A year ago today.........

It was exact one year ago today that Lee and I decided to pursue the adoption of our daughter in China. I remember because it was the Third Sunday of Advent and also the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe We soon picked our agency. At that time we and later in January or February I wrote this email, I borrowed a lot (with permission!), but I think I tried to throw it together with my own personal voice. Note how the wait has increased to about 9 months!


Dear family and friends,

For a few of you this is old information, but some of you haven't heard our exciting news yet . . . our family is in the process of adopting a daughter from China! We are thrilled and excited beyond belief, and are working hard to bring our daughter home. As we have been sharing our news with both family and friends, many questions have arisen. Questions regarding our initial decision to adopt, questions regarding the adoption process, and specific questions regarding adoption from China. We are writing this letter to fill you in on the details, both large and small. We want to give everyone the opportunity to understand how we came to this decision and how we are moving through the adoption process. Be prepared, this is a long letter, if you aren't interested in the details, just skim along and look for what interests you.

Why Adopt?
For some, the news that we are adding another daughter to our family came as a huge surprise, and to many our family seems complete. For years I (Tracy) have dreamed that our family would be able to participate in the miracle of adoption. I don't know how or exactly when the dream began, but I've been interested in adoption for more years than I can remember. After giving birth to the twins, we made a decision we now regret that we would not have any more biological children. The years have gone by quickly and Lee and I have had some discussions regarding adoption. While we would discuss adoption, sometimes casually and sometimes at length, we never felt called to pursue it in earnest. That is until this last winter. We really can't explain it, but we both felt God tugging at our heart that we were meant to have another daughter. Our conversations turned to action. We called an adoption agency and began collecting information.

So, calls were made, paperwork was gathered and we prayed and prayed and prayed.

Why China?
There were several factors that we looked at when determining where we would adopt from. Ultimately, we believe God led us to China because that is His will for our family, but the process of learning about the millions of orphans worldwide has been heart wrenching and convicting. There are more than 30 million orphaned children around the world. Nearly 2 million of these children are in China, and it is estimated that only 2% of these children are ever given a forever family and a place to call home. Every year in China, hundreds of thousands of baby girls are put into orphanages. Adoption resources estimate that only 6,000 to 8,000 of these orphans are adopted each year. Those precious children that are left behind will grow up in the orphanage, and at age 18 will "age out" and be sent out to live on their own, usually with very little or no training, skills or source of income. The figures are staggering, and the stories are heart breaking.
One of the factors that contributed to our decision to adopt from China was the fact that we felt called to have another daughter. China's orphanages are filled to overflowing with little girls . . . just waiting for their forever family. Another factor that we considered was travel. When adopting from China we will travel just once, at the very end of the process, to meet our daughter face to face and bring her home. Many other countries that are open to adoption require at least two trips, that circumstance just did not seem feasible to us. We have talked with others about domestic adoption and foster adopt. We considered both, but ultimately feel God's strong call to adopt from China.

The Process
The adoption process from China has four major steps:
#1 The Paper Chase
This process includes applying to the adoption agency of your choice and completing a Home Study. The Home Study is a thorough investigation into your personal, professional, financial and family life. It involves page after page of questions, medical information, letters of reference and financial statements. Also included in the paper chase is the application to the Immigration Department to bring a foreign adopted child into the US. (We are told that this application could take anywhere from 2 weeks to 8 months, and is a really hurdle to cross during the paper chase process.) Once the Home Study is complete and the official documents are gathered, all the documents must then be sent to various government agencies to be notarized, certified and authenticated. Whew! I'm tired just typing about it! Once all of these papers are complete, they will be considered an official Dossier that will then be sent to China. Once in China our dossier will be given a log in date, a date of huge importance during our journey. It is estimated right now that the date to receive the referral of your child typically comes six months after your log in date.
#2 The Wait
After months of paper chasing, once we have a LID (logged in date) in China we will begin waiting. We anticipate waiting six months or so, and we should be able to estimate when our referral is coming based on many internet adoption sites we now belong to. Each month we will be able to virtually "watch" other families receive their referrals and see how the wait time is progressing. The reason for the six month or so wait time, is that our papers will now be at the CCAA, China Center for Adoption Affairs, a Chinese Government Bureau that handles all international adoptions. Once there our papers will be translated, process and in general shuffled around until we are matched with our daughter.
#3 The Referral
Once China has matched us to our child, they will send us a photo or two of our child along with as much information as they have (which probably won't be much). We are specifically requesting a girl, under the age of 1. We expect that at referral our little girl will be between the ages of 6 and 12 months old. While some are surprised to hear that we will have no say or choice of what little girl we receive, we actually are thrilled with the process . . . we believe God has known from before time began who was meant to be in our family, and we are just waiting for Him to reveal her to us! The referral will hopefully include some general information about her personality and interests, and we will not be surprised if she has the typical "orphanage haircut." Many children in the orphanages are given very short haircuts in order to help promote cleanliness. Upon acceptance of our daughter, we will then be given travel approval from China and expect to travel within 6 to 8 weeks post referral. We already dream of Referral Day and what it will be like to "give birth" via adoption . . . we just can't wait! Given the way things are moving along, we can very tentatively estimate that we receive a referral in October 2005.
#4 The Travel
Once we receive our referral, we will know exactly where in China our little girl is waiting for us. Our travel will take approximately 10 to 14 days. We will fly first to the province in China where our little girl lives in an orphanage. We would expect to be united with our daughter within the first day or two after we arrive. We must spend 4 to 5 days in the province processing much of the Chinese adoption paperwork. We might also have the opportunity to visit our daughters orphanage, and perhaps her abandonment site (more on that later). After finishing our paperwork within the province, we will travel to Guangzhou, China where the US Consulate is located. This city is home to almost 7 million people and literally caters to the adoption community with lavish hotels, stores, and touristy type things. It is here that we will process our daughters' US Visa and passport and have a cursory medical exam. Once all of our work is done there, we will fly home to be united with our entire family!

