An Adoption Reunion: Aliens in America

I've been thinking a lot and reading a lot lately about the issues Jen Fero raised in the documentary film Adopted which I wrote about recently. As a parent in general but also, as an adoptive parent, I feel a responsibility to learn and do all I can, to pay attention, to stay attuned, and help my Chinese born daughter feel at home in her adopted home, culture, and country. At the same time, I know the risk: it's easy to become hyper-vigilant, to second guess every exchange, and make oneself just a teeny bit ...stir crazy.

I'm thinking back to an exchange I had with my daughter this past summer.


It was the last weekend in August and my 9 year old daughter and I drove 3 hours south to join the annual reunion of 10 or so adoptive families who traveled together and bonded, 8 long years ago, on our journey to China to adopt our beloved daughters.

This year was the first time, since making this trek, since my daughter understood the significance of this gathering, since she'd struggled with the losses in her story this past spring, that my daughter was excited to go.

The reunion is typically hosted at one very generous family's home. We all contribute different dishes and share in a potluck dinner. We visit. We feast. We celebrate.

As parents, it's our hope our girls will develop and share a life-long bond. As parents, we already share a special bond, remembering that singular morning we gathered together in the lobby of the Liang hotel in Wuhan to meet our toddlers, each and every child looking pale, worried, tearful, and uncertain. We share the bond too of knowing, in a crazy-making-kind-of-way, that any one of our daughters -- the lanky girl running across the garden, the stocky girl sneaking an extra helping of noodles, the girl seated shyly at the table -- could just as easily have been our daughter. None of us will ever know, or be able to divine, the thinking (or even if there was much thinking) that went into the effort to match each girl with each family. It happened thousands of miles away, in a small sterile office, at the China Center for Adoption Affairs, in Beijing. The end result? No music, no fanfare. Just a letter and a crude photo mailed, special delivery, to homes across the US, a single envelope that would change the trajectory of each of our lives.

With the start of the reunion this year, the girls took a little time to warm to each other. But soon enough they embraced each other and the traditional party-like atmosphere. In prior years, one of the dad's had rigged a hose to a giant, jerry-rigged slip'n slide. Another year, the girls had partied on an enormous outdoor trampoline. This year the girls piled like puppies on to a hammock, swinging and tumbling. Then they disappeared to the basement to test their skills at Wii Karaoke and some kind of rock band fantasy. But the big hit, by the end of the evening, was an improvised i-spy, hide and seek game staged in and out of the garden and throughout the house.

It was stunning to see the difference the years have made. The girls seemed especially happy, as if they'd come into their own. They were healthy, strong, boisterous, sassy, and happy, hanging on us parents with an easy sense of entitlement. We might as well have been door posts planted for their pleasure. They rammed, tugged, poked, pulled, and punched at us playfully. We smiled back, caressing a head, stroking an arm, patting a bottom, exercising a parent's prerogative.

It was late in the evening by the time we said our good byes and thanked everyone. My daughter had been running non-stop, laughing, popping in and out of our host's house, clustered together with the gang of girls. Her eyes were bright, her cheeks flushed. She was either coming down with swine flu -- or she'd had a good time. On the drive back to our hotel, I checked in:

"Did you enjoy the reunion?"

"Yeah Mom. It was great. It was awesome!"

"Awesome, huh? Well, that's good news. I'm glad we came."

"Yeah. Me too. And, guess what Mom?" She whispered: "I'm not supposed to tell you this -- so don't say a word to the other parents -- but I just have to tell you --"

(What mom doesn't love this?)

"What's that honey?"

"We were aliens! We decided to pretend all the Chinese girls were aliens. And, we were hiding and spying on the parents!"

"Nooo way. Too funny."

We talked on, sharing impressions of the night. Nostalgia got the better of me and I shared a confession, dead certain the other moms felt exactly the same way -- and would have felt the same way again, even if the match between girls and parents had somehow played out differently.

"You know honey... I love each and every one of you girls. We're all family in a sense. Our lives are connected. But I feel blessed cause somehow I had the amazing good fortune of becoming your mom. I love being your mom."

She was quiet a moment. "But you know.... you're not my mom."

My heart lurched and froze for a nanosecond. Did the reunion trigger something? Were we headed back to the exchanges of last spring?

"No..?" I asked weakly. I glanced in the rear view mirror and saw her raising her palms upward. She looked at me -- like I was slow.

"I just TOLD you! I'm an ALIEN!"

I laughed. Apologized. And resumed breathing.



Sometimes, just sometimes, an alien is just an alien.

Finding Home, Feeling at Home -- An Adult Adoptee's Painful Story

Nine year old tidbit for the day:

"Hey Mom! Did you know if you whisper --" she drops her voice a notch below audible and, with exaggerated precision, mouths: "'E-le-phant shoes,' -- people think you're saying 'I love you!'"

