Baby Nemote, Formerly Known as Li Ming

I’m not sure if my daughter’s new dolly is named after Nemo the fish or the remote control for the tv. Either way, her baby is saddled with an unconventional name; Nemote. While her name might be odd, she is an absolutely beautiful Chinese baby doll that I got from Precious Baby Dolls.

We gave her to our daughter for her second birthday, and I love this picture of her seeing the doll for the first time. It was love at first sight.

Being an adoptive parent in a multi-cultural family means searching for toys and gifts that have anything but blue eyes and blond hair. I’m sure other adoptive parents can relate. It’s very difficult to find a variety of dolls with authentic features that are high quality and value. The reason I am writing this is two-fold.

First, I want to help out another mom I connected with online. She started her own doll company, and for those of you who know me well, motherhood and small business are two of my greatest passions. The backbone of this country is family and small business; therefore, I love what Mary Beth is trying to do. Plus, she has an awesome name.

The other reason I am writing this article is to pass along how impressed I am with little Nemote. (It just doesn’t have a pretty ring to it, does it?!) She is well made, soft in the body, and durable in the head, arms, and legs. Her eyes and even her hair resemble my daughter, who absolutely loves her. She even wanted to share her glass of water with her, and proceeded to dump a glass of water on poor baby Nemote. Luckily, it didn’t hurt her one bit. We dried her face and the little red outfit didn’t even bleed.

For those of you who shopped for silk doll clothes in China, I have to say this dress is well made and even lined. None of the clothes we bought in China for dolls and barbies were lined.

If your family is multi-cultural like ours, there are many nationities of dolls to select from, and all are made with love. You can see the entire doll collection at http://www.preciousbabydolls.com/ You can follow Mary Beth on Twitter at Twitter.com/adoptedbabies

They also have a cute clip on YouTube:

What’s That Squeak?

Updated Post*

Squeak, Squeak.What’s that noise? It’s not a mouse. It’s not a doggie chew toy. It’s my baby’s shoes. Everywhere I go, people  love my daughter’s shoes and continue to staop and ask me about them. The are called Squeaky Shoes, and they are wildly popular in China. Many adoptive families fall in love with Squeaky Shoes while traveling in China and buy several pairs in various colors, sizes, and styles. I saved the pairs I bought for my older daughter, and added new ones to my baby’s collection.

Last spring at baptism, my daughter wore a white Chinese traditional silk top and skirt. She wore her purple flowered, Chinese silk squeaky shoes that make her giggle as she walks.

Most moms want to know where they can get Squeaky Shoes in the US. I recently discovered the site called Got Squeakers?

In case you are wondering, yes, you can remove the “squeak” mechanism temporarily. But, what’s the fun in that?

To my littlest daughter whom I call Bean

It seems like yesterday we were in China meeting you for the first time. I can’t believe almost ten months have passed already. In the short time you’ve been here, you’ve learned to crawl, walk, and talk. You’ve learned to trust both your mom and dad, as well as rely on your sisters for endless entertainment and fulfillment of your every wish. When you smile, you make all of us stop what we are doing to watch your face light up. You laugh a lot, complain little, and can entertain yourself for a long time. Your nature is curious, independent, and easy-going.

Bean, you are such a blessing in our lives. I am so lucky to be your mommy. It makes me sad to know your other mommy is somewhere else, wondering if you are ok; if you’re happy; if you’re loved. I pray that somehow God can bring her peace in her heart. I also hope that through my writing, relationships, and friends, I can help more people open their hearts to adoption and know the special mommy-baby bond like the one I have with you; My little “Bean”.

From Mother to Mother

It’s been nearly 10 years since I adopted my daughter, Eleni. Since then, so many things have changed. The adoption restrictions in China have tightened. My “baby” has grown immeasurably, having morphed from a curious, wide-eyed infant into a strong, athletic, confident preteen. I have a decade of parenthood behind me, making me tougher, more compassionate, more forgiving, and more in love than I’ve ever been. I have learned that motherhood is an art, both surprisingly simple and complex.

