Well, none of the kids anyway. And the parents can’t go off to sleep leaving the three children to entertain themselves all night. I’m sure they’d be happy to, but I don’t think it’s either safe or healthy.
So we’ve banned electronics between 10 and 5 and insisted on lights being out.
Which is apparently akin to torture. We’ve been told we’re very bad people (in words that I don’t understand, and can’t find in a dictionary. Probably just as well I don’t know what they are. Makes it easier to not take offense.)
And some folks won’t sleep anyway–so last night we had a baking session between 3 and 4 am, and I didn’t get to bed until past 8. AM. Tonight’s a little better. Everybody in bed (or at least prone in a reasonably comfortable spot) and quiet by 2. At this rate, we might have semi-normal bedtimes in a week or so.
I’m beginning to think it might be even worse trying to get over jet-lag with tweens and a teen than it was with toddlers.
So the trip home was the usual trans-Pacific marathon (About 26 hours all told–going from Guangzhou to Shanghai to LA to Denver. We had a van, a couple buses, three planes, an airport shuttle, three security lines, two customs/immigration checks, and finally, at the end, another van). The normal exhaustion was complicated by a security gentleman in LA deciding Ben’s bag needed to be gone through with a fine tooth comb (the search found nothing, but resulted in a missed flight and the need to tramp to another terminal to catch our back-up). We also had a couple of bouts of “You go on; I’m tired and want to stay here.” Fortunately the “You go” bits didn’t last too long, and each time, after a few minutes of rest (and sometimes some food), everybody was willing to move on together. We were very glad we didn’t have to force anyone onto any airplanes.
When we got in last night (I suppose technically it was this morning), the children who had been dragging their feet through the last two airports suddenly had boundless energy. Who could sleep? Didn’t I know it felt like morning?
But, hey, we were home. Even J smiled a bit.
Our boys show what they love best about being home: the access to wifi and electrical outlets.
Now we’re on to the challenge of trying to show all our kids that we love them, even if they’re tired and grumpy, and even if we’re barely keeping our eyes open (and somewhat grumpy ourselves).
Besides the jet-lag, screen time and food have been the major challenges so far.
With screen time, it’s a matter of J feeling like he shouldn’t have any limits at all, and us feeling that some limits are essential to family relationships and everybody’s health and safety. So far, the only rule we’ve insisted on is “internet-connected devices only get used in public spaces.” When I enforced this one, I got mutterings about how I’m not an OK person. I suspect today is not the last time I’ll hear that.
With food, the trouble was not having much in the house when we got in, and then realizing that many of our usual foods are things J doesn’t like to eat. We did have some instant noodles to tide people over to the morning, and we picked up some fruit and other things that served us fairly well today. We’ll have to keep going by trial and error until we can figure out what works for all of us. At least we know that most fruits are welcome. I also foresee more Ramen and other noodles in our future than we’ve been used to.
We had jiaozi for supper, and B dragged himself up from a nap to eat a few before returning directly to bed. (I love that King Soopers has tolerable Chinese dumplings in their freezer section.)
So day one as a family in our own home is nearing a close. Thanks to all of you who’ve been thinking of us and praying for us along our journey. I know it has helped immensely.
Just a quick post to say we’ve all made it home safely. It’s after 3:30 in the morning here, so I’ll post more about the trip after I’ve been able to sleep some.
K in the garden with Feng Laoshi and Shi Laoshi (the teachers from J’s orphanage who accompanied us to Guangzhou).
Today was another free day (well, a wait around for visa paperwork to show up day). We enjoyed the breakfast buffet, walked around outside a bit, enjoyed the gorgeous garden here (on the fourth floor for whatever reason) ate several times, took naps, and then in the cool of the evening, played around in the pool as a family. We saw a bunch more real smiles from J, and had quite the splash war going. Not a bad day at all.
We hope tomorrow, when we fly, everything will also go reasonably smoothly.
J has joined our family. In the eyes of both the Chinese and the US governments, he’s ours.