This pleases her.

My daughter is full of good humor and snappy comebacks these days while I've been scrambling to launch her back into the school year and launch myself, full force, back into the job hunt. We've had a lot going on. Last week, the stress got the better of me. Out of patience, I launched into a lecture and told her if she couldn't learn to help around the house and clean up the trail of mess she leaves behind -- in the front hall, on the couch, on the dining room table, all over the kitchen counter -- and find a home for each and every one of her belongings, I'd have to assume they were leftovers. Trash. Oh, yes. The 18 origami cranes that lay for the past two days littered about the piano bench like leaves in the yard? Trash. Obviously trash.

She stammered, looking for the right response. "But, but... they're not trash! That, that... that is their home! It... it's... it's a display, Mom."

The corners of her mouth twitch and a wry smile escapes at this unexpected flash of creativity. I too am taken by surprise, and explode with a belly laugh. The cranes earn a reprieve and she quickly sweeps them into a nearby drawer.


We are back to innocent, happy days once more. But, in my off hours here and there, I continue the adoptive parents' journey in due diligence. Two weeks ago, a Korean adoptive parenting group (Korea Focus) and our local FCC (Families with Children from China) organization sponsored the showing of Point Made Films' documentary "Adopted." And so it was, thanks to an invitation and prompting from one my blog readers (Thank you Laura) I found myself with a gathering of 15 or so other adoptive parents in a well lit church basement one Tuesday evening.

According to the Point Made Films' web site, "'Adopted' reveals the grit rather than the glamor of transracial adoption."

The film is controversial and it's easy to see why.

We meet John and Jacqui Trainer of New Hampshire. They are just beginning their adoption journey and they're filled with great hope and joy at the prospect of becoming parents. They want to do the right thing by their child. There's no doubt they're completely committed and will love their daughter deeply. At the same time, it's clear they have no concept of the issues and challenges involved in transracial adoption. These issues and challenges are highlighted by Jen Fero, a 32 year old Korean born woman, adopted and raised in the late 70's and early 80's by a loving Euro American family in a small Oregon town.

Jen is the dominant voice in the film and, as she looks back, sharing her experience, she raises a number of blunt, difficult questions not only for her own adoptive, now terminally ill parents -- but for other adoptive parents, particularly those with children of differing racial backgrounds. Jen narrates her story and shares how early on she came to put on a game face, to present herself to her family, to the broader world, as the happy, funny, affectionate daughter she thought her family wanted.
Underneath this veneer, she struggled.

As a child, Jen heard again and again from people in her community what a "lucky" girl she was. But Jen didn't feel lucky. As much as she loved her adoptive parents, she felt loss and sadness over her abandonment by her Korean family. Jen's adoptive family emphasized their love and sense of good fortune in having her as their daughter -- but her losses were never referenced or acknowledged. Jen feared disappointing her parents, contradicting their joy. She felt she ought to be happy. Unable to discuss or explore the possible reasons behind her abandonment, Jen was left with a nagging vulnerability. What if she failed to please her adoptive family? She assumed a kind of vigilance, striving to please and placate her family. She learned to deny her more challenging, difficult feelings.

Growing up in a white family and predominantly white community, Jen identified with those around her. Since Jen's parents believed love was more important than race, they chose not to discuss racial differences. But -- if there's an elephant in the room and no one mentions the elephant -- will the elephant disappear? Jen was left to wrestle with the differences that announced themselves in the mirror each morning. The image of her own uniquely Asian face, her eyes, her nose, her skin tone, created a dissonance within her. When she was out in the neighborhood, in the school yard, on the playground, other children saw these differences too and they teased and taunted her. Jen felt ashamed. Lacking any kind of dialog at home, she had no words, no language, no safe harbor, place, or person to confide her troubles.

Remarks not only from other children but from others, elsewhere, over the years, made Jen aware there were people who didn't view her as fully American. Jen yearned to return "home" to Korea. But when she traveled to Korea, she found she was far more American than Korean -- and Koreans saw this too. When Jen moved away from her hometown to a larger city for work, she struggled to feel fully accepted within white communities -- but also had difficulty feeling a sense of belonging with other Korean Americans.

In the film, Jen makes an earnest effort to communicate her struggles and bridge the connection with her terminally ill parents. But the message they have failed her is too much and perhaps, too late, and too painful for them to take in. They don't understand and Jen feels even more alone. She succombs to anti-depressants and pain killers and is forced to leave her terminally ill parents to commit to her own self care, to enter a rehabillitation program.

Watching "Adopted," I felt a little like Ebenezer Scrooge witnessing the slow parade of ghosts of Christmases past, present, and future. I remembered the dark moment Scrooge stood perched at the edge of what would prove to be his grave, afraid to peer over and confront the worst.



