"Gottcha Day:" We Have a Baby Girl!!!
Sunday, June 6th, was in a word, "hectic." This was the day we finally got Sam. We had gone to dinner the night before with our Guide, (while in Beijing), and although we went to bed at 10pm, we were up at about 4am to pack- we couldn’t sleep any more due to our anticipation of the day’s events. We left our Hotel in Beijing at 9:30am, and went to the airport. Our guides had the tickets, had already checked in our luggage, and walked us through security. After a 2.5 hour flight, we landed in Lanzhou at 2:30pm. Lanzhou is located in an arid, desert area, which was quite a contrast to the heat and humidity of Guangzhou. The temperature was 66 degrees when we landed here with no humidity. If you’ve ever landed in the Tucson, AZ airport in April, that is what the area is like here. Lanzhou is in a valley surrounded by sparsely vegetated mountains. The skies are blue, the Yellow River looks like the Mississippi, and although a fairly high pollution index, it is not nearly as bad as what we experienced in Guangzhou. We met our new local guide, Steed Chen, who with our national guide Cindy, loaded all 13 families onto a bus and took us to our hotel in the city. We arrived at the JJ Sun hotel at 4pm, and were allowed to go to our rooms and unpack. The guides we are using are very efficient: Our local guide had already checked the entire group into the hotel, and handed out our room keys on the bus. During the hour long drive into the city, he talked about what would happen that day. Due to recent changes in this province, especially since it is so new to Chinese adoptions, we were going to have to get more paperwork done Sunday, including passport & visa photos, and verification of the adoption paperwork. The children were to arrive at 4:30pm, and we had to be at the official photographer before 5:30pm. *Our original itinerary had us doing all of this on Monday: Surprise, surprise, surprise. Like they say in the Marine Corp, "Improvise, adapt, and overcome." Too bad I was in the Army, huh!
We dumped our luggage in the room, (there was a little crib already by the bed), organized the gifts we brought for the orphanage staff, and then bounced around in general with great anticipation like a couple of five year olds on Christmas morning. This was the moment we were waiting for: Our first face to face encounter with "Zhang Yu," our Samantha. At 4:15pm we went up to the 22nd floor where most of the other families had already gathered. There are three orphanages represented, and the four babies from the Wu Wei orphanage (about 4 hours away from Lanzhou) had already arrived. Of course the doorway was brimming with four families absolutely dying to rush into the door and hold their babies (I have video of this). As we were waiting in the hallway for the time to go in, the next group of babies and nannies had just arrived and came into the hallway. This was our orphanage! As the six nannies walked by in single file with the babies in their arms, we immediately recognized baby number 3- it was our little girl! Debbie started bouncing up and down when she saw her, and squealed in delight, "There she is!" She was wearing the dress that Debbie had sent a couple of months ago, but that didn’t matter- we knew that little face. She was so beautiful, and looked right at us with a radiant smile as they passed by. As the nannies and the babies from Zhangye entered the meeting room, Debbie and I hugged each other and began to weep. There was our little girl and she was about to be in our arms. Our hearts were full & overflowing. One of the couples in our group had laid odds on which parents were going to be the most emotional and show the most waterworks. I think we were a close second.
At exactly 4:30pm, our guide began to call families into the room one by one to get their babies. As the first group of parents entered the room, I was able to get in the doorway and video tape the nanny holding Sam. I indicated that she was our baby, and the Nanny turned Sam to us, and picked up her little hand and waved to us. It was probably about another 5 minutes before we were called into the room, but it seemed like an eternity. You could hear some babies begin to scream and cry when they were taken from their nanny, which left a lump in our throat. When we were called, I entered the room behind Debbie with the video camera running, and have some video of the exchange. The nanny handed Sam to Debbie; Sam looked at Debbie and grinned, and went to her with a smile. After they verified our adoption certificate and passports, I gave the gifts to the nanny, and off we went to our room. Sam didn’t cry at all- she just kept looking at Debbie with a pleasant but curious expression. This was great! It seemed so easy, and Samantha was such a little joy!
