Starting the Polish Citizenship by Descent Confirmation… am i in for a wild ride?
Hey all- I found out that I was eligible for citizenship by descent 2 years ago and sat on starting the process because it all seemed daunting to me. Last month I had an amazing trip to Krakow and decided it was time to pick it back up, so I met with my Polish lawyers and am now currently in the process of gathering documents.
I already have everything located on the US side as well as have found all family documents for one of my ancestors from Poland, but my paternal side is a bit harder to find since they’re from a small village that was ravaged badly by both wars when it comes to records. I’ve received good news that we located them in some important archives so now my genealogist is pulling them.
My question is- I’m seeing so many different timelines here. My lawyer said “about one year”, but on Reddit I’m seeing people waiting 2 or even 3 years with frustrating replies from the administrative side. Then i see some people get decisions in only 6 months! 😅 I don’t want to get hopeful that this may be done sooner than I hoped. Also- I’m not sure if these timelines are post submission or from the start of the process document gathering etc to the end.
Also- if there’s any tips or tricks to know about before heading into this i would appreciate any advice. I’m super excited and having a lot of fun finding my family’s history and would like to try to keep this process fun and not stressful if possible.
For reference my family is from the Ostrołeka area, Masovian Voivodeship. They are from a small village called Gibałka where only 23 families lived at the time!