Artyom and Chrissie

For almost a whole month, I've been thinking about 7 year old Artyom who was sent back to Moscow on a one way, nonstop flight with a note pinned to his coat that explained that his adoptive mom no longer wished to parent him. I'm not going to go into how I feel about what she did because I've already hashed all of that out on my blog but it's pretty obvious to most that this child had problems that his family were not equipped to deal with. If there's a silver lining to his story, it's that his next (and hopefully last) family will be MUCH more aware of his needs and better able to dedicate the patience, time, and resources to give him what he needs to thrive.

All children deserve to thrive.


Chrissie is trying very hard to thrive right now. She's hooked up to a ventilator in a hospital in San Antonio with her mother near her side. Right where her mommy's been since April 19th when Chrissie first arrived at the hospital to fix a heart defect that her new family knew was "incompatible with life." They had all of the information they needed and they made the choice knowing full well that she'd need serious help to survive.

I'm almost ashamed to say that I'm not sure I could have made that choice. I know they didn't do it to earn the admiration of people like me but they sure do have my admiration and respect anyway.

I'm thankful that there are people like Chrissie's parents who will do this in spite of all of the emotional risks and I'm thankful that Chrissie orphanage in Serbia didn't downplay or minimize (or completely withhold) the severity of her heart condition. If they had, an unsuspecting family might have easily fallen in love with her sweet smile and brought her home. But other than love, would they have been able to give her what she needed? Would they have been able to dedicate the physical, emotional, financial and medical resources necessary to give her the best hope of a full life? A life beyond her preschool years?

Could you do it? Could you adopt a child like Chrissie?

I couldn't.

I know my limitations. If I'd been handed a child like Chrissie, I would have done my best and it would have been a fantastic effort and I'm pretty sure that nobody would find any fault with it but I'm almost certain that it wouldn't have been as good as the mom and dad she has right now.

Why?

Because this family knew what was coming and they were prepared for it while most of us would only be able to respond to it.

Proactive vs reactive.

Two children.

Two countries.

Two adoptive families.

Two totally different outcomes.

Hopefully, they'll both have happy endings.

"How much did they sell her for?"

I originally posted this on my blog one month after returning home from China with our first daughter - almost 5 years ago. We've heard a few variations of this question over the years and even though we get better at answering the questions, we never really get used to them.

+++

I went to Walmart yesterday and found $200 worth of things I didn't even know I needed. However, there was no charge for the amusing conversation I had with the cashier (Socorro) who noticed right away that Gwen was Chinese.

I had a bit of trouble understanding her because of her very heavy accent but she was chatty and seemed proud that she was able to guess that Gwen wasn't my daughter.

I explained that she *is* my daughter and happily added that she was adopted from China just a few weeks ago. She paused her scanning duties briefly and looked me straight in the eye and asked me with great curiosity how much the Chinese people sold her to me for.

I should point out that she wasn't hostile with her questions. Even so, I was a little bit taken aback. Maybe she just assumed there was a market for Chinese babies and, somehow, the birth mothers of these children benefited financially from the transaction. She probably couldn't imagine any other motive for a mother to give up her baby. It's not unusual that she thought this so I (nicely) set her straight.

Truth is, Gwendolyn cost less than the hospital bill for my bio son's birth 17 years ago.

I explained that most of the adoption expenses were for fees here in the United States and airfare and government fees in China. The orphanage got some of the money (which helps improve the quality of life for the other orphans) but the birth mother would never be identified and she gets nothing. I spoke, briefly, of the one child policy and the difficult choice the birth family probably faced.

Everyone in line behind me seemed keenly interested in our discussion. They all thought Gwen was adorable and they were shocked that she's only been in our family for 5 weeks since she looks so comfortable with me. I enjoyed this opportunity to be an Ambassador to China-Adoption and clear up some pretty big misconceptions!

No hands but mine?

This summer will mark the 5th and 4th anniversaries of our girls adoptions and, as of this writing, I've never spent one single night away from them.