Was Jen's fate my daughter's fate? Our fate? There was still time. What more could I, can I do, here in the present, to re-cast our future?

I'm being a tad melodramatic. But there's no denying Jen's story is tragic. By all appearances, her parents were loving, well meaning people. It took great courage for Jen as well as her parents to allow the film makers into their home, to share their story, and offer the seeds of hard-won wisdom.

I think there were two distinctly different issues at stake for Jen.

The first problem was that Jen was never encouraged or given the opportunity to recognize her own unique story -- and losses -- as a separate, legitimate reality apart from her adoptive parents' story -- their journey and joy in adopting and raising their daughter. Jen sensed her sadness and grief at losing her birth parents posed a threat or, at the very least, would prove hurtful to her parents. So she bottled up her sadness. As she grew older, as the pain persisted, she tried to numb it, then medicate it away.

As a community, as adoptive parents, we've learned how important it is to help our children own and process their stories -- including their losses. We live with the irony that our children's greatest loss is the basis for our joy: their presence in our lives. As threatening as that may feel, we have to support our children, to help them grieve one family so they are free to celebrate the next. Jen's experience is, in part, a desperate cry for this recognition and validation.

The second issue Jen wrestled with is, I think, even more complex.

Jen’s well meaning parents failed to recognize and address the challenges that come with being a mixed race family. To be fair, I think the Feros followed the beliefs of their generation. Once you adopted, you treated your child as if s/he were -- had always been -- your own. Love and acceptance trumped dislocation or differences. To acknowledge the rift or difference threatened the fantasy the bond could be re-made, perfect and whole. So families didn’t discuss abandonment, adoption -- or race. Korean adult adoptees like Jen have taught us the price of this denial.

Listening to Jen, I couldn’t help wondering if her struggle to fit in was unique to her experience as a transracial adoptee – or part of the broader experience of persons of color, of racial, ethnic, and religious minorities in this country. Friends of mine raised by immigrant parents, Chinese, Japanese, Spanish, Italian, Polish, and Russian, have shared childhood memories of not fitting in, of being the outsider, living betwixt and between two cultures, the culture of their parents' generation versus that of the American school yard and the media. Those of my friends who were happiest seemed to have found a way to mix and move comfortably in both worlds, having made their peace, even taking pride in a hybrid identity.

Is it possible Jens’ struggles to fit in were more authentically Korean American, or Asian American, than she realized?

As for adoptive parents, how many of us truly acknowledge, or understand that, when we adopt a child of another race, we become a family of color?

When I first made my decision to adopt my daughter, I threw myself into reading and learning everything I could about China. I developed a deep, one could argue naïvely romantic fascination for its difficult history, politics, and people. Now, as much as I know it’s helpful to give my daughter a sense of pride in her birth country, I see there are many more layers to my job.

White adoptive parents have only known the world of white privilege. We have no idea what it feels like to walk about in someone else’s skin, to enter a classroom, apply for a job, shop at the local mall or museum, wander a city street and greet the world with a face that isn’t Euro American -- but is Asian American, Latin American, or African American.

We are blind and yet, we need to learn more, read more, reach out more, if we are to help our children feel at home, with a mix of faces, in a variety of places.

Wrestling with the Daddy Issue

Even as I was making my decision to adopt my daughter from China, I pondered if it was fair to adopt a child when I couldn't offer the complete package, both a mom and a dad.

Friends argued a loving mother, a warm, stable home life, and extended family and friends were better than the alternative, institutional life, or nothing at all. I bought into their arguments and, at the same time, told myself there was always the possibility I might still meet someone wonderful. I had the issue neatly and rationally sorted out in my mind -- until I viewed the question from the other side.

In those first few days and weeks, as I held my daughter in my arms, as I looked into her innocent, cherubic-like face, as I felt the weight of her body, the rhythm of her breath, and smelled her powdery, baby-like scent, the reality of what I'd done sank in -- in a different, decidedly more visceral way. This little bundle of life was mine. All mine. Her life, her health, her most basic needs, her happiness, now lay in my hands. As the days unfolded, a powerful new instinct flooded my veins and, as it did, one of the more troubling thoughts that creeped back into my mind was:

Have I done something really selfish?

In my more vulnerable moments, the question haunted me. Could I really be all she needed me to be? But then reality, the relentless demands of everyday life with a baby, prevailed. The flow of her life merged with mine in a single, unending blur of her sleeping, waking, eating, peeing, pooping and sleeping . We played, we laughed, and my daughter blossomed.

It wasn't till several years later, when I was driving her home from pre-school one day, that she first raised the issue herself. It seemed to come out of nowhere. One moment the car was quiet. The next moment, she said it:

I wish I had a Dad.