After the months of paperwork and week or so of worry, it was ridiculously easy. We went into the consulate, (we were the first of two families this morning), gave them our paperwork, and waited a few minutes. Then the other mother and I took an oath. They asked J a couple of questions–to which he responded the mildly affirmative “ng,” Then they asked us another question or two, and then it was all done. We’ll get J’s visa tomorrow, and can come home on Saturday. (There may well be challenges with that, but at this point we figure it’s best to worry about one hurdle at a time, and this felt like a big one. We’re glad we cleared it.)
In the evening we had more swimming and a bit of fusball, and J seemed to really enjoy himself, and maybe connect a bit with Craig and the other kids.
It’s a bit uncomfortable all hanging out in the hotel, but nobody really wants to go out (except the parents sometimes, and unfortunately, we can’t go out together!), so we’re kind of stuck until we get home. In some ways, I can’t wait for Saturday.
The only thing on our official schedule today was a debriefing about our return to the States (how to get through the various customs and immigration checks). Craig did that by himself while the rest of us hung out in the room. For a while, we had three competing movies going–way noisy.
At lunchtime we got a special visit from Joshua Zhong (the co-founder of our adoption agency). I believe he was already in-country for meetings, and he stopped by to check in with J. J really likes Joshua, and we’ve got a couple of great pictures with real smiles (check out the one at the right).
This evening we got out of the room for supper and then for some swimming. All in all, not a bad day.
At least that’s what it sounds like J was saying this morning as he tried to get some friends to help him with something. After checking in with our CCAI rep here, we think it was shoring up his lines of communication, so he’s sure to still be able to get in touch with the people he knows when he returns with us to America. (At least I hope it was a friend he was talking to at the point he gave out the password. He was also talking to at least one stranger at the time.)
In some ways it’s discouraging that he doesn’t feel like we can or will be able to help him keep lines of communication open, but in other ways it’s very encouraging that he seems to be planning on coming home with us. It was also encouraging that he was willing to play basketball with us for a while (maybe half an hour) this evening.
B and K also benefited from getting out of the hotel room, if only for a few minutes. They’re holding up pretty well, though B is having a rough time adjusting to our new family dynamics. Even K has had a few bad moments.
At the end of the day, there’s one thing I keep thinking about–J’s password. It may be that “love” is indeed the password to his heart.
This morning, J and I, along with his teachers and a bunch of other adoptive families, went to the hospital that does all the check-ups for everybody who is trying to get an immigration visit to the US. Near as I can tell, J has been getting worked up about this since he heard about it. He got more and more sullen throughout the morning, and when it came time to do vaccinations, he actively resisted going into the room. His teachers believe the entire fuss was about a fear of vaccinations. This seems incredible to me–except I’m pretty sure Craig had to physically restrain Ben to get him to sit still for his last shot.
Eventually, J got them done, though, and he’s been more cooperative ever since. He still doesn’t want to leave the room or spend much time with us while he’s there, but he’s expressed some interest in food (he likes chicken sandwiches, cookies and pizza. We’ll see if we can’t manage to get some Chinese food into the mix tomorrow.) Anyway, we’re still moving forward, albeit slowly.
Since it’s late, I’ll keep this to the short story: With help from some wonderful ladies from Junyong’s orphanage, we made it to Guangzhou, and are back on a schedule where we should be able to finalize the adoption on Thursday.
We are supposed to be in Guangzhou at this time, but we’re still in Dalian because J ran away from us at the airport. This time I ran with him, and stayed with him until Craig and some friends were able to find us and take us back to a hotel room Craig had located for us. It took about five hours, mostly of walking around and around the parking lot. During this time, J frequently told people I wasn’t his mother and that he doesn’t want to go back to America with me. Once we got back, we learned that some of the reason for this (or perhaps all of it) was due to the fact that he felt embarrassed to have a foreigner for a mother, which is understandable. I do rather stand out, being a fat white woman with mediocre Chinese.
A couple of teachers from J’s school have come down here, and had a talk with him this evening. We’re not sure where things stand at the moment. We would like for this adoption to go forward, but J seems conflicted about it–both wanting and not wanting it. We’re trying to figure out if there’s any way we can make things work that is safe for him. We’ll meet with the teachers again early tomorrow to try to work things out.