Okay, that's not entirely true. I did spend the night at the hospital with Maddy when she had her surgery and Gwen stayed home with Daddy. It wasn't a good night for her and it ended with lots of crying and vomit. Naturally, Daddy's not in a hurry to repeat the experience so it looks like I'll never be able to spend a night away. I'm not complaining about missing "Mom's Night Out" with my girlfriends. I'm just sorry to miss friends weddings and funerals and other big life events. If money and time weren't a factor, I could take the whole family to these things but obviously money and time are factors.

I guess my question is: How can they ever learn that "Mommy always comes back" if Mommy never leaves?

Donna
Double Happiness

Fitting In

You probably think I'm going to tell you that my adopted Chinese daughters are represented by that lonely red flower but if you guessed that, you're wrong.

My girls are actually better represented by the two lovely yellow ones (no pun intended) in the upper left. Can you spot them? One is taller than the other and they're both standing happy and proud right next to each other. Just as you'll almost always find them here in the real world.

At first glance, the yellow tulips all look the same. But are they really the same? If you look closer, you'll see that they have different sizes and shapes. Some bloomed sooner and are already starting to fade while others are still waiting for the perfect moment to show the world what they're made of. Many have imperfect or broken or missing petals. Some are so tightly clumped together that they nearly disappear completely in a bright blur of yellow while others seem to prefer to stand all alone.

I thought about this photograph when Gwen and Maddy brought home their Kindergarten class photo last week. I quickly scanned all of the little faces for my two sweet girls and then I took a moment to stand back and examine the entire class photo in a bit more detail. My girls have been talking about most of these kids for months so it was fun to finally be able to put the faces and names together.

The first thing I noticed was that most of the kids were Asian. I always sorta knew this (since we researched the school before we moved here) but didn't realize the ratios had grown to be this wide. I specifically looked for Caucasian kids in each class (my girls are in different classes) and I only spotted one. All of the rest of the kids were quite obviously Asian or Indian (one or two Black or Latino). Really, I'm not good at guessing but I'd say that the overwhelming majority (75% or more) were clearly Asian while the rest were Indian and a tiny fraction (like one or two kids total) were something else. Only one was unmistakably Caucasian and I couldn't help but wonder how it was going to be for THAT kid growing up.

What does this mean to my kids?

I think it means that they are the ones who will have to be tolerant and open minded and accepting of classmates who are "different" (instead of the more common situation in International Adoption that it be the other way around). I'm glad my girls will fit in -- in almost all of the immediately obvious ways -- but I also hope they'll be kind and compassionate and make the red flower kids feel like they belong and fit in too because some of those red flower kids will discriminate against them when the tables are turned. And the tables will turn constantly.

The world is much more multi-cultural than it was when I was growing up but that doesn't mean that kids will automatically embrace all of those differences. My husband and I have a big job ahead of us because our girls won't always be able to blend in. We need to prepare them for that. But we also have to prepare them for the reality that other people will feel like they're unaccepted too. It's a big job and I hope we're up for it.

More about us at Double Happiness.

I miss my Foster Family...

My oldest daughter is a tomboy but you'd never know it by looking at this photo. She loves to pose for me and she's always full of surprises.

Last week, she was keeping me company in the master bathroom while I was putting on my makeup and doing my hair when her face suddenly got all serious and she announced, solemnly, that she missed her foster family.

"I miss my foster family, sooo much! I really want to visit them but you won't let me and that makes me sad. I feel like I have two hearts thumping in me." Then she patted her chest to show me where those two hearts were thumping.

It was sweet and touching and I stroked her silky cheek with the back of my hand and told her that I love her two hearts with all of my one heart. Then I gently reminded her that she doesn't have a foster family.

Yep, she made it all up.

She was never in foster care in China so she clearly didn't really miss her foster family. And she knows what a foster family is so there's no confusion about that either. She was merely pretending. She has a beautiful imagination and frequently tells stories with fuzzy edges between reality and fantasy and this was just another story to her. She probably hasn't even thought about it again but I sure have.

She doesn't have a foster family but if she'd gotten that one critical little detail right, I almost certainly wouldn't have questioned her sincerity about the rest of what she said. But maybe I should be skeptical because there's a pretty hefty price to pay if I get it wrong.

