For anyone contemplating adopting from Ukraine

Yes, we were given even more time than we actually needed)))) I think that such things like rights of a prospective adoptive family and opportunities that are offered by a law of any foreign country to prospective adoptive families are in the pocket of adoption facilitators. When you come to a foreign country having no command of its language, a little knowledge of culture and traditions and no knowledge of its laws, you feel like a blind kittens. The only person you can rely on is your adoption facilitator. They are the ones who are supposed to guide and advise you throughout the process. That is why it is very important to have both reliable and competent adoption facilitator who can give you useful and competent advice when necessary and assert your rights in foreign country. We felt absolutely protected with our facilitator who never allowed any kid of pressure to be effected by bureaucrats and officers wherever we went in Ukraine. But as we noticed and compared our experience to experience of some other families who adopted from Ukraine, facilitators are not the same. Some families facilitators acted mostly as translators, Doing not more than that. In our adoption experience we had a case when biological mother intervened in the adoption process when we were gathering documents for court in Ukraine. She lived nearby the orphanage and never visited her kids. But as soon as she learned that Americans came to adopt the children to whom she gave birth, she stepped in. She hired a free of charge lawyer and applied to the local ChildrenҒs Service for retrieval of her parental rights. That could have halted our adoption process for a pretty long time or even could have made it impossible at all, if we had not been blessed with our adoption facilitator. He settled this issue with bio mother and her lawyer without any extra payments. It took him two meetings with bio mother and her lawyer to explain to them their situation, their rights, opportunities and options in that situation and our position and our rights and opportunities. Therefore I am sure that when choosing an adoption facilitator you should weigh his experience, knowledge and competence in adoption law allowing for contingent necessity for his help as a lawyer not just a translator.

Thanks a million for the info Cathy. Helps so many others out.

Cathy, I am in the research stage of adopting from eastern europe, and I find your posts very helpful. Thank you.

Great advice!! I'd also recommend folks be very, very careful about adoption "ministries" that claim to legally photolist children available for adoption in Ukraine -- nope! Not legal! Despite the fact that this "rainbow" ministry helps PAPs set up fundraising blogs in the name a particular child by giving them "faux referrals" ... And a horrific number of them seem to end in disruption by well intentioned but totally out of their league folks -- though you do have to feel for a lady like autumn winkle who adopts 2 institutionalized toddlers Only to kick one to the curb a few months later cuz she cannot be bothered to deal with insurance to get him desperately needed therapies or a walker. Much easier to rehome!! [url=http://noknots.blogspot.com/2011/10/story-you-have-been-waiting-for.html?m=1]No knots: The story you have been waiting for.[/url]

Hello: Do you mind sharing with me your facilitators name? Thank you!

Hello...thank you so much for your post! It was extremely informative. Do you have any updated information? We are starting our next adoption and with our first two being from Russia....this is a new experience for us. Any information is greatly appreciated.

Ukraine is considering implementing Hague convention as far as I know. But I have no idea when they are going to do that. To the best of my knowledge no radical changes have occurred.

We spent almost 6 weeks getting to know our child with our first Ukrainian adoption. And were able to consult with a physician or whoever we wanted. Time limits weren't an issue. I agree with the original poster, sometimes they make you wait too long. Also we had no agency. Saves a lot of money but you have to be someone who doesn't need any hand-holding and is very diligent and organized to do everything yourself - as we did. It's an adventure.

Pls contact me regarding this on my email address: popes29@hotmail.com Regards, Vlad

