There has been a lot of talk of lost referrals lately and I wanted to share our loss as I still think about the precious little girl that stole our hearts. Maybe someone will learn from our experience and if even one person does not use Adoption International Program... I will have done my job! We saw her picture and immediately fell in love. She was so precious. We called the Orson and asked what we needed to do to get her off the photo listing and into our home. We had no idea referrals in Kazakhstan were illegal. We overnighted the $800 plus application/agency fee. We were told we needed to come up with almost $9,000 and then she would be taken off the registry. We spent the weekend showing everyone her pictures and going over her medical information. We borrowed money from my parents and scraped together everything we could to make this happen. We were told by Orson that 80% of his client's receive their referral. This is why we felt that in our hearts she would be home with us. We were so excited that our dreams of having a family were going to be a realty. I spent hours staring at her picture and stroking the picture where her little hand was. I remember thinking I can't wait to hold her hand. When we had the funds together and were ready to Fed-Ex everything the Orson told us he had to first make sure she was available. This was strange to me because I thought if she was on the photolisting how could she not be available? Why would someone toy with people's hearts and emotions like that? It turns out... She was not available. This was devastating to me and my husband. The hardest part was the questions from our family and friends because we had no explanation for how this happened. A few weeks ago we were happily living our lives and now we were heart broken. It was so fast.
We were promised that we would get a perfect Russian girl and were told by Orson that he and ONLY he gets the best Russian girls. (after completeing my adoptin with an honest company I BEG TO DIFFER) We stayed for a few moths more until we could not take the way we were treated anymore. I would often come across very negative and scary information about Adoption International program and I would confront Orson and ask him what the deal was. My theory was rather then get all worked up, I would ask the source. He somehow made me feel stuipid everytime I talked to him and bad mouthed other clients to me. He also lied to me on many occassions. He actually told me that a Russian girl costs more then a Kazakh girl! His information was constantly changing and when I questioned too deeply into things that did not ethically sit well with me I was brushed off like an idiot. The final straw is when I asked him a question and his response was "are you really asking me that, you are a lawyer, you are smart, figure it out". I knew then and there that this relationship was over. He may deny these conversations but I have some on tape.
We asked for the $800 plus back and were told sorry, we signed the agreement. This just made me angry, he had done nothing for us. Switching agencies was the best decision ever. Beware of this agency.
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