Day Four - Adoption processing

Day Four – Adoption processing

Today started VERY early. I woke up at 1:00am and could not fall back asleep. I laid there until Tony woke up at 3:00am. Jet lag is certainly setting in because those times don’t make sense in either time zone – 3:00 am China is 1:00pm in America – so this trip has got us all mixed up. Selah woke up with a screaming start at 4:00am. Her nannies said she usually sleeps until 6:00 – I’m not surprised today was different.

We changed her, played a bit and then she…and dad…fell back asleep. Unfortunately, they could only sleep a short while because we have to go to processing today and need to get an early start.

Today was a good day all things considered. We headed back to the same building that we were at yesterday.



We were really dreading this. We sat in the same room where her nannies left her yesterday. What was she thinking? Was she looking for them?

She wouldn’t get down from my lap. Even when I tried to set her down, she’d lean back into my chest – but all the staff who were there the day before came up to us at one time or another and said, “Much better than yesterday – no crying”. Yes, there was no crying, but I wonder if she was feeling any better. I doubt it.

We got a family photo taken and were interviewed about our “satisfaction” with our child and took an oath to never abandon her. They have the processing and notary the day after placement to allow parents the opportunity to “change their minds” if something unexpected comes up in the less-than-24 hours between placement and registration. The thought of someone actually exercising that option literally made me sick.

Then we had lunch and naptime! Mom and dad were definitely more interested in napping than baby. She refused to go in the bed – and by refused I mean she cried the most pathetic, mournful sounding “gee gee” – which was her name for one of her closest nannies. So, we brought her in bed with us and she crashed for only 20 minutes. The she laid there picking the tag on my shirt for an hour. The orphanage is right, she is a very “peaceful” child, but I suspect she has a million thoughts going on in that mind of hers. I can’t wait for her to let me in on them.

Then it was time to see the doctor in the afternoon. We were anxious to see the doctor because she has a nasty cough. She did great in there!


I think all the people attending to her and speaking Chinese and touching her really gave her comfort. Bing, the other mother in our group, is Chinese – I think I need to ask her to speak to Selah more. Everything check out fine and the doctor was not worried about her cough. I still am.

Then we came back to the room. We had food in the room to feed her for dinner. Tony and I were not hungry so we just fed her and ate some light snacks ourselves. I know were suppose to eat even if we don’t feel hungry, but I figured since I was only going to sleep it would be OK to break the rules. We’ll have a big breakfast in the morning.

We found out that Selah does not like to “teased”. She was playing with blocks and we put a ball on top and knocked the ball back off thinking she would enjoy seeing it roll. Every kid likes to knock things over, right? Wrong. First crying of the day. I can’t distract her verbally or try to attract her attention elsewhere because she has no idea what I’m saying. The typical techniques of child distraction are useless here. It’s like Superman not being able to fly or Spiderman having no webs. So, we turned to the only thing that does distract – TV- lots of Chinese TV or English TV with babies. It helps her lose focus on crying for awhile. Sorry, mom. I know you don’t like kids watching TV, but these are desperate times and desperate times…..well, you know.

Then we thought at 8pm we’d take a little nap because our eyes were no longer negotiating with us anyways. There was a coupe and our bodies took over our minds saying we must sleep. There was no “sleep or else….” It was "sleep now" – end of story. I was dreding what that would do to all of our schedules, but here I am up at 5:30am typing away and dad and Selah are sound asleep. So, I guess all is well.