Shortly after I returned from China, I wrote the essay below. In it, I reflected on Eleni’s birth mother, a woman whom I’d never met. One morning, years ago, she made a decision that would change her life, and my own, forever. While I don’t often find time to think of her lately, I do owe Eleni’s first mother a debt of gratitude. She gave me a child who is hard-wired to be cheerful, resilient, kind, smart, and sporty. I’ve provided the structure, the love, and the opportunity for my daughter to thrive. In a sense, she and I have had a mystical, long-distance partnership that has shaped Eleni into the wonderful child she has become. One decade later, I can simply say to her birth mom, “Thank you. We’ve done great.”

About six months after I returned home from China with my adopted daughter, Eleni, I dreamed of her birth mother. It was a brief dream that allowed me just a glance of a young woman’s face, but it moved me nonetheless. As the adoptive mother of a baby from China, I know little of my daughter’s past. I know that she was born sometime around December 5, 1998, and that several days later, she was abandoned at the gates of the Changsha Social Welfare Institute-a state-run orphanage near the Yangtze River. I know that Eleni, who was named Du Xue Jing by orphanage officials, spent the first months of her life sharing a bamboo crib with another baby and playing in a room filled with colorful mats and toys. And I know that she was given rice and hot milk and was nurtured by a staff of loving caregivers.When I adopted Eleni, at 8 ½ months of age, last summer, it was apparent that she had been cared for. But the question of her family-and the mother who bore her-remained a mystery. Like Eleni, thousands of baby girls are abandoned each year in China, often in the darkness of early morning. Their parents, who must adhere to a one-child-per-family rule, have most likely abandoned them in an effort to conceive a son. (For thousands of years, Chinese sons have been expected to care for their elderly parents, while daughters are expected to marry and care for their husband’s family.)

Because of the situation in China and the circumstances surrounding Eleni’s adoption, I will never know her birth mother, nor will she know me. But as a mother myself now, I can barely imagine the pain and conflict Eleni’s birth mother must have felt when choosing to give up her daughter-or the joy and magic I would have missed if she hadn’t.

A Brooklyn Baby

Eleni, at 17 months, is an integral part of my life now. She toddles around our Brooklyn neighborhood, happily and systematically making friends. She loves the park, her books, and all things American-particularly Cheerios and our TV’s remote control-and she has made it quite clear to everyone that I am her mom. (She began her campaign in earnest with various, expressive forms of “Ma!” soon after we arrived home from China.)

For my part, I marvel at the distinctions-and the similarities-between us. I am 43, with a strong Mediterranean heritage. Eleni, a mere fraction of my age, hails from the province of Hunan. According to the Chinese calendar, I was born in the Year of the Monkey; Eleni is a Tiger through and through. But like me, my daughter is dramatic (I’ve often dubbed her my “Mediter-Asian” girl), and like me, she has a spirit of compassion and adventure. We share the same jokes, an affinity for Pat the Bunny and Goodnight Moon, and a fondness for baseball and pasta. After the months of red tape and bureaucracy that preceded Eleni’s adoption, I find it remarkable that the two of us-kindred spirits-were given to each other in this world.
A Life-Changing Decision

Unlike so many mothers, including my own, I came to motherhood later in life, and on a path that was somewhat circuitous. I was 41 when I decided to adopt a baby from China-on my own. In retrospect, I was driven first and foremost by my desire to become a mother, whether I was married or not. And second, I was moved deeply by the fate of the girls in China.

In the winter of 1998, I began my journey to motherhood. I joined a national support group called Families With Children From China; found an agency that would help me facilitate a Chinese adoption; began the long, convoluted process of collecting personal and official documents that would eventually go to Beijing; reorganized my home for a baby; and did a lot of soul-searching.

