UPDATE:The day after we arrived in the UK without a single passport official giving us even a second glance, I got the SMS that Leo’s passport was ready for collection. Murphy’s law!

Today is the day we leave for the UK, ready to start the new life we have been dreaming of. We have spent the last weeks saying goodbye to all the friends and family we won’t be seeing for while. It’s been sad and emotional, and real journey of the soul.

But that is nothing compared to how I feel today. You see, we don’t have all of Leo’s travel documents. His UK visa was granted but somehow the message from UK Visa and Immigration never got sent to TLSContact (the visa centre in South Africa) to issue his visa into his passport and return his passport to us. The case has been escalated 4 times, twice to the wrong department. You can’t speak to an actual human being and we ran out of time. We don’t have a house anymore, we have sold everything and we have to take the chance. The UK Immigration Solicitor that we use has said that she honestly does not see how they would possible not allow Leo to travel – he has a British father, proof of the visa being granted and is travelling with his entire family.

But there is a chance that they won’t let Leo on the plane. Or that we arrive in the UK and won’t let him in. The stress and anxiety that has been building for weeks, hoping the passport got released and we wouldn’t have to take this risk, is all now washing over me in waves.

If they don’t let him on the plane? Then Leo and I will be hanging around in SA for a while, staying with our amazing friends while I camp outside TLSContact every single day until they release Leo’s passport. Izzy and Nick will carry on to the UK, where Nick may be able to travel to Sheffield to get someone at UKVI to actually take action.

The only thing I do know is that in 24 hours, I will at least know one way or the other. It will either be the next step on our amazing journey, or a speed bump the side of a bureaucratic iceberg.

Praying with everything I have that the next update will be an ecstatic one!