The blood drained from my fingers while my grip on the steering wheel tightened. My body went cold and I proceeded to flood my daughter with empathy, reflections, ideas, and suggestions. I babbled on for a good five minutes -- till I glanced in the rear view mirror and noticed my daughter looking out the window, watching the scenery, humming. She was three, maybe four. My words had washed right past her.

I'd overlaid an innocent comment, devoid of deeper meaning, with the backlog of my own emotional baggage. I replayed our exchange and it occurred to me -- with respect to dads everywhere -- that in that particular moment, she could have just as easily said, I wish I had a Barbie doll.

I realized I needed to dump the baggage, listen more carefully, take a deep breath, ask more questions, and try and respond to the place my daughter was coming from.

We've been through several stages of the Daddy Issue since.

At first she wanted a dad because she figured this was something other kids had. Then, she wanted a dad because she didn't want to be different. She grew tired of the same question over and over (You don't have a dad?!) At one point, she tried telling a pre-school friend she actually had a dad. But, as quickly as she created him, she killed him off. (Oh, but he died.)

It's only been in more recent years that my daughter -- through stories, books, observation, time with family and friends -- has truly come to understand what having a dad is, or can be, about.

Having a dad, I think, in whole, or in part, means having an adult male in your family, in your life, who loves you, who's there for you, who makes you feel special, who talks with you, spends time with you, teaches you, flirts with you, even wrestles with you. He takes you on special outings and buys you the treats your mother won't. He watches movies, plays pool, or pinball, or other silly games with you. He hugs you, cheers for you, roots for you, and is, generally speaking, crazy for you.

Miraculously, in the same time period that marked my daughter's growing awareness and need, my brother stepped into the void.

He's a free-wheeling bachelor and lives less than a mile away. He's a software guy, an engineer-type, a fix-anything, project-manage, tech-savvy kind of guy. He's a skier, a scrambler, a camper, a climber and, yes -- a bit of a bar-fly. But, in my book, he's just a hair's notch below God. He's become a surrogate dad to my daughter. He's not here at the house every day, but we see him most every week. He stops by for dinner, for brunch, or simply to "hang." He's known my daughter since she first came home but it's really, in the past few years, they've grown increasingly close. He helped teach her how to ride a two-wheeler and now, takes her out biking, canoeing, swimming and skiing. They cook together, carve Halloween pumpkins together, go to street fairs and movies together. He's there at Christmas and on Father's Day, and for special school performances. If work takes him to Mexico, India, or China, he returns home with posters, trinkets, and toys, with flowing paisley patterned skirts, even embroidered blouses.

My daughter is not a natural hugger. She likes her physical space. But when her uncle arrives, she flies toward the door and into his arms. He scoops her up, lifts her high to the ceiling, then hugs her tight. He's her hero and rightly so. I get sappy and sentimental when I try to thank him, to tell him just what that means to me, to her, that he loves her, that he's there for her. He just tells me, Oh, stop. You're wet. And he's right. But, in recognition of Father's Day, I'd like to honor not only the dads out there (mine included,) but all the cool surrogate dads, the brothers, uncles, and incredible friends, who step into the void to help a child feel loved and special and all the more whole.

And, to one very special uncle, with a clear, dry-eye, I offer a huge, humble, heartfelt:

A Note For First Time Visitors

Welcome. Thanks for stopping by. My name is Lisa. I’m a single mom with a 12 year old Portuguese Water Dog and a 9 year old daughter I adopted from China. I started this blog this past March -- and had no idea the places it would take me, or the response it would elicit. For me it’s a chance to share everyday stories. I write about parenting, adoption, life, love, and loss. I write about the big moments, the ones that touched me or shifted my world. I write about the little moments, the ones that caught my breath or gave me pause.

The more I write, the more some of my favorite (or hardest won) posts get buried. To give you a sense of us and our journey, here are a few highlights and pointers:

Why a "Pack?"
A brief introduction to who we are as a family and how I came up with the name, Pack of Three.

Shifting Gears
How I left behind life as a professionally manic work-a-holic, and started the pack, beginning with an 8 week old Portuguese Water dog.

Puppy Tales
A funny, zany look back on my trial run as a new “mom,” trying to rein in an 8 week old Portuguese Water Dog pup. (If the Obamas had only known!)

An Adoption Paradox
As my 9 year old daughter struggles with her losses, I realize, to strengthen our bond, I must loosen my grip and make room for the mother and life she misses.

A Day in the Life of a Single Mom
Every mom has those days where, the harder you try to pull it together, the more things come undone – sometimes in the most relentlessly humbling, hilarious way.

How I Came to My Decision
After I did the research and mulled the idea over (and over,) how I finally came to my decision to adopt my daughter from China.

Warriors
The heartstopping moment my beautiful, angst ridden daughter confesses a deep-seated fear: did I steal her from China?

