Pathetic Snowman

Poor pathetic snowman. He looks so sad. I am going to leave him like this though (partly because I can't figure out how to fix the blower) because he just fits my mood this holiday season.

Yesterday we got some devastating news about Ahren's case. To recap for you, we accepted his referral last January. Ever since then we have been in a process called 'rectification' to fix errors on his birth certificate. Until he has a valid birth certificate he is not legally available for adoption. So although we are matched to him, he is really unavailable to adopt. The rectification process is lengthy, requiring severral different gov't offices to cooperate. We had made it to the final step in July. The overseeing office, called PGN, received the rectification file and all the reports showing what the investigation found. PGN was then supposed to review it, approve the fixes and then we could have a new BC and move on. In October, the PGN reviewer asked our attorney for one additional signature on the file. The attorney picked up the file around October 10th and was supposed to get the signature and resubmit the file by the following Monday. We have been told the file was resubmitted on Oct. 16th, November 6th and November 13th but after extensive searching the file has not appeared in PGN. The attorney and the facilitator both swear up and down the file was resubmitted but there is no evidence of it in PGN. It has officially been declared missing. If it is found, it can be submitted to PGN and we can proceed. If they don't find it we start all over again. It took 6 months to get to the point where the file is ready to submit. It may go a little faster this time, but maybe not. If they do find it, it will still be January before PGN re-opens after their holiday break and could review the file again. January is our best-case scenario. That is 1 year. One year of no progress. One year in a baby's life. One year of heartache, wishing, praying, hoping, hurting. I have decided to keep the pathetic snowman, and now you know why. If Ahren is not with us next year either, then the pathetic snowman will reappear for the holidays. The pathetic snowman will be the beacon to bring Ahren home.