Many nights I lay awake wondering whether I was doing the right thing, and pondering whether I had the capacity to be a single mother. I told myself I could always turn back and withdraw my application for adoption, but in my heart I knew my decision had been sealed. In August 1999, I flew to Changsha, China, and after many months of anxious waiting and wondering, I met my baby daughter.
Two Mothers, Two Worlds

So much of what happened during our first days together-in China and in transit-remain a blur to me now, partly because of the emotion I felt and partly because my daughter had fallen ill. About 24 hours after I adopted her, Eleni spiked a 104° fever that lasted two days and began a bout of diarrhea that lingered for nearly two weeks. Her illness turned out to be nothing more than a virus (as I learned upon my return to America), but it presented me with my first test of motherhood. In hotel rooms in Changsha, Guangzhou, and Shanghai, and on a long international flight, I comforted a sleepless baby-and slowly nurtured her back to health.

In the months since Eleni and I have been a family, I have been given even more tests of motherhood. I have stayed up nights when my daughter has been sick or restless. I have fought back tears of exhaustion after a long day of work and baby care. I have agonized over my choice of caregivers. But motherhood, I’m learning, is a process that changes from day to day, as quickly as my growing daughter. It’s a place where I can make mistakes and be forgiven, and a place that offers strength and pride and confidence. And nine months into my role as Eleni’s mom, I can safely say that motherhood has little to do with biology or a shared family tree, and much more to do with the love and experiences that two people share.

On my final day in China last August, I was boarding a flight for New York City. I was tired, relieved, and overcome with emotion. As Eleni lay sleeping in my front pack, a Chinese worker came up to me, placed his hand on my back, and said: “You know, you’re giving her a life.” In hindsight, I believe he was right. Eleni and I share a day-to-day world filled with music, dancing, and laughter. I am there for her when she cries, and when she achieves each momentous milestone. But I know that her life-her destiny-has been shaped, too, by the woman who bore her, and by the decision she made many months ago on a cold December morning in China.

* This article originally appeared in American Baby magazine (May 2000).

Laura Broadwell is a writer and editor in Brooklyn, New York. She has written for national magazines and web sites, and was previously the author of the Single Parent column of Adoptive Families (adoptivefamilies.com). She also wrote “Raising Eleni: An Adoptive Mother’s Journal,” a weekly, year-long column for BabyCenter.com.

Dealing with Institutional Behaviors and Attachment Issues

I consider myself blessed to parent three beautiful little girls. Each of my daughters came to our family with very unique stories. Becoming parents presented an array of challenges, including infertility and adoption. Our youngest two daughters were adopted internationally, through the help of many experts. Anyone having gone through the adoption or infertility process knows that the journey to becoming parents is anything but private.

We’ve have been lucky to have the same, energetic social worker involved in our lives for the past six years. She is a source of support and encouragement to us. She guides us through a complicated process, and steers us toward information we need to be healthy parents to our children. Six years ago when we started the first adoption process, our social worker started preparing us for everything that would happen, as well as what could possibly happen after our children were placed in our arms forever.

The attachment issue was one that concerned us the most. While there is a wealth of unknowns, we know our daughters were abandoned and institutionalized prior to joining our family. We are not willing to ignore the time they spent before we entered their lives. However difficult, we recognize and validate that our daughters’ lives started long before they met us. We do not judge birth parents for their difficult decisions that led to the abandonment, nor do we condemn a society that pressures such decisions.

To understand the opportunities and challenges of parenting an institutionalized child, it helps to know how our parenting journey began. One of our daughters was abandoned two weeks after her birth. We have an estimated birthday, based on a medical examination. We will never know her birth date for sure, and it makes me sad. Someday I’ll have to explain this to her, and she will have to work through how this makes her feel. Our other daughter was abandoned the day she was born, and we know this based on her physical condition, circumstances, and evidence. Both girls were placed in orphanages the same day they were found. From what we know, they were not placed in foster care. Unfortunately, we can’t know this for sure.

We take comfort in having met some of the people who cared for our daughters their first year of life; one was in the orphanage until 14 months, the other until 11 months. We have some pictures and details from the first year, but it is minimal and sketchy. We hold on to each little tidbit, as it will be all they have in their life books to celebrate their first year of life. Somewhere across the world, I believe two birth mothers remember and celebrate my daughters’ lives with us. It is out of our shared love and devotion that I have a responsibility to parent them the best of my ability, even when faced with challenges.