Of Loss and Joy and Desiring
To show my daughter I've nothing to hide, we sit down and review her adoption papers – and confront the hardest truth of all.

Two Mothers
My daughter regains some of her old bounce. Life returns to normal but then, she shares a strange dream.

Car Pool
Carpool comments that have taken me by surprise: a few favorites.

Half a World Away
How girls, sadly, came to be available for adoption from China, in such numbers, and how that dynamic today has changed.

One Small Step After Another
Having just processed the hardest parts of her story, my daughter is asked to write an essay for school. The third grade has just studied tales of the Oregon Trail and the teacher suggests an essay: How My Family Came West. My daughter writes, How I Came East.

Thanks again for stopping by Pack of Three. I welcome email and comments.

Half a World Away

I was thinking we were through the worst of it. Silly.

Less than a week after my daughter admitted her fears I stole her from China, a story from the New York Times online edition appeared April 5th on the first page of the site, above the fold, announcing itself with a heavy black headline: Chinese Hunger for Sons Fuels Boys' Abductions, by Andrew Jacobs.

I wait till late at night, when I hear long, deep in and exhalations emanating from my daughter’s room, when she’s deep asleep, when it’s safe to click on a story without fearing two small eyes peering over my shoulder. Idle worry? Not when your daughter’s in third grade. Not when she was reading at a 6th grade level in the fall of 1st grade. She misses nothing.

The bulk of the story revolves around China’s demand for sons. Lacking any form of social security, Chinese families, especially poorer, rural families, yearn for a son, for someone who won’t marry and leave, for someone who will care for them in old age, for someone to continue the family bloodline. But the one-child-one family policy has frustrated this yearning. So now, more than ever, boys are in demand, in danger of abduction. Heartrending stuff in its own right. But then, a quote stops me cold:

A grieving father of a four year old boy, Peng Gaofeng, started an ad hoc group for parents of stolen children. His claim? Girls are abducted as well -- and some of these girls are sold to orphanages. They are the lucky ones Peng says. These girls often end up in the United States or Europe after adoptive parents pay fees to orphanages that average $5,000.

It feels like a punch to the gut.

The claim makes no sense. To even entertain the possibility, that I could have been an unwitting accomplice, that I could have taken a child from her family, sickens me.

I finish the article but there is no further mention, evidence, or explanation regarding these supposedly abducted girls. The focus returns to the issue of boys and China’s desire for sons.

I write Jacobs to ask (politely) what this claim is founded on. If it makes any sense for China’s orphanages to pay for girls when the orphanages are flooded with more girls than they can handle. Does he have any idea how this claim might hit adoptive families in this country? Can he substantiate the claim with hard data? Answers would be helpful.

I have yet to hear from Jacobs.

Adopting a child from this country, as a single parent, was never an option for me. I’d never thought about adopting, much less looked to China, till a friend graciously served up the idea. I’m not one to move into big decisions lightly (an understatement... I can hear friends chortling.) I weighed my decision carefully, asked the hard questions, gathered the data over months, in truth, years.

Was it right to pull a child from her country, her culture?


My understanding was that there were hundreds of thousands of girls in China, that domestic adoption was uncommon in a country where families held an overwhelming bias and preference for blood ties. Hundreds of girls needed families, loving care. Orphanages were underfunded, understaffed, and overwhelmed.

It all made so much sense: me, wanting to love and raise a daughter. All those girls in China needing a home.

I adopted my daughter in 2001 and these larger existential, philosophical, moral questions were instantly relegated to the furthest recesses of my mind as everyday demands overwhelmed me: bottles, diapers, Desitan, formula, feeding schedules, nap schedules, bath routines, bedtime routines, books, teddy bears, dolls, nursery rhymes, nonsensical rhymes, hand games, finger games, food games, numbers, colors, letters. Such joyful days. An innocent interlude.

Eight years later we’ve come full circle. But now it’s my daughter asking these questions.

How could I have been born to one family, … and ended up with another, half a world away? How could my parents have given me up?

Knowing her as I do, loving her as I do, I hear these questions in a new light. They have new meaning, new urgency. Worse, a harder question confronts me:

Could I somehow be …culpable?

Its insane to consider. But I don’t like avoiding hard questions. In the face of bad news, I want to know the worst, confront the truths, then deal with them.

I dig out Kay Ann Johnson’s book, Wanting a Daughter, Needing a Son. Johnson, a professor of Hampshire College with her own daughter from China, spent ten years researching the elusive story of abandonment, adoption, and orphanage care in China. She published her book in 2004. A friend recommended it. I’d promptly bought it – and shelved it.

Johnson’s book is full of hard data. I’m a former MBA. Hard data is my friend.