[quote=205017]I have come across several posted messages on this forum devoted to adopting from Ukraine and noticed some wrong information relating to some legal and procedural aspects of adopting from Ukraine.As a person of analytical and a little skeptical disposition, I had made a thorough research and analysis of legal, cultural and procedural issues of adoptions from Russian and Ukraine before making a choice of a country.We chose Ukraine. After making a choice of adoption country, we contributed a special diligence to choosing a source of adoption assistance. Both adoptions through agencies and independent adoptions are allowed by Ukrainian laws (which is a substantial advantage of this country).Wishing to combine reliable and solid quality of adoption assistance with its reasonable cost, we spent almost 2 months obtaining info and references on multiple agencies and independent adoption facilitators, checking, analyzing and weighing things up.Some options that looked reliable were too expensive for us. Some other looked quite suspicious, especially those that advertised for awaiting children when any pre-selection of kids for foreign adoptions has always been prohibited by Ukrainian legislation (vide infra for more details on that). So finally we chose an independent adoption facilitator based on multiple references from families, US Consulate in Ukraine, confirmation of his competence, experience and fees.By now we have adopted twice from Ukraine and now I am helping my relatives do the same, which obliges me to be well versed in Ukrainian adoption law and current procedure at least until I stop volunteering)))So that not to reply to each post I have decided to create a new thread clarifying some issues relating to adoption regulations, procedures and laws of Ukraine:1. It is one of the general delusions that adoption of healthy kids under 5 is prohibited by Ukrainian law. That is NOT TRUE. According to article 283 of effective Family Code of Ukraine:Adoption of Ukrainian orphans under 5 years of age is allowed in cases:1. if their older siblings are adopted with them into the same family; 2. if adoptive couple is related to a child; 3. if a child has a disease listed in a special list of diseases approved by the Ministry of Health Protection of Ukraine (children with special needs); 4. if a child is a sibling of a child/children adopted by an adoptive family before.2. Another thing that anyone going to adopt from Ukraine should know is that any Pre-selection of kids for international adoption is prohibited! And I personally would choose to warn any family against choosing those entities (agencies or independent adoption facilitators) who offer pictures of awaiting kids and promise or even guarantee that you will adopt them. Before coming to Ukraine in 2009 I had read dozens of posts sharing experience of those families whose agencies/adoption facilitators had offered them pictures of waiting kids in Ukraine. Just few families succeeded in adopting those kids and all of them were families who came to adopt older kids (over 13 years) and there was just one family who saw a picture of 6 y.o. boy and adopted him finally. But that family had to make four trips because the boy actually was not available for international adoption when they came to Ukraine first and their two following trips were unsuccessful for the same reason as well. In all the rest cases families who pre-selected Ukrainian waitingӔ kids by pictures, received one of the following excuses instead of chosen kids upon arrival in Ukraine: a child got adopted or some relatives took a child under their guardianship or biological parents retrieved their parental rights to a child. Not mentioning that some of these families had to spend over 30,000$ for nothing.Indeed, Ukrainian Childrens Services do post pictures of waiting children on their websites. But they are meant only for domestic adoptions. And in most cases these kids are not available for international adoption except for some older kids.The only possible option for pre-selection is hosting children. Ukrainian side usually sends pictures of kids and some brief information on them, before hosting program. In such case families can choose kids by pictures and host them. But again hosting does not absolutely guarantee that you will adopt hosted child. I mean it is not 100% guarantee. There can be multiple precluding circumstances like: child is not available for international adoption or child can change his/her mind when you come to Ukraine or anything like that. Lots of things depend on your personal experience with a child you host and completeness of information you get on this child.But according to what I have heard from our adoption facilitator (who also organizes hosting programs), some agencies and families who adopted hosted kids Җ overwhelming majority of hosted kids get adopted by hosting families. In my opinion hosting is a good option for those who want to see if a child can fit into their family before adopting him/her.3. Another very important inference that I have made based on our own adoption experience and experience of other numerous families I have talked to personally or corresponded with is that It is very important to be adequately prepared for the adoption process in emotional, informational and financial respects. Your correct notion of adoption process in Ukraine and overall readiness for it is a key success factor. It heavily hinges on a source of adoption assistance that you are choosing (agency or independent facilitator). While choosing a source of adoption assistance both some agencies and independent adoption facilitators described very attractive and promising adoption situation in Ukraine for us, saying that Ukraine offered a wide choice of young and healthy kids; that we would definitely be able to choose children during the first interview with the SDA (State Department for Adoption Ukrainian adoption authority) and finalize adoption process within three weeks and so on. But we were lucky to find our adoption facilitator who is absolutely honest and is rather inclined towards preparing you for the worse and does his best throughout an adoption process. We came across family from Colorado after our interview with the SDA in 2009. They looked stunned and lost as they did not choose anyone after their first interview. They did not know what to do because they had been told that there would be no problems associated with a choice of young healthy kids in Ukraine. And they were not ready to wait for the second interview as their adoption schedule did not provide for that. They were ready just to quit.Luckily they got their second interview scheduled for the next week and they chose a sibling group instead of one girl. Another very important reason why we chose our facilitator was that his contract that lists his fees and services is very clear and unequivocal unlike many other contracts that we had considered before.I recommend that one should pay a special attention to adoption contracts. Financial issue of adoption was very big for us too. We used to receive rather decoying low-cost contracts from some of the independent adoption facilitators to whom we applied. But all of these contracts listed just the major items of expenses set out in outlines.4. I can definitely say that Ukraine is one of the best countries for adoption for those families who have flexible adoption criteria. If your adoption criteria are rigidly limited in age, number of children and their state of health (e.g.: you want to adopt a girl from 5 to 7 who is healthy) it may be difficult for you to succeed in Ukraine. Please, note that I am saying difficult not impossible. It may take you two or three interviews (foreign families cannot have more than 3 interviews) with the SDA to find such girl having no guarantee that next interview will bring you success. The database of the SDA is being replenished with new kids on a daily basis and each new day can make a big difference. But since no one has an access to it except for an authorized officers of the SDA, no one can guarantee and foresee when a child that can potentially match your adoption criteria will become available for international adoption. Another facts relating to availability of kids for international adoptions are:- there are more boys than girls in Ukraine- there are more kids who have some medical conditions (both serious and minor/correctable) than healthy kids- there are more kids with siblings than single kids in Ukraine. Also you should note that in most cases siblings cannot be separated in Ukraine.Ukraine also has a special list of diseases which comprises rather serious diseases like HIV, neoplasm, absence of hand or leg etc. And those families who apply for adoption of such kids get priority in Ukraine. As I wrote above, Ukraine is a good country for any flexible family. If you are open to adopting let us say from 2 to more kids within the age range of 3 years to 12 (or even older) with minor chronic and/or surgically correctable condition you definitely can succeed in Ukraine. This is definitely not the exhaustive information on adoption from Ukraine, but is at least what I have wanted to mention now.If anyone needs more info or advice, please, PM me.Cathy Thank you for all the info , could you please share the facilitator information?Cristinajacobson@gmail.com

HelloGreat post.I have a question if anyone can answer. Last year my wife and I hosted a girl from Ukraine, we fell in love with her and would like to adopt her. She was in an orphanage, the orphanage closed down and she was allowed to go and live with her brother/ her brother has prenatal rights. Her brother is okay with us adopting her. Because she is no longer in an orphanage can we still adopt her?Thank you in advance

Hi Cathy,Thank you for sharing your experience with us. Could you please share with me your facilitator contact information? We would love to adopt from Ukraine, and would like to start the process immediately.Thank you so much!

Hi Cathy, and everyone,I am looking for a facilitator to adopt from Ukraine. Could anyone please share with me the contact information for the facilitator that you used for your adoption.Thank you.:)

Hi Cathy, hi everyone,Thank you for sharing your experience with us. Could you please share with me your facilitator contact information? We would love to adopt from Ukraine, and would like to start the process immediately. I forgot to include my email earlier.My email is ann_isk@yahoo.comThank you so much!

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