The attachment process for both girls has been very different. The similarities that exist have more to do with how prepared we are and how quickly we are able to recognize signs. Our second daughter (first adoption) came to us screaming and crying, with a preference for sucking her clothes or blanket. She was scared, underweight, and lacked muscle tone. She was also sick; congested, fever, and perforated ear drum. Her situation allowed us to comfort her and help her feel better through food, medicine, and attention. She didn’t show a preference to either one of us, which made holding, rocking, and carrying her easy. Her father and I shared the responsibility and delighted in her cautious desire for attention. Before long she was displaying extroverted personality consistent with a child accustom to multiple care givers. She lack discrimination and had to be taught the difference between parents and strangers. I distinctly remember our first trip to Target. She toddled down the aisle in front of me; putting her hands up (indicated to be picked up) to a man I didn’t know. To others she was endearing and sweet. I, on the other hand, was dying inside. I was wracked with worry. I knew what was going on, that it wasn’t healthy, and it was inevitable.

We isolated about one month upon returning home. We wanted her to be with us exclusively. Telling grandparents was the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to do in my life; you can’t see your new grandchild for the first month while we bond. Did I mention that this was smack-dab in the middle of the holiday season? We forged ahead with our plan to stay at home with our daughter, and she learned to trust and depend on us for comfort, food, sleep, etc. It made a world of difference, and we were glad we made this choice.

Children are born with medical issues every day and birth mothers embrace whatever comes their way, however, the difference with an institutionalized child is the lack of medical records and family history. Lacking medical records makes immunizations difficult. We are lucky to have a pediatrician with two internationally adopted daughters, who understands our challenges. We made the decision to test for immunities present and start over with any shots that seemed missing. Our daughter was diagnosed with asthma, allergies, and poor eyesight. She started wearing glasses at one year. She had a chronic drooling problem due to lack of suck; an infant in a Chinese orphanage is often fed formula through a bottle with a very large opening cut in a nipple. (The baby gulps the milk rather than sucks it.) She was also diagnosed with a severe milk allergy that resulted in stomach aches and a polyp in her intestine that was surgically removed.

The scariest incident happened when she was 20 months old. She started vomiting uncontrollably, became dehydrated, and was hospitalized. With no medical or genetic history, no knowledge of past illnesses or injuries, and no language to communicate, we fought to restore her health. She was in the hospital for a week with no one able to diagnose her. She slowly recovered, but we’ve never known what caused her to be so ill.

Another challenge is not knowing if something could be attributed to being institutionalized or if it’s normal. Would our daughter have had severe night terrors if she had been biological or placed with us at birth? We have no way of knowing. I spent months sleeping on the floor of her room, beneath her crib in case her sporadic crying fits were attributed to a fear of being abandoned. Slowly the crying stopped and she slept alone in her room.

She gorged on food for months after coming home. Afraid she wouldn’t get enough or that she couldn’t count on when the next meal would come, she would eat until she gagged. It was a struggle every time to decide how much to give her. We wanted her to feel safe, and eating too much food made her feel safe. Again, this slowly subsided and she was able to eat only when she was hungry. This was a difficult area for others to understand. They either remarked about what a good eater she was or reprimanded us for giving her too much. To parent an institutionalized child means having patience with others who don’t understand attachment issues.

As our daughter gets older, her perceived “extroverted” personality is diminishing. This tells me that it never was part of who she is, but rather part of her survival mechanisms. Our daughter is fun, spunky and bright. She is also quite introverted, quiet, and shy with those she doesn’t know. It is wonderful to see her true self shine through.

Our third daughter (second adoption) joined our family only three short months ago, at eleven months of age. We believe she was well-taken care of at her orphanage, but had little time with her birth mother. I imagine her as a newborn, listening to new voices and sounds from her crib. She developed many institutional behaviors at the orphanage to self sooth, including sucking her thumb.

