Waiting

It’s June 8 today which means we’ve been waiting 6 weeks now for India to open back up after they went into lockdown due to skyrocketing Covid numbers. The most recent update is that the lockdown has been extended until June 14. News sources say that the government in our daughters state (Karnataka) will be determining in the next few days whether to extend the lockdown again. All of our documents for our daughters passport are in India right now simply waiting to be taken to the passport office as soon as it opens up and public transportation is allowed again. We are cautiously optimistic that the passport offices will open on June 14, but also recognizing that it could be weeks yet before things are fully opened enough for our daughter to get her passport. If the passport office does open on June 14, there is likely to be a huge backlog of passport applications and we are unsure of how quickly the director of our daughters orphanage will be able to get an appointment. We’ve also been told to expect that the time it takes to issue the passport once it’s been applied for could be longer as the passport office and mail services may be short staffed as well due to Covid. Once the orphanage has the passport in hand, they will let our adoption agency know and they will get started planning our trip to India! We will likely travel within 2 weeks of being notified that they have our daughters passport. All that to say, it could potentially be weeks or even months before we have a passport for our daughter and the green light to travel. We are still hoping and praying that things go much more quickly than we anticipate but we want to have realistic expectations also. There are some specific ways we would love for our friends and family to be praying during this time:

1. Pray for the passport office to open soon and for our daughter to get a passport appointment quickly!

2. Pray that there would be adequate staff and mail couriers to get the passport issued and to the orphanage in a prompt manner.

3. Pray for our agency as they navigate the ever changing travel restrictions related to Covid and as they plan our trip. Our travel coordinator has an extremely hard job as all the rules of travel seem to change weekly and sometimes even daily!

4. Pray that we would test negative for Covid at each of our “checkpoints” and that we would stay healthy throughout our time in India.

5. Pray for our daughter as she waits. We have been able to see updates and videos that show her growing and learning new things. That encourages our hearts but we also pray that she would know she is loved and her family is coming for her. Pray for her protection and health.

6. Pray for our hearts as we wait. This waiting is hard. Our feelings about it go in waves… some days we are doing well and other days it feels so hard to be patient when all we want to do is have our daughter home with us. 

Thank you all for faithfully praying and cheering our family on through this entire process, and especially over these last few weeks of waiting. We have had so many people check in and ask how things are going and we cannot even begin to tell you how much that means to us! To know that our daughter is on your hearts and being prayed for by so many is so incredibly encouraging and uplifting. Thank you for “holding up our hands” and standing in the gap praying for us when we don’t know what to be praying anymore. You all are a sweet blessing to us and huge part of our daughters story! We will hopefully have more news to share in the next few weeks!