The Blevinses Begin to Wonder
The Blevinses were planning their near-term future on Denise’s promise that the adoption would be completed in six months, but Denise and Valeri failed to mention that that only began when the documents hit the Ministry of Health. They were going under the belief that the process began when the first visit to the child was made.
They were told to keep off the Internet and received the infamous “Lurking Bulgarians” email. But Dorothy was on both the Topica and EEAC Bulgaria lists. She was fed the line from Denise that everyone posting on the listservs were liars — and to never believe any information obtained from them.
For this reason, she seldom, if ever, posted and if she did post, she never mentioned the agency she was using on either the Topica or EEAC Bulgaria lists.
In October, the Blevins were offered to place Maria in foster care for $150 a month. To their (and our) knowledge, they were the only BBAS family to be offered this option.
Denise assured them that Dr. Panova had told her that under Bulgarian law, it would be legal for Maria to go home with her primary caregiver, Annie.
The $150 was Annie’s salary and would allow Annie to stay at home with Maria and her own two children. Once Maria was adopted, Annie’s job would be held for her and she could resume her work at the orphanage. The $150 per month did not cover other expenses such as food, formula, clothing and toys.
The Blevinses decided not to place Maria in foster care. They were still under
the belief that Maria would be home by January or February and did not want
Maria to become unnecessarily bonded with her leyala.
Additionally, $150 monthly plus expenses was more than they were able to
afford.
By November, the Blevinses’ homestudy and most of their dossier was completed. They still believed Maria would be home in six months. Or sooner.
Prior to the papers being signed — the contract in this case — they were told the adoption would be a fast, expedited one. But adoptions aren’t frequently expedited in Bulgaria, as they were to learn.
They began asking Denise directly what they could do for orphanage support in Buzovgrad. They asked what the orphanage needed and how they could raise funds for the children.
They attempted, as Dorothy recalls, “to get videos, pictures, and a ‘needs’ list,” all to no avail. This seemed strange, for Denise wanted to help the Blevinses “let the money filter through her” but “she did not want to do anything to provide the information that we needed to actually raise the money.”
All that was provided were three scanned photos of the kitchen. Not much to go on.
As soon as their paperwork hit BBAS, their case got temporarily “transferred” to Wendy Stamper. Wendy, the kind trusting soul that every client relied on for the truth, told them straight up that a quick adoption would be great, but to plan on the long haul. The long haul turned out to be a 14 month month wait.
Wendy was good at one thing: reading through the paperwork.
In fact, one of the few things BBAS did do well was update clients on their paperwork. Wendy took the time out and read their homestudy and the other documents the day after she got them. Perhaps the agency actually had learned something from our experience.
“Every single time that I had a question she was right there to answer all of our questions!” Dorothy wrote to us later. However, once Wendy was transferred to handling the Russian program, they again had to deal with Denise. Communications would hit a brick wall.
Later on they were to learn through another client that Denise had allegedly
arranged for Maria to have a “personal caregiver,” but no evidence that
Maria was getting “personal care” while in Buzovgrad was ever presented to
them.
Denise had told them that she was paying for physical therapy, but their
pediatrician had requested no attempts be made for Maria to even attempt
walking. The pediatrician felt that
the less mobile Maria was, the less precious calories she would need to burn.
They requested instead that
Maria’s cognitive skills be worked on.
Denise told Dorothy that the staff in Buzovgrad
wouldn’t go for not attempting to get Maria walking.
Who knows what was going on there for her?
They found out that their documents were in Bulgaria on Nov. 24. They would be entered into the Ministry of Health on Dec. 20, almost a month later.
During her orphanage relief trek in December, Denise mentioned she had made a
video. Yet she told them
there was very little footage of Maria on the tape for
Maria was in a bad mood the day it was shot. She was not on the video for very long because she had been removed
from where the video was being shot.
Some families received more video footage than others. One client was told repeatedly that footage of her daughter from another orphanage would be in the mail, but Denise kept putting her off and never sent it.
The same went for the Blevinses. Dorothy, attempting to be nice, was regularly sending Denise nicey-nice email messages in order to get on to Denise’s good side to get the videotape of Maria.
Denise relented. When Dorothy got the videotape, sure enough there all of
30 seconds of Maria. Just that tiny snippet of their daughter to keep their
family going through the holidays.
There was also 60 seconds of footage of the decrepit orphanage kitchen,
nothing worth using for a fund raising event.
But Dorothy Blevins, once Maria came home, did make a difference in Buzovgrad. She teamed up with an AIAA Buzovgrad mom by the name of Jill Tate. Jill created her own organization called Bright Futures Foundation to help the children left behind. In 2003, Dorothy managed to help raise funds for the kitchen's refurbishment. With all of Denise's promises, sad sales talk about the kitchen, it was adoptive parents who got things moving. Not an adoption agency.
Here is what was accomplished in the Buzovgrad orphanage in j2003:
http://www.brightfuturesfoundation.net/files/programs.html
Buzovgrad Kitchen Project
Our featured project is the remodeling of the kitchen at the orphanage in Buzovgrad, Bulgaria. When we started this project, the kitchen was in such a state of disrepair that the health department had threatened to close it down.
The photos below show various places around the kitchen. At right is the team who worked on the project, including translators and drivers, as well as some of the staff and children.
Thank you to everyone who contributed to this project, which has certainly helped to improve the lives of these children.
By late January 2001, doubts were beginning to creep into the Blevinses’ minds about the Bulgarian adoption process.
Updates on Maria were few. If and when they got updates, they were always that Maria is fine, Maria can stand, send the formula so it can be sent with a traveling family. They still hadn’t gotten a timeline from Denise or anybody at BBAS.
Dorothy noticed the posts that we and the Corrigans had made to the EEAC Bulgaria list, naming our adoption agency. Neither us nor the Corrigans had anything good to say about BBAS.
When Dorothy questioned Denise about our negative BBAS posts, Denise downplayed our experiences and told her that we were both disgruntled families without causes — it was all the process! It was all the Bulgarian government’s fault! They were a professional agency and Valeri and Mr. Dobrev were doing all they could!
They cared about the children! Just let the process work!
Having had enough of the lack of information, on Jan. 30, 2001, Dorothy bit the bullet and contacted us, after having first contacted Sue Corrigan. Sue told her to email us, and this is what she said.