She came to us calm and quiet. She didn’t cry when she was handed to me. The orphanage worker brought her favorite toy so that she could have some familiarity with us. I am greatly appreciative of this small gesture, as it made her transition just a little bit easier. She held tight to her toy chicken. After a short time with us, she cried inconsolably. After the crying stopped, she slept unnatural lengths of time. She wanted to sleep through her trauma, which scared us. Recognizing her coping mechanism helped us to allow her to sleep. When she was awake, she alternated between crying, refusing to eat, and staring at her hand. She also rocked herself and scratched her scalp bloody. I won’t lie; the first few days with her were rough and scary. She arched her back, pushed away from us, and refused eye contact. We responded by holding her, looking into her eyes the best we could, and carrying her with us in a baby carrier pouch. She quickly liked being carried in the pouch, and we caught her sneaking peeks at us. We didn’t know everything would be ok, but we hoped. We worked hard, and we had patience.

Our daughter had a very slow adjustment once we got home. We isolated even more than the first time. I never left her sight, which was very exhausting. I spent weeks on the floor so she could sit, lie, and scoot by me. She is a very sensitive, gentle, and shy baby right now. It’s hard to know if what we are seeing is still part of her coping skills, but I suspect it is.

She has come so far in just a couple months. She is very smart and smiley, loves to jabber, and is close to walking already. She has an intense attachment to me, which is such a blessing. She rarely goes to anyone else and is intensely afraid of strangers; such a stark contrast to our first adoption experience.

Our story is never ending, and each day presents new challenges. We love our children and couldn’t be happier. We appreciate our experiences and know that there are difficult days ahead. However, if given the choice, we would do it all again. My hope is that more people will find their heart for adoption.

Adoption is a Long Emotional Journey

We had briefly considered adoption when we were having trouble conceiving our first child. Fortunately, the doctors were able to figure out what was causing the infertility, we were treated, and then had two boys. I still did not feel like my family was complete.I always felt people who adopted so they could have a child of one specific gender were adopting for the wrong reasons. Then I stepped into their shoes. You see, there are no women in my family. My grandmothers and my husband’s grandmothers are all gone. My mother-in-law is gone. My only aunt on my dad’s side is gone. My husband only has one, mentally handicapped sister who is incapable of having an adult social relationship with other adults. My only brother is unmarried. I have three female first cousins. Two live out of the country and the third is four hours away. My mom is still alive, but is in remission from cancer. Here I was, hosting Christmas and Thanksgiving already in my 20s, when my friends were still going to the GRANDmothers’ houses for these holidays. I’d be all by myself in the kitchen, with no one to talk to because the guys were all watching TV.

I don’t believe in rigging a test tube to get a baby of one particular gender. I also felt that if I had a third biological boy, I might have negative feelings about it and that most certainly wouldn’t be fair to that child.

I knew that I did not want to adopt domestically. I’m well aware of the shortage of adoptable infants in this country and I didn’t want to “take” an available child from someone who couldn’t have children at all.

One day I went to a MOPS meeting and one of the gals said she was going to adopt a baby girl from China. This was the time when the world was still talking about the horrors of Chinese orphanages. I believe there was a documentary called “The Dying Rooms” that started all of this. This woman told me about little girls who were unwanted and spent their days wasting away strapped to potty chairs. Thousands of little girls seemed to be in dire need of homes. My heart was broken.

I did some research and found out that adopting from China meant spending two weeks in the country. I’m NOT a fan of travel to exotic locations. I have a very sensitive stomach and thought I’d get sick. I’m NOT a fan of sitting on long flights. I didn’t think I could handle the travel.

The day after Thanksgiving, 2004, I was having lunch with my mom and a friend and told them I had been thinking about adoption from China. They strongly encouraged me to do it and offered their support.

I decided I was being a wimp and could handle two weeks in China. My husband was completely on board and needed no convincing whatsoever.

We began the process of selecting an agency. We wanted a Christian agency with an office a reasonable drive from our home in “the sticks.” We had a good feeling about Bethany and had friends who had had a successful foreign adoption experience with them. We chose Bethany.

