A K-1 visa visitor has three months to get married, or else it’s back home for you. Unfortunately, getting married isn’t the last step. This is the US government. Of course there’s more busywork! Once you’re married (and before the three months of your visa have expired), you have to submit an application to adjust your status from visitor to immigrant, which also gets the ball rolling on your green card.
The annoying thing about this—the thing that has really started making the whole process downright irritating—is how most of the paperwork is asking for information we’ve already submitted at least three times! I don’t think Sarah’s birth date or country of origin has changed from when we first applied until now. Aren’t all of these facts already on file somewhere? And they’re still going to charge us $1,000 in fees. Great.
But one new item in this bundle of paper is proof of vaccinations. All immigrants are required to get a tetanus, chicken pox, and measles & friends shot, and the form has to be signed by an official “civil surgeon.” This cost us $250, because Sarah isn’t on my insurance yet and wouldn’t be until after the K-1 expiration date. All the money we got from the wedding is going straight to immigration…