Everything Changes

We’re not out of the woods yet because in many ways nothing has changed, but really everything has changed.

All my nightmares and worst fears evaporated in an instant when I saw Jay and Harriet enter the International Arrivals Hall at Terminal Five. We have a six month visa to sort out her legal status definitively.

And now we are at home, here in Hertfordshire with Harriet in the Moses basket that once Jay slept in.

We have counted down the weeks for so long, anticipated and worried about so much but now all those hopes are become reality - a reality in an infant’s bouncer chair that makes her presence known I can assure you!

Her song, that calms her is the theme from Babe; “If I had words”. Well, if I had words I’d tell you how I feel and maybe soon I will but for the moment I cannot think of a stream of words that sum up sufficiently how I feel. Every milestone has been great but this is quite simply, the best.

Boredom

It's been a beautiful day here in Hertfordshire, sunny and slightly warm. Scamper, Pip and Billy have been easy to deal with since I can give them a good, tiring walk. They have all been the vets to have their vaccinations and a general check up and all have been pronounced to be in excellent shape (Billy's teeth receiving particularly good marks).

I continue to see Harriet and Jay every day thanks to Skype. Dealing with the lawyers has continued to be extremely difficult although we finally got some sort of response from him last week. Still nothing from the Home Office though. I am not losing hope and I'm sure I'll see her soon but definitely not soon enough. The US passport application has gone through (we already have the Holy Grail of US personal ID the social security number) and we are desperately hoping that it will arrive soon.

So it's just the same old boring stuff - but not for much longer I hope!

Still waiting

These are not happy days. Harriet is healthy and well and that is the most important thing but it's difficult to feel good when she is 6,000 miles away. They are staying in a hotel with walls of paper and it makes it very hard to leave her to lie and cry herself to sleep so Jay is exhausted.

I can't make the legal situation resolve itself even though I desperately want it to. We are ineligible to automatically register for citizenship because she is illegitimate and must rely on Home Office discretion. They were told about our case five months ago but their website complains that due to the new points based system of work based immigration they are very busy and will take six months to process anything. We are paying very expensive immigration lawyers (350 pounds an hour) to try to resolve it but I am having a nightmare dealing with them too. I have explained our desperate situation but it doesn't seem to make much difference - immigration lawyers I guess hear lots of sorry tales and they just basically do not care. I phone every day or email and I pray everytime I return to may desk that I will have an email or voicemail and I am disappointed every time. It's killing me that Jay is suffering so badly out there and I can't help.

Our best hope at the moment it seems to me is to get the US passport and then come in on this. We still need the social security number to apply for this but in principle it shouldn't be too hard. If someone said to us - you will be home in x weeks no matter what that x was we could make plans and it would be bearable. But when you get up each day and this might be day that you get news but then it isn't, it's draining.

So that is why I haven't written a blog for a while because frankly you don't want to listen to me. It's not the usual boring new parent stuff of every new little thing. I just feel like I'm letting my family down.