TA’s have started to arrive for the early July referral batch.

Congrats to those families who are that much closer to being able to buy airplane tickets!

How about a little balance? I talked about anger, I should talk about joy as well.

There is a lot more joy in my life than there is anger. Tons more joy than anger. And for that, I am most grateful.

Both of my girls bring me more joy than I could have possibly imagined. The feel of their arms around my neck, their kisses on my cheek. The artwork they make for me. TwinkleToes saying “I off oo mommie” (I love you, mommie). GlitterGirl seeing me from a distance when I arrive somewhere to pick her up and running to me as fast as she can, stumbling over her words to tell me about her day as quickly as possible. The two of them (and the dog) greeting me at the door when I come home and they are already there. All of us in the car singing together. Reading books to them at night. Listening to the two of them play in the bathtub together.

This is the happy post, so I’m not talking about the cleaning of vomit, or the fits pitched because if they eat peaches right after apples they will have a tummy ache so I have to say they can’t have peaches right after apples, or the argument over which teddy bear belongs to who after grandparents buy them identical teddy bears, or the tears in the morning because one shoe is missing and someone has to wear a pair of shoes they don’t want to wear.

But you know what? Even the exasperating stuff makes up the good part of the day. Most days, anyway.

Yes, there is a lot more Joy in my life than anger.

Today I’m going to talk mostly about what and who I am not angry with.

First on that list is the CCAA as a government agency. I believe that most of the employees of the CCAA have the best interest of the babies at heart. I’ve heard from too many people who have personally met them, I can’t believe any differently. By all accounts, the ‘worker bees’ at the CCAA take their jobs very seriously. I’ve heard mixed reviews about upper management, but I’m not directing my anger that way, either. I don’t know if upper management is making decisions or following orders, so I can’t really be angry at them, either. As I said yesterday, it is my hope that anyone responsible for creating this mess someday understand, in their heart, exactly what it is that they have done.

Next on the list of what I’m not angry at will have to be the one child policy. Surprised? Let’s look back in history for a bit to understand why the policy was put in place to begin with. After years of food shortages and people literally starving to death, the country was finally able to feed most everyone. But the government looked ahead and realized that if families continued having lots of kids that in another decade or two there would (again) not be enough food to feed everyone. Realize that in the late fifties and early sixties it is estimated that between 20 and 43 million people in China died of starvation. In some areas one out of every four people died of starvation. Imagine 16 of your friends and family, with four of them dead to starvation and you perhaps not far from it. Can you imagine how scary it would be to have the money to buy food but no food available to buy?

So, in the late 70’s when the one birth policy was put in place, it was done in part to keep the population from exploding back to what it had been when there wasn’t enough food to feed everyone. This is an over simplification of course since there was more at work during the famine than just population, but it’s a complicated subject and I’m trying to do this in a blog post and not a book. My point, kind of, is that it has been my experience that most Chinese people understand the reasons for the one child policy. I say this based on conversations I’ve had with them. They are sad that they are only allowed one child, but they understand the reasoning for the policy and they are not bitter about it. Many of them appreciate that it has kept the country from going back to the days of food shortages and say that it is necessary, even though they are sad that they can’t have more children. If most of them aren’t bitter about it, I can’t really be angry at it, either. I don’t like some of the results of the policy, and I hate the way it has been enforced in previous years, but I understand that it was a choice of children not being born at all, or children being born only to starve to death later.

Am I angry at TT’s orphanage? Not really. The emotional part of me wants to be angry with TT’s orphanage director for not running a better orphanage, and for not feeding the babies better. And for having all of those babies and toddlers there that were not made paper ready so they can have families. And most of all for making TT wait so long for a family. But the rational part of me knows that’s not realistic. I don’t know the reasons, and his hands may be tied. For all I know, someone at the CCAA told him he can send paperwork for ten babies a year and he’s doing the best he can within those limits. There were a lot of babies there, and I don’t know what kind of a budget he has to work with. Maybe it hurts him to see the babies on the verge of starvation, too. All I can do is hope that if he is choosing this path instead of being forced down it that he someday see what it is that he has done. Not with his eyes and mind, but with his heart.

