GRAND Magazine - November/December 2008 - (Page 48) Foreign exchange When our daughter decided to adopt a baby from Guatemala, we knew just how we could help BY SHARon KRATz I REMEMBER THE DAY Joe and I got a heartbreaking phone call from our daughter Kara: “I can’t get pregnant.” She was considering Guatemalan adoption. Kara is a single woman. I believe the best parenting scenario is a man and woman, working together to provide a loving home for their children. But I’ve seen so many examples of bad parenting and the subsequent disastrous results that I’ve made shifts in my basic tenets. I knew Kara would be a wonderful parent. We asked her if a U.S. adoption was a possibility. “Not a baby,” she replied. “Two-parent families get the babies. I could get an older child, but…” God willing, there are special people available to adopt older children, but most adoptive parents want a newborn. We had three granddaughters. Kara wanted a boy. A boy: Karson. To this day, Joe and I sometimes call him The Boy because we love saying it. 48 GRAND NOVEMBER DECEMBER 2008 pHoTo BY MARcElo WAin/GRAHAM KloTz In Guatemala at the time Kara started her adoption process, most so-called “relinquishment” adoptions involved placing the child with a foster family. As Kara explained the adoption process to us, we realized we could help. We could serve as our grandson’s foster caregivers. Kara began the adoption process in August 2005. Her financial background and family setting were investigated; she was fingerprinted for the first time. For a woman who is a private person, it was difficult because every personal detail was researched and documented. She filed an international adoption form with the Department of Homeland Security—U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)— and then prepared presentation papers, a dossier of paperwork the U.S. and Guatemala governments require. It includes photographs of the baby’s future home and his nervous motherto-be (wearing a severe gray suit). Grandpa Joe
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