Thursday, June 25, 2009

Waaahh!!

This is the part where Wendy has her first of many meltdowns in the process to bring Clarissa home. Arm protective gear now.

Ready?

Ok, so we got the paperwork in the mail today. If you've ever bought a house you know what it's like to sit down at closing when they bring in a ridiculously large stack of paperwork and then proceed to spend the next hour going through every page while you "sign here" and "initial there". That's sort of what came in the mail today, except that it wasn't accompanied by a nice lady who turns the pages for you and explains what each form means.

We decided to spread everything out on the dining room table and just start at page one. That worked well for a while, the first part wasn't too hard. Just lots of forms we have to sign saying that we've read her medical reports, a page about how much we still owe the agency (gulp), blah blah blah.

Then we got to government form I864a and I864. They're immigration forms, petitions for Clarissa's Visa. Form I864 and I864a, I officially hate your guts.

First of all, you have to fill them out in triplicate and each form is like 10 pages long. Second, it's totally like doing your taxes. "If you marked yes on section 2, line three, please skip to section 4 and fill out a, b, and c. If the combined weight of your mother and sister is over 300, please stand up and do the hokie pokie, unless you're wearing blue shoes, in which case skip to form C and complete lines 6 through 10." Only it's asking questions that we don't understand and we have no idea how to fill out the forms.

The instructions we got from the agency said that there were sample forms inclosed so that we could see how to fill it all out, but the sample forms unfortunately are missing from our packet and it's too late to call the agency.

Argh. All I can do is call her tomorrow and hope and pray that the instructions can be e-mailed to us and we don't have to wait to have them mailed. I was bound and determined to beat the world record in adoption paperwork completion, lol. My plan was to fill everything out tonight, get everything notorized first thing tomorrow morning and have everything in the mail on the way back to the agency by the afternoon.

But thanks to crappy form I864a and I864, we're going to have to wait, which means I may not get everything in the mail until next week. That doesn't seem like that big of a deal except that in my mind every single day we wait is one day longer that Clarissa will be in Korea. I know that things might be delayed due to the government taking their own sweet time to approve things, but I was determined to help make up for that by doing the paperwork at lightning speed. I'm freaking out at the thought of uncompleted paperwork sitting on my dining room table while my daughter is sitting in Korea waiting for us.

*sigh* Wasn't my giddy mood this morning nice while it lasted? lol

I'll be fine. The paperwork is going to get finished, Clarissa will make it home and life will go on. This is certainly not the end of the world. Sometimes I just overwhelm easily and this is one of those times.

So tonight I'm going to forget about it, I'm going to put my jammies on and maybe find a movie to watch with Shawn. In the words of Scarlett O'Hara, I'll think about it tomorrow.

5 comments:

Jill said...

Ha! So much for being bored! You get it all figured out and write a tutorial for me for when I get my referral, kay? :)

KrisJ said...

You are SO not alone in this! I reprinted those forms 3 times Im not even kidding I just kept messing up I was a HOT mess until those were in the mail! Advice.. take it slow and easy 1 day of taking your time will not slow anything down so dont stress PROMISE!!! Just enjoy that you get to look at that sweet face and that you WILL have her home soon!

My5Blessings said...

Just keep looking at her picture and remember that each piece of paperwork is a step closer to having her in your arms.

Tracie said...

Our agency had everything filled out for us... we just had to sign and date! (Oh, I think we had to fill out the part that listed our adjusted gross income from the previous two years. Two lines total. And they had it clearly marked.

Still, we were at the notary when I realized that one of the forms (not the gov't ones) needed some info we had at home, so we had to go home and come back the next day. Our plans to return them the same day also didn't pan out... so I feel your pain. :)

Think how much you'll love waiting for the paperwork to get done when it's sitting on someone else's desk and there's NOTHING you can do about it.

Jill said...

I just went back to re-read your referral to travel posts and when I saw this one, I told my husband that I think I should copy and paste it to my blog because it is EXACTLY what we went through this past week! Ahhhhh! I hate I864 and I864A!