Someone asked yesterday if I think the program was slowed deliberately. I know that not everyone agrees with me, but yes, I do believe it was slowed deliberately. Once upon a time I think that China was proud of running the best IA program on the planet. But somewhere I think that shifted, and someone decided that a world power shouldn’t be running the best IA program on the planet. World powers are supposed to take care of their own. And if you think about it, what better way to prove that there is no longer an abandonment problem? When the media asks about IA during the Olympics they are going to be told how there is no longer an abandonment problem and the proof will be the long wait to adopt a baby.

Some people visit their child’s orphanage and see an almost empty orphanage or an orphanage with only special needs babies. Others (like me) visit and see an orphanage full of babies who are not special needs, they (like me) are told the special needs children are in another part of the building. Now that I’ve got people asking, many are discovering that the empty orphanages still have almost as many babies in their care as they did two or three or four years ago on their first trip, but that those babies are now in foster care. Same number of babies, they just aren’t visible anymore. This isn’t true everywhere, in the economically booming areas the orphanages aren’t seeing as many abandonments, but in economically depressed areas, and areas with factories that hire mostly young women, some orphanages have more babies than ever. Remember, the one child policy is not the only reason mothers decide they can’t raise a child. It happens all over the world, even where there is no such policy. When someone can’t afford to raise a child they look for someone who can.

There are some who think the wait will speed up some after the Olympics. Some agencies are saying the ‘donation’ being raised will be the reason for the speed up, that the CCAA will say that the higher donation gave enough incentive to the orphanage directors so they would spend the money to make the babies paper ready. But other agencies are saying there will be no speed up, that things are going to be the same and possibly get even slower. I don’t really know who to believe at this point, but without a backlog of finding ads I’m not sure how things will immediately speed up. I am told that most of the babies in orphanages now did not have a finding ad placed when they arrived, and that means they likely will never be able to be adopted through IA. Finding ads are, for the most part, only placed for babies the orphanage intends to make paper ready for IA. If they don’t intend to make them available for IA there is no finding ad placed.

To try to wrap this up, as I said yesterday, I don’t really have anyone or anything to direct my anger towards. The best I can do is just hope that whoever made the decisions that created this situation will someday completely understand what it is that they have done.

As for what I’m angry about, I think many of you misinterpreted that. I’m angry because TwinkleToes laid in a crib with no one to hold her, and barely enough food to survive, while our family waited to be allowed to adopt her. We were all forced to wait. It wasn’t just RK and GG and I waiting. TT was waiting, too.

I’m angry because my child starved both physically and emotionally for more than a year longer than she should have had to. The mama bear in me rears up at that every once in a while and there is no way to deny how it makes me feel. If she’d been adopted at a year or slightly less instead of the age she was adopted then I believe her life would be much different than it is going to be. She’s a survivor, she’ll survive it. But the point is that she shouldn’t have to. Her brain was starved of nourishment and stimulation at a very crucial part of her life. The brain works on a timetable, and she missed out on learning things when she was supposed to be learning them. I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that this can be worked around, but it can’t be fixed.

I’ve directed my anger in the healthiest way I believe that I can. It’s not going away, but I believe I’ve made peace with it. Mostly.

And I’m talking about it because I see that I’m not the only one dealing with these feelings.

I’ve talked about this before: Who to be angry at. I made a comment yesterday that has me thinking about that. Who is my anger at?

The answer is that I’m not angry at anyone in particular. I suppose if I have to name my anger, it’s toward a system that allows children to languish in substandard care while parents who have jumped through every hoop imaginable to prove they are worthy sit waiting to adopt them. I realize that not all of the babies are in substandard care, but mine was.

But, that same system made the adoption possible. So, it’s kind of a confusing anger.

In the end, the peace I’ve made with myself is that I don’t wish revenge or retribution on anyone. My hope is that for anyone out there who has knowingly contributed to this mess, that they at some point in their life learn exactly what it is that they have done. Not just in their head, but in their heart. I’m not going to sit in judgment of them, but it is my hope that someday they understand enough of what they have done to sit in judgment of themselves.