China’s one-child policy was initiated under Deng Xiaoping in 1979 in an effort to control China’s population. Resistance to the one-child policy was most widespread in the countryside – where 75-80% of the population then resided, scraping a difficult existence off of the land.

In the 80’s, desperate families developed private work-arounds. Yes, some aborted. Yes, some left their daughters out in a field or on the roadside to die. But many others hid their girls or quietly, informally, adopted their girls out to family, neighbors, or friends. In the early 90’s, authorities responded to this subterfuge with what appeared to be greater leniency, offering a “one-son or two-child” policy for the countryside. But they matched this leniency with stricter laws going beyond a narrow focus on births to address the loophole: informal adoption.

Cadres of birth planning workers blanketed the countryside to monitor household head counts and reproductive behaviors. Penalties for violating birth planning laws were as harsh for adoptive families as birth families and included stiff fines (anywhere from one, to five, to even ten years’ worth of wages,) lost promotions, lost jobs, forced abortions, sterilizations, as well as public humiliation via tv and radio. (How easily we forget what it means to be free...)

Still, babies were born.

Thousands of brave families continued to adopt abandoned girls in the face of great personal cost and risk -- and another problem emerged. None of these girls could be registered at birth or beyond. They weren’t supposed to exist. But lacking formal registration, they also lacked basic civil, legal, and medical benefits: the right to go to school, the right to basic medical care, innoculations, or the right to reside in a given region or district. Those girls who made it to school were targets of derision – as if in fact they had no right to exist.

With fewer options to hide or care for the children, the number of abandonments soared.

State orphanages maintained a low profile to obscure their purpose. Signs suggested a preschool, or kindergarten, or children’s dance institute. Or there were no signs. Or the entrance was hidden. The fear was that if these places were discovered, their purpose known, they’d be flooded with babies.

They were flooded anyway. And flooded with healthy children. In the years preceding the one-child policy, Johnson estimates roughly 90% of abandoned children in orphanages were disabled. But by the 1990’s Johnson found that, for example, in her daughter’s state-run orphanage, fewer than 20% of the children had any known disability.

Overwhelmed with children, China's state-run orphanages grappled with mortality rates as high as 40%. In smaller, more remote areas, mortality rates approached 80%.

Foreign adoption was viewed as a way for the government to release some of the pressure, to provide some of the children with homes, to bring in much needed funds -- while still masking the problem.

Conditions in China’s orphanages have since improved. The government has slowly owned up to the problem and turned to the public for funds while also easing some of the restrictions on domestic adoption. Foreign money has helped. Over the last decade, Johnson estimates international adoption fees brought in more than $100 million. (Part of the cost of my daughter’s adoption was a required donation of $3,000 in support of her orphanage.) But, in her book, Johnson also raises a troubling possibility. Would China become dependent on foreign adoption? Was it too lucrative?

I wrote Johnson to thank her for her book and ask about recent developments. Had she seen Jacobs’ New York Times article? She is currently working on a grant to pursue further research in China. With a scholar’s caution, she was reluctant to be quoted. She generously shared her sense that the situation in China hadn’t yet changed in the time I adopted my daughter (2001.) But she also senses things have changed in the past four or five years. Domestic adoptions have increased. And now, there are far fewer healthy girls in orphanages. She is wary.

I confide my worries to a friend, a mother of two. What kinds of things will my daughter read as she grows older? What will she think? Did I contribute to something, in some small way, that’s beyond my wildest imagining?

She’s not an adoptive parent. She tells me we can’t control what happens in the world or what our kids hear. I know she is right. I can’t change what happened or what’s currently happening in China. And I can’t protect my daughter (protect myself?) forever. I can only hold her and love her.

Still, I never truly understood the extent of my vulnerability as an adoptive parent. Till now.

Two Mothers

It’s close to midnight and, as I get ready for bed, my mind returns to the start of the day with my daughter.

I'd woken her that morning and rubbed her back and she’d mumbled something about a bad dream. In the rush to get ready for school, I said I was sorry and urged her to tell me more -- once she was downstairs, dressed, and ready for breakfast. But breakfast came and went in a blur. We finished our morning routine and I sat on the stairs to wait with her for her carpool. She tossed her lumpy, blue book bag -- bulging with books and a snack -- down by the door, then jumped and danced about the living room with her usual light-hearted spirit.

She was dressed in a boy’s blue and white, striped t-shirt, baggy, bright red, athletic shorts that hung over navy leggings with a giant hole in one knee (she likes the hole there,) and running shoes. She prefers the “boyish” look even while she often complements these outfits with a ponytail tied with a large, lavendar, sequined scrunchie.

She is lucky her mother doesn’t give a rip about fashion.

She was silly, almost slapstick, striking funny poses. One minute, the sultry mystery woman, the next, a ninja spy, a karate master, a fierce warrior woman, then a swash buckling feminine sword fighter. (Oh… to be nine again!)