Of course that changed when we got to the room, noted her bottom was wet, and decided to change her. We removed the cloth diaper and wet dress, and replaced it with a pampers and new outfit so we could go get the pictures made. By the screaming that ensued, you would think we were torturing the poor child! Our sweet little baby who was laughing and grinning a minute ago now cried, screamed, arched her back, kicked her legs, threw her arms wildly, and had a good ole "Grade A" hissy fit! So, note #1: Sam hates to have her diaper changed. None the less, once she was cleaned up and dry, her sweet disposition returned. We both held her, hugged each other, and wished we could have spent the rest of the evening getting to know her, however, there was still adoption business to handle. We loaded the diaper bag and headed back to the lobby to board the bus for pictures. (Our national guide had a list of formula, food, feeding schedule, and rest schedule when we got to Beijing, which allowed us to purchase the Chinese formula and rice cereal in Beijing to have on hand when we got her). I don’t mind telling you what a comfort it was to be prepared. We also had the bottle of Pedialyte ready, because our orphanage was a 9 hour bus ride to the capital, and we thought she might be a little dehydrated- she was, and downed the entire bottle.
We went and had the photos made, which Sam did very well. We gave her a bottle for dinner, and she played the entire time with her Ling doll from the Valentines. The nanny told us that Sam has a nick-name: In Chinese it is "Xiao Yu Dian," which means "little rain drop." The nanny, the orphanage director, and both our guides kept calling her this, which makes Sam giggle and wiggle about whenever she hears it. After we returned to the hotel, we returned to our room for a minute, then one parent was required to go back to the conference room and begin the local paperwork with the orphanage director and our guides. Since Debbie had organized it and was the most familiar with the paper work, we decided she goes and I stay with Sam.
This is where Sunday went really down hill. When Debbie went upstairs, it was about 7pm, and we had been up since about 4am. Neither of us had eaten since about 11am on the flight in, and we were already exhausted both physically and emotionally. They said it would take about thirty minutes, however, it unfortunately turned into 2 hours. When Debbie left the room, I checked Sam’s diaper which was wet, so decided to change her and get her ready for bed. That’s when the crying and screaming started, which I expected given the first diaper change. What I didn’t expect was for the crying and screaming to last nearly an hour before she finally passed out. I rocked her, walked with her, sang to her, laid her in the crib, on the bed, gave her every toy we had, and finally offered her tuition to medical school if she’d stop crying. She didn’t want a bottle, wouldn’t play with her toys, and continually cried "mama." She didn’t want me to touch her, jerked away from me, screamed louder when I picked her up, and kept looking around the room calling out for mama when I picked her up anyway. I knew this was a part of the process: She is now apart from everything familiar, and I think the fear of the unknown had finally hit her. Poor thing- physically exhausted, in a strange place with a strange person who doesn’t sound or look like anyone she’s ever seen before: Deep voice, hairy lip, funny smelling American guy. I was kinda scared myself, and for the first time in a long time, I felt absolutely helpless. In fact, I was also in unfamiliar surroundings with people I couldn’t understand, hungry, tired, sleepy, and exhausted. So, I joined her, and we both cried for about 10 minutes! We rocked back & forth together over the next hour. I then laid her on my chest and started singing lullabies to her until somewhere after the 8th song she finally fell asleep. Mental Note #2: Go immediately to holding her against my chest and singing when she won’t stop crying. I laid her in the crib, and covered her with a baby blanket. I think we were both ready for the day to end.
From that point on, Sam had a good night: I wish I could same the same for us, but it’s like Murphy’s Law: "Things often get worse before they get better." That is precisely what happened. At 8:30pm, and Sam now sound asleep, I ordered room service and made a brief journal entry, and at 9:00pm, both the food and Debbie got to the room. Debbie was about to fall over, as was I. We ate about half the food, being careful to remove the lettuce and tomato from our club sandwiches, then I went down to the business center to send a quick email while Debbie got ready for bed. When I returned and collapsed on the bed, Debbie and Sam were asleep, and I joined them. About 10:30, however, our night ended as we started suffering the effects of food poisoning. Debbie threw up twice, and I had similar issues. Now that I think about it, I don’t believe the mayonnaise was supposed to be clear like that. Throughout the night, we made many trips to the bathroom, and by 5am, we were beyond tired. I can’t describe how horribly drained we had become, which was now amplified by illness and a severe lack of sleep. We held each other a little while, wept together, and then prayed together for God’s strength. Despite how miserable we now felt, our thoughts turned to Sam, and at sunrise on our knees, we offered her to God and asked His guidance in raising her. We spent the rest of the early hours talking. We were so worn out that we could not sleep. Fortunately, our problems did not keep Sam from sleeping soundly for nine hours.