As for what I’ll do: I’ll love my girls with all my heart. My anger belongs to me, and I’ll do my best to not hand it off to them. Someday TwinkleToes may need to know it is there, but that day is a long way away. And maybe she’ll never need to know about it. I’ll have to play that one by ear and see what the future holds. Maybe she’ll have only positive feelings about her time in China and her adoption, and maybe she will never need to know I was angry on her behalf. But maybe she’ll have her own feelings of anger and will need to know that others who love her feel the same way and have learned to deal with the anger without letting it take over.

For now, it’s my job to teach her to be proud of the country of her birth. And, I’m not mad at China in general, that’s not where my anger is aimed. My anger is aimed at individuals who may have made choices that have kept babies in orphanages when they could have been with families.

And it isn’t an all encompassing anger. So, I guess I have dealt with it, probably as well as it will ever be dealt with. Like I said, someone caused pain to my child. Possibly long lasting stuff that won’t ever go away, she’ll just have to figure out how to live her life around it. The mama bear in me can’t help but react to that.

And I guess I’m talking about it because I see others out there dealing with similar feelings. I had none of these feelings after adopting GlitterGirl. I wish I could feel the same warm fuzzies now as I did after GG’s adoption. But, I don’t, and denial of my feelings won’t make them go away. I think the best way to deal with them is to accept them, embrace them, and then focus on the good stuff as much as possible. And when the feelings of anger come up, I don’t just shoo them away. I accept them, but I don’t let them take over.

Three years ago we were waiting for our I-171H. Everything was done, we were just waiting on the &%$&* USCIS Office to get us that final piece of paper. They, of course, took much longer than they should have.

Mainly I guess I’m just being sentimental. It’s been three years since we were on the back end of the paperchase, and almost a year and a half since we traveled to get TwinkleToes. It breaks my heart that, at the current rate, there will be people who will still be waiting three years after their paperchase.

I watched my girls dance along with Hi5 this morning. TwinkleToes is quite good at following along with the moves. She can’t sing along yet, but she sure can dance with them. I know of a dance studio in the area that has an excellent preschool program and I’m thinking of signing her up in the fall. She’s young, but she has an aptitude for it. And, as I said, they have a great preschool program. The focus is on having fun, not being good. I’ve noticed though, that their little preschoolers are actually pretty good. GlitterGirl wouldn’t have been able to handle it at three, but I think it will be good for TwinkleToes.

I am so glad that my girls are so close. They are farther apart in years than I think siblings usually are, but somehow it works out. I can see each girl’s individual talents beginning to come out. GlitterGirl has noticed it, too. There are a few things that TwinkleToes is almost as good at as she is and GG thinks that is just wrong. I’ve explained that everyone has their talents, things that come easy for them. She’s working through that. She thinks she’s supposed to be better than her sister at everything.

I haven’t had to travel much for work since we returned home, but that’s starting to change a little. I guess they figure they’ve given me enough time. And, theoretically they are right, but being away from my girls, even for a day or two, is excruciating. Who knew that two small people could wedge themselves so fiercely into my heart?

There isn’t really a point to this post. I guess the point could be that the wait sucks and that even a year and a half after you are home you remember the pain of it. Or it could just be a rambling post.

The last 12 referral batches arrived at 28, 32, 29, 31, 33, 26, 32, 31, 32, 28, 38 and 28 days.

The least time between batches is 26 days, the most is 38, and the average is 31. We see 28 and 32 three times each, and we see 31 twice.

The soonest I would expect to see them this month is Monday, August 4 and the latest is Thursday, August 14. The most likely arrival based on the average would be Thursday, August 7.

But we have to talk about the Olympics. There is speculation that the CCAA might want to get a new batch out if indeed they are going to be shut down during the Olympics. We know that only businesses needed for the Olympics (mostly hospitality places) are supposed to be open for business. But we aren’t sure if that means non-essential government employees will be told to stay home as well. If they are going to shut down and if they want to get one more batch out before then… well then my guess is we could expect to see them begin arriving August 4th. But that’s a lot of iffing.

And, if they don’t get a batch out and they close the office for the Olympics, I have no idea when they might get another batch out.