We'd had a great week together the previous week, over break. She spent a day skiing with her beloved uncle – and arrived home exuberant, full of tales schussing down the slopes. (And I got to sit in the front seat on the way home, Mom!) We picked out a new bike -– her first with gears -- and spent sunny days pedaling around town. When the rain returned, we spent lazy mornings reading books, playing piano and card games, and watching movies cuddled on the couch (including a wonderful old Danny Kaye movie: The Court Jester. Hilarious. Run, don’t walk to your local video store.) She enjoyed play dates, sleepovers, and a special evening performance of HMS Pinafore. She loves Gilbert & Sullivan, the language, music, rhythm, poetry, and patter song. She's memorized the lyrics to most of their productions.

As I sat on the stairs and watched her happy, high energy dance I thought, It's been a good week.

Then I realized: I never checked back in about that bad dream.

Did you want to tell me about your dream? We have time now.

She came and sat down beside me.

This was a strange one Mom! We were cuddling in my bed like we always do. But when I looked around, it wasn’t you! The hair was frizzier than yours, (sorry -- hard to imagine) and the eyes weren’t green. I jumped up and found you in the closet -- tied to a stake. When I untied you, the woman in the bed sat up and said, (pointing with dramatic flair) “You have betrayed me!”

Then, my daughter, imitating the woman from her dream, made the motion of someone slitting their throat.

Wow! I said. Was that your birth mother?

Yeah. she said. I think so.

She didn't seem the least bit upset. She seemed more surprised by the strangeness of the dream.

Do you feel torn between two mothers? I asked.

No. It was just weird, Mom. Really weird!

Did you wake with your heart pounding?

Yeah!

That’s intense…

Yeah!!

Well… I paused. (What to say?) Thanks for untying me.

Sure. No problem.

She shared this all in a completely matter of fact way. Her ride came and she hugged me with enthusiasm before running down the steps to greet her friends and take on the day.

I checked in with her once more when I picked her up from school that afternoon. We chatted about lots of things, then I referenced the dream, reassuring her she didn't need to pick sides. She could love two mothers -- and even love them in different ways if she chose. She knew this. She was cool about it. The dream was already, so... yesterday.

That night, I flash on an image of myself tied to a stake, stuffed in my daughter’s closet.

I guess it was my turn this time.

Part of me wonders if I need to call Jonna again. Or, if I’ll need to lock my door when my daughter reaches her teens and hormones kick in.

I remember Jonna's words:

This will come up again and again.... the first time is usually the hardest.

Then I can’t help but smile as a voice in my head whispers,

It's the battle of the mothers...

Or… is it the mother of all battles?

I give silent thanks again for my daughter’s honest, open heart, and climb into bed.

Gratitude

We could be in someone’s living room. There are two big armchairs in the corner and the coffee table and walls are decorated with brightly colored Latin American dolls, textiles, and totems. There are plants, a lamp, and a nice spread of magazines. But there’s also a large desk in the corner piled with papers and the lights are turned down awfully low for 4:00 in the afternoon. A large box of tissues sits conveniently within reach on a low table to my right.

Thankfully, I don’t need the tissues today.

I am sitting in a large cushioned armchair talking with Jonna, a child therapist I tracked down and met with last spring. (My daughter met her back then too.) She’s a petite, brown haired woman probably in her mid to late fifties with a lean, angular body. She sits in the other oversized armchair facing me. Just like our visit last spring, she’s slipped off her shoes and tucked stocking feet up snug under her thighs. She leans to one side, balancing a small notebook in her lap. Her arm lies casually draped over her thigh and a pen dangles loosely between two fingers. She listens intently, focusing round, birdlike eyes on me. Her face is lined with wrinkles -- as if she’s taken on the cumulative cares of her clients. I like this woman for her compassion, for her work with children, but even more -- for her direct, no-nonsense feedback.

I tell her about the events of the past week. About my daughter’s fears and worries. About confronting the truths of her story. Then too, I tell her of the night my girl asked to re-read her Homecoming story, outloud, together. How it felt like coming full circle, a joyful celebration.

Jonna tells me it’s common for adopted children to have these fantasies and fears. What’s more unusual is for grade school children to share their concerns so openly with their adoptive parents. Many are afraid to air their feelings. They stuff them and hold them inside, then wrestle with their confusion, or anger, in their teen years. (I’m afraid of the teen years.)

Jonna reaffirms what she told me last spring. That my daughter is perceptive, and emotionally solid. That abandonment is the most profound, fundamental fear we face as humans. That she needs to be able to grieve, and that grieving is a process. That these issues will come up for her again, in different ways, but that the first time is usually the hardest. And, that it’s a testament to her courage, our relationship, she can be so honest with me.

