out that we do not have your BC. There is a problem with your facilitator and we are in the process of getting someone else to take over your case. We cannot tell you who it is for their safety in Guatemala, but know that we are doing everything possible to get to the bottom of this. Your BC is back in the registry, because there was an error on the BC. We should be getting the BC soon."

We couldn't believe what we hearing. Our baby girl wouldn't be home for Christmas! This would be our 2nd Christmas without her in our arms (the 1st was the month after she was born and Christmas 2005 was her 2nd Christmas away from us). We received our original BC on Dec. 17th, and on my dad's birthday, Dec. 22, 2005, we received our PINK slip from the Embassy!! Our appointment date was Jan. 10, 2006, and our GOTCHA day was Jan. 5, 2006!!! What a Christmas present!!

As you can tell by emmasmom’s excitement about her daughter’s GOTCHA day, all of the struggles she endured were well worth it to bring her child home. However, there were many frustrations when an already complicated adoption process became even more so thanks to the actions of her facilitator. You never know what can go wrong when you are adopting, so prepare yourself to roll with the punches and remember that all of the pain will be worth it when you hold your child in your arms.