As I write this, she's playing in the other room and she isn't sad or mournfully missing anyone or bearing the weighty burden of any aspect of her unfortunate beginnings. And that's a relief because, even though my intentions are always completely honorable, I have tremendous power to influence how she internalizes some pretty hefty issues. I can make her believe that she's suffered tragic and unfair losses, that people on the other side of the world cry for her and miss her and think about her every day, that it's perfectly understandable that she'd miss them too. And even though all that might very well be true, there's a pretty good chance that she wouldn't be spending any time thinking about it if I didn't make a ritual out of putting it under her nose and helping her scrutinize her feelings about it. In other words, I'm careful not to treat my kids like injured baby birds because they might start believing that's what they are.

I feel like I should end this with some really enlightening tie-up-the-loose-ends way but I can't do it. I know it's a hard subject for many adoptive parents to discuss because most of us want to err on the side of caution and that means we'll risk delving into these issues prematurely because we think doing it early will make the path easier to navigate later. Personally, I don't recommend that because I've seen many instances of kids crying for lost loved ones that they clearly don't remember. But there must come a time when we need to wade out into these waters with our kids just so they don't think we're uncomfortable discussing these topics. I'm not sure what that age is but I know it's not 5 and a half. Maybe ten? If anyone with older adopted kids has started discussions about "loss", I'm curious to know how it went.

As always, you can see the everyday happenings of my cheerful little brood on our family blog, here: http://2happy.typepad.com/

Virtual Twins (Artificial Twinning)

Six months after we came home from China with our first daughter (Gwen), someone on our Agency's message board announced their 2nd referral: A cute baby with a beaming smile and a very minor cleft palate. A few days later, they updated to say that they'd refused the referral because she was only 2 weeks younger than their first daughter.

I called our agency to find out more about Special Needs adoptions and got a referral right on the spot when they offered us this same little girl. Now we had our own questions about adopting a toddler who was just 5 weeks younger than our (newly adopted) Gwenny. We spent the weekend searching our heart and the internet about the merits and perils of virtual twinning (aka artificial twinning) and we got plenty of advice. More than we could actually process! But, in the end, we weighed the pros and cons and ultimately decided that having virtual twins wasn't that much different than having actual twins. We understood that all children require a leap of faith so we took the leap and called our agency back and accepted her. Six months later, she was home with us.

You can see pics from Maddy's adoption <here>. That was summer of 2006 and here's a picture from just a week ago (that's Gwen "helping" Maddy clap her hands). This is the only life they know and even though we remember what life was like before our "twins", they can't remember a time that they weren't sisters.

Obviously we can't imagine making a different choice and wouldn't ever wish to go back and do things differently. But that doesn't mean we've not learned a thing or two.

Here's what we've learned:

• We thought it would be cool to have twins.
  Wrong. It's interesting but it's not cool. It's not even, especially, fun.
  
• It's annoying when people ask if they're twins because it either requires that we lie (and say they are twins) or explain that they're adopted and not biologically related. That's more information than we're comfortable sharing with strangers but we don't like to lie so we're stuck. The other option is to say "No, they're not twins" and walk away before they can ask the obvious follow-up question.
  
• Even though it's fun to dress them alike, it makes the twin question come up even more so we don't usually do that. At age two, they were the same height and weight but now they're five years old and Gwen is 25 pounds heavier and four inches taller than Maddy. But people still ask if they're twins -- and it's still annoying.
  
• Every child deserves to be the baby of the family but Maddy never got that and I feel bad about it. I think she'd have been happier if her "big" sister was at least one or two years older instead of just 36 days older. I think I would have cut her more slack too. This isn't a minor point -- it's HUGE.
• Bonding with Maddy was harder because she was the same age as our Gwen. Love isn't something that happens immediately so there was a gap because I already loved my other kids. I was, understandably, very protective of them and that interfered with bonding because Maddy was frequently mean to her "twin" (biting, hitting, etc). Oh boy -- we had LOTS of that! I found that many of my maternal instincts were working overtime against eachother for the first six months that we were together. When I wasn't actively angry at Maddy, I was consumed with guilt over ever having been mad at her in the first place.
  