China's Adoption Crisis

We would like to share with you some of the history as to why so many little girls live in and/or grow up in orphanages throughout China. Please realize that we share this information with you to help you understand all the emotions we are experiencing as we go through this process, and also to help you understand where our daughter is coming from. Some day at the appropriate time we will share this information with our daughter.

Birth Facts in China

China is the most populous country in the world with 1.2 billion people . . . that is 22% of the world's population. China has had a one child policy for the last several decades, and it is enforced to varying degrees within different regions of its country. Two years ago urban Chinese were granted the right to have two children per family, but not every family and every region is granted this privilege. In some places, a couple must apply to the government and receive an authorized schedule of with it is "their turn" to try for pregnancy. The penalties for having unauthorized children are severe and can consist of being fined a year's wages, the loss of a job, imprisonment, social ostracism, etc. Forced abortion has been a common practice to both eliminate an unwanted pregnancy or a baby girl. There are other, equally barbaric choices, that are made once a baby girl is born if an abortion was not performed while pregnant. But there is another choice, for those unwilling or unable to care for their child, they can abandon their baby in a public place, knowing that the child will be picked up, taken to a local police station and "logged in", and then placed in an orphanage. We have spent many hours imagining the agony those millions of mothers have faced when giving up their child. What must it be like to leave your child on the steps of the police station, and then hope that she might be one of the lucky ones who will be adopted into a home where she can be cared for and loved forever? The heartache that must follow these mothers forever just haunts us.

Baby Boys

China is primarily an agricultural country where hard labor is necessary for survival, and therefore there is a need for men and boys. Cultural practice also maintains the desire for a son. It is the son who will take care of the aging parents and carry on the family name and farm. In a country where this is no social security, pensions or retirement plans, a son is the security a family seeks. When a Chinese daughter grows up and marries, it is with her inlaws that she will live and serve.

Abandonment of Baby Girls

It is illegal in most of China to give birth to a second child. It is also illegal to abandon a child, though many seem to have no other choice because there is no system in place for a parent to make an adoption plan and place their child with another family. It is a relative Catch 22 for birthparents, forcing literally millions of parents to abandon their child anonymously. Some birthmothers leave a note of the child's birth day and possibly a bit more information, but for most abandoned daughters of China, there is no birth record or history to be traced. It is then up to the orphanage to give each child a name and birthdate.

Chinese Orphanages

There are about 1,000 orphan facilities in China, also know as Social Welfare Institutes (SWI). Only about 250 of these SWI's are licensed for international adoption. Those that are licensed receive income from the adoption fees; this income enables them to provide a relatively good environment for the children. Although many of these orphanages are short of resources and cannot give each child adequate personal attention, the caregivers do seem to become quite attached to the children. Because of the love and care the children do receive, babies from China, in general, are not showing significant attachment problems. While some children may be malnourished and many will be somewhat developmentally delayed, those who are adopted seem to be able to quickly overcome these initial set-backs. Please pray, not just for our future daughter, but for all of the precious children who are growing up without homes. It seems a bleak picture, but the more we are aware and praying and seeking to make a difference, the more beautiful the picture can become.

The saddest part of the orphanage story is the remaining 750 or so orphanages that have very little resources available because they are not participating in international adoption. These orphanages are unable to provide basic services like nutrition, medical care, education, or even heat. The plight of these children is practically unimaginable. Please pray. If you are led, there are many organizations and resources available to help these children who are desperately in need.

When We Return: Bonding

We will expect that our daughter will go through a sort of grieving process when we first take her in to our family. While in China we expect and actually hope for her to grieve the loss of the only caretakers she has ever known. Her grief would actually indicate a healthy ability to attach and bond with others. While we hope that our new daughter will be able to bond with us relatively easily and quickly, we realize this may not be the case. It will take her awhile to realize we are permanent and she is not going with anyone else. We will want to be very sensitive to our daughters need for attachment and bonding, so we will be taking every precaution we see necessary at the time. When we return home it will seem to our little girl like her entire world has been turned upside down, and in fact it will have. Every sight, sound, smell and taste will be new to her. She may take everything in stride or she may be overwhelmed for a few weeks. Please be patient with us when we return. If you come for a visit and we don't immediately pass her around, please know that we are just trying to make the most wise decisions possible to enable our daughter to adjust to her new and exciting life.

To sum it all up, we are humbled by God's gift to us that we are receiving by the miracle of adoption. We are thankful for your interest in our journey, and we hope that if you have any questions at all during this process you would feel free to ask us.

Thank you already for your sweet love and support,
Lee and Tracy

PS. If you are interested further to learn more about women in China and the factors leading to this gender imbalance and preference in China, we have a few suggestions!

Wild Swans, by Jung Chang - This is not about adoption, but is is a wonderful biography and autobiography of 3 generations of women in China throughout the 20th century. It really gave me some insights on to how and why China is the country it is today.

The Lost Daughters of China, by Karin Evans

Wanting a Daughter, Needing a Son, Kay Ann Johnson, Amy Klatzkin

Lisa Ling hosted a National Geographic special on "China's Lost Girls". It is now on DVD and may be repeated on the National Geographic Explorer channel. She was also on Oprah to discuss the special and that may be in reruns as well.

PPS. China accepts potential international adoptive parents from ages 30-55ish and also a limited number of single women.........just in case you were wondering!