Is the first court date *after* the bonding period?

We went to court before the bonding period to request temporary custody. The real court day (the adoption hearing) is at the end of the bonding period.

Our first court date was had without us present because we had already gone and met the child. They at that time scheduled a three week bonding period to star a couple of weeks later (to give us time to get tickets and get there) and then we went to court again to actually adopt him. The first court just was for giving us temporary coustody for the bonding.

Thanks for your responses. It seems like our agency is telling us that they are making plans for our travel there (looking for rentals, etc.). They are asking *us* when we would like to go over there (as if we have a say). We told them as soon as possible!!! After they heard from us that we could leave on a moment's notice, they responded by saying they'll be making plans right away then. I'm just confused about the whole thing. It sounds like the adoption center there thinks they can talk the judge (or whoever they talk to) into making our court date according to *our* ideal timing. Anyway, this is why I was wondering if perhaps they can make plans for our bonding period without really knowing yet when our court date will be. Ugh... it's all so vague and confusing! :hissy: I just don't know what to think or hope for at this point. Thanks again.

Our first court date was ten days after we had met our kids. The second date - the actual adoption approval - was without us a few weeks after we left Poland. I assume there was a first, first court date without us giving us permission to visit with the children (3 kids and 1 1/2 years later and the memory begins to fade).

The judge must issue a decree for visitation or temporary custody; however whether or not you need to be present is dependent on the judge. Our judge required us to come to court. Because the "hearing" was not until we were in Poland, we did not know how long our bonding period would be (e.g. 2 weeks, 3 weeks etc). Other families we have met knew, their final court when they left for Poland and did not have a "first" court date because the decree was issued in their absence to their lawyer or appointed power of attorney. As I've mentioned previously every judge is different. Our lawyer has had a ton of experience with many of the judges in our area and was good at predicting which judges would allow different things. Even though he knew our judge would be "difficult", he could not predict exactly what would occur, but was able to give us a good idea. The adoption center has very little to do with the court date. The primary players in the court date are first and foremost the judge, second your power of attorney or yourself depending who needs to be present, third the legal guardian, and finally the equivalent of the district attorney. The more flexible you can be in the dates your travel, in theory the easier it should be for them to find date for court (pre-bonding or post-bonding depending on the judge). Hang in there, waiting for a court date is the most nerve racking part of the whole process in my mind :)

Yes, the legal gaurdian, there is one person who on paper is the legal gardian of a child in an orphange. In our case our son had been moved but his legal gardian not changed. Since she was not willing to travel to his new town (it was a long ways) we had to have court in his old town. Now, since this meant he had to be moved, and they did not want to send him back to his old orphanage, this meant they had to give us permission to move him. Our judge had done only one adoption and so things were new. It turned out we were also interviewed and photographed with our son with a bunch of people who were important with the adoption center (Catholic) and some other people. There had been very few seriously disabled children adopted before our son. But now more are being adopted. A group that helped us to find our son has been really doing a great job of finding parents for seriously disabled children in Poland. I get tears in my eyes when I read the e-mails they send me about children finding parents and they tell me about the next child they have waiting for parents. If your children are in an area where many children have been adopted, then the lawyer may know the judge well and perhaps this judge is more helpful in trying to accomodate adoptive parents. One thing that I did not do as well as I should have before, was to ask for more references from families who traveled with that agency before me. I would have learned wheather to beleive everything I was told or not if I had spoken to previous families. However, I asked but did not push so never was given any to talk to. I ignored that red flag and got my son, but life would have been easier if I had pushed.

We met our boys and a few days later had our 1st court date requesting temporary custody and continued visits. A few weeks later we had our second court date and they were ours permanently. Don't worry about what is called what. I have to echo the 'go with the flow'. Seriously - just be ready for anything and go with it!