We began the interview/paperwork process in March, 2005. We took our time with our paperwork. At the time, the wait from sending in your dossier to referral was only about six months. Our youngest was only a year old. We didn’t want two children that close together in age. So, we finally sent in our paperwork in November of that year. Our dossier entered the Chinese adoption system on Jan. 5, 2006. By that time, the wait had jumped to one year. We expected to get the baby in Dec. of 2006.

Little did we know, but Chinese adoptions were beginning their great slowdown. I believe it was March of 2007 when China only matched infants with families for two days’ worth of Log in Dates. I cracked. I cried and thought we would never get our baby. Because we still lived 100 mi. from our agency, I was unable to attend any waiting families support group meetings. I turned to our agency’s online forums for support. I also found two websites giving updates on the process of matching in China and followed them religiously. Our paperwork expired once and we had to pay several hundred dollars to renew it. Our fingerprints expired three times. China jacked up their orphanage donations by $2,000. We considered pulling out of the program and changing countries, but figured we were too far along in the process.

Finally, we received a referral for a little girl on 4/4/08. It didn’t seem to be real. I was actually in denial for a long time because The Wait had become so much a part of our lives, I didn’t know how to live without The Wait.

We traveled with a group of five families to China in June of 2008. Five families was a far cry from the 17 or so families who used to make the trip. This was a sign of China’s adoption slowdown. Other parents I spoke with in our travel group were also in denial about the whole thing. We didn’t want to think this was really happening because we’d been through so much already. I wouldn’t let myself get too excited until I actually got that baby.

Cami Now, Easter 2009

On June 16, 2008 I was presented with my beautiful 9 1/2 mo. old daughter. It was a good thing our agency told us the babies might not like us at first because did she ever scream. She screamed for three days straight. I told my husband I didn’t think I could go through with this, but he told me I was being ridiculous. Our seasoned guide told us two things: 1. The smart babies are the ones who cry. 2. After three days she’ll be a different baby.

Both my husband and our guide were right. On the third day, Cami woke up happy and acted as if nothing had happened. We enjoyed the remainder of our time in China.

One of my early fears, did come true, unfortunately. I picked up a horrible stomach bug the morning we left China. I drugged myself with Imodium and lived on Sprite in order to survive the plane flight. Fortunately, we had given the baby Benadryl and she slept most of the way home. I was sick for three weeks after we got home and my weight dwindled to 102 lbs. We had many tests done, and all they could conclude was “Asian virus.” Cami didn’t adjust to the time change and didn’t want to sleep at night. Our friends basically stayed out of our way. I believe it was either because they thought we wanted to be alone, or they did not view adoption the same as a birth. I hit a very low low.

Things did slowly improve. The international adoption community in our area got wind of the situation after two weeks and began bringing meals and offering to watch our boys.

God is so good. Cami is not without her issues. She still wakes up once per night. She’s lactose intolerant, and she still drools vast amounts at 19 mo. of age. She is a happy baby, and like our guide predicted, her intelligence astounds me. She seems to have no major attachment issues. She is tall and healthy. She is the perfect baby for our family.

I realized that our long wait was all part of God’s plan. Our boys are very high maintenance and if we would have gotten Cami when I wanted Cami, things would have been much more difficult. By the time we got her, our youngest was four. The age span was perfect.

I struggle with some guilt over all of this. At the time we started the adoption, there seemed to be thousands of babies needing homes. Now the referral of non-special needs children has dwindled almost to nothingness. I sometimes feel as if I “took” a healthy, available baby from a family who cannot have children.

I tell everyone I know today that I would not adopt from China today unless I were considering a special needs child. The wait may be eight years or more, and I don’t think there’s anybody who would honestly want
to wait that long. Unfortunately, there are so many people in the dark about the situation over there. They start the process believing they will only wait as long as those receiving their child TODAY waited. They are unaware that the wait increases by 20 days with each month that passes. Even though it’s probably none of my business, I feel it’s my responsibility to inform them what’s going on since some agencies unfortunately aren’t doing that. I am sad for them.

Adoption is a long, emotional journey. But, God is with you, He knows the ultimate plan for your family and it will all work out in the end.