• For better or worse, I find that I'm constantly comparing the girls. My expectations of what one "should" be able to do is based on what the other is doing. Whether it's coloring inside the lines or knowing her ABC's or reading words or riding a bike or being dry all night - the skill comparisons and expectations are there so I have to constantly struggle to not send signals that I'm disappointed when one can't do what the other is doing. They each have wonderful strengths that are uniquely their own. But they also have shortcomings that are amplified because their sibling is a living breathing walking measuring stick of what a kid that age can do. Even though I'm very aware of this "comparing the kids" trap, I fall into it often.
  
• It's really convenient to have the kids in the same grade at the same school and in the same age league for sports (even if they're not in the same class or on the same team). It's soooo nice not to have to run all over the place to get a kid to school (or home) at different times.
  
• I don't think I'll ever put my virtual twins in the same class or on the same sports team and their teachers and coaches will thank me for that.
  
• It's fun that they are the same age because it's easier for them to share interests and play together. Although they fight pretty constantly at home, they get along better when we're away on vacation and that makes it really fun to go places with them. This is in sharp contrast to our son, Michael, who was an "only child" for almost all of his childhood and was bored to death on family vacations.
  
• All the stuff we thought they'd share, they don't. They don't wear the same size clothes or shoes or want to share a room and they have polar opposite personalities and interests. Even so, if we buy one of them a toy, we'd better buy the other one the same toy or they'll fight over it until our ears bleed and we weep for mercy.
  
• When we buy two identical toys, they usually show no interest in them at all. I think the battle over the toy is half of the fun? Hmm... well I guess that makes them more like SIBLINGS than twins, huh!

1 out of 1361

One thousand three hundred and sixty-one days ago, we saw our our daughter, Madeline, for the very first time. She was a grainy image on a fax we'd received from our agency and we were only seeing her photo this early because she was "special need". Five months earlier, we'd adopted a NSN baby girl from China and learned through our travel mates about China's SN program. At that moment, two things happened:

1. We realized that everything we assumed we knew about SN kids was wrong.


2. We knew our next child would come from our agency's SN list.

I know that sounds painfully simple and it really was. When I called our agency five months after bringing our first daughter home, they told me about the child who would be our 2nd daughter. The rest, as they say, is history.

I realize procedures and time lines are different today but I'm pretty sure one thing isn't: The kids.

Our daughter is a normal child. She not physically or emotionally perfect but neither are we (or any of our other so-called "non special needs" kids). In the last 1361 days, there has only been one day that her special needs were the dominant driving force in our life and that was the day we had her cleft palate repaired.

Here's a synopsis of that day:

I've had lots of trouble coming up with my first post here because I just don't think about my kids in terms in their SN's.

Only one of our kids is "technically" SN but all of our kids could be. Our bio son had a undescended testicle until age 5 and that's a common SN in China. He also had febrile seizures until age 3 and that's another SN. But he's 21 and totally healthy now.

I was a 3 pound preemie and I had (and still have) a small red birthmark (an hemangioma) on my head under all my hair. Either of those issues would have landed me on a SN list.

Gwen, our technically NSN child, has severe food aversions and still won't eat anything that doesn't completely dissolve in her mouth. Not a day goes by that I don't have to make a special accommodation for her or worry about her food "issues".

In contrast, we don't even think about Maddy's SN it at all. I'm not even sure if it's okay to say that because there are some SN's that are much more serious or difficult to casually overlook and I'd never want to say anything that minimizes the significance of what day-to-day life is like in any of those richly blessed families. Our situation is merely different in that it's not really different at all. We just don't notice that we have a SN child until it's time to write a story for this site or until we realize that our LID for Maddy was 5/25/06 and we'd still be YEARS away from her referral were it not for the fact that she had that totally insignificant little fissure in the roof of her mouth. Something we weren't even sure we needed to fix but easily fixed in just one day.

One day out of 1361.

(The rest of our story is unfolding, day by day, on our family blog: Double Happiness)