So… how are you doing in all this? Jonna asks.

I concede it hasn’t been easy but, with each passing day, I am grateful – indeed immensely grateful -- for my daughter’s courage, her willingness to trust in me. It tears me up to witness her pain and yet, I stand in awe of her strength.

I admit, with trepidation, I’ve been writing about our journey, sharing our story -- anonymously – in a blog I started. I’m scared Jonna will tell me I am betraying my daughter’s trust. Which is the reason why I know I should tell her about the blog. To get her candid assessment. Do I kill the blog? I don’t want to kill the blog. Writing about all the ups and downs of this journey helps me make sense of it all.

Jonna’s answer is not what I expect.

This is your story too. You’re entitled to a life as well.

I pause, and swallow an unexpected lump.

Damn. I do need one of those tissues today.

How I Came to My Decision

Every time I thought about the idea of adopting a child from China, a dozen different fears leapt forward and crowded in close around me like a horde of hungry pigeons at the park. You know, the kind that attack the pedestrians with the peanuts. They hover. They sense what’s coming and they’re poised and ready to strike.

I had so many questions, so many concerns. They stalked me.

How would I do it alone? What would I do if she got sick? Could I afford a child? Would other families accept us? What if my family wouldn’t accept her? What if we didn’t like each other? What if I couldn’t handle it?

It was overwhelming to think about it and I didn’t know how to think about it. So I pushed the decision away. At the back of my mind, there was still that glimmer of hope the right man would arrive (complete with armor and dashing steed) making the question irrelevant.

My life continued and followed a reliable rhythm. I tended to my dog. We went on long walks each day and he gave me great joy. I consulted. I wrote. I took dance classes, and I dated. But the relationships didn’t gel for me and one day I stopped to study my face in the mirror. My 40th birthday was not all that far off and I wondered if my life, in the end, would be nothing more than the sum of a string of broken relationships. Then, it struck me. What if avoiding the decision to adopt, became in effect, by default, a decision not to adopt? A non-decision kind of decision. I didn’t want to wake up when I was 45 or 50 -- in a panic -- with regrets. The question presented itself:

Did I really want to go through life without the chance to love and raise a child?

I wish I could say I grabbed my sword and shield and swashbuckled my way (complete with bandana and eye-patch) aboard a ship bound for China. The truth is: I sat down at my desk, grabbed a pen, a blank sheet of paper, and sketched out a list.

A list? you might ask.

Yes. I know it sounds terribly clinical and logical and I hate to disappoint. But it started with that list. Not that everything else flowed clearly and smoothly from that point forward. Hardly. But I’m jumping ahead...

I scribbled down all the questions and concerns that for months had circled relentlessly along well worn paths in my brain. It was cathartic to get it down on paper, to release it, and look at it. Suddenly, the demons didn’t look quite so daunting. I sat back and looked at the first question -- and realized there were ways to address it.

Before I knew it, I’d created a second column on the page (Be still, my little linear heart!) I worked through the questions, one by one. I scratched out some numbers, rough figures, and a few calculations. Then I paused and stared. For each question there was a practical solution or answer. It hit me:

I could do this.

My mouth went dry and my hands felt cold. This was do-able. I had flexible work hours and was financially secure. There were innumerable local and community resources for me to draw upon. Most importantly, I had a strong support network and loving family I could, most likely, bring round. It hit me again:

I could do this.

Then something odd happened. A well of sadness surged up within of me. I broke down and wept.

For all my logical, practical thinking, there was something I hadn’t yet reconciled. Taking this step meant giving the nod, giving in, letting go: facing the death of a dream. We grow up with this dream and we take it for granted. It’s the dream of sharing the journey.

I’m not ready.

I tucked the paper away.

Max and I walked two, even three miles a day, by a nearby lake, through a beautiful arboretum. We walked rain or shine, though it mostly rained. It was early spring and we walked under gray clouds and gray skies through gray drizzle along gray gravelly paths down by the water’s edge.

My feelings didn’t shift overnight. Our walks continued and I let myself feel sad. New shoots of grass sprouted by the shoreline and the cattails and pussy willows opened. Fresh shades of green overtook the gray and the birds grew noisy. One day the sun poked through the thick canopy of clouds and I stopped to watch a swallow dart, swerve, and flirt with his reflection in the water. A light white feather, a puff of cotton, floated by on a current of air. The swallow swooped and grabbed the cottony puff tight in his bill. He flew with it -- then released it. It hung suspended, right where he left it. The swallow turned, darted, swooped, dove, and caught it again. I laughed. When I turned to resume my walk, I noticed a man in the distance walking with a child strapped onto his back. I flashed on an image of myself, walking with my daughter packed snug and close to my body.

I felt no sadness. Only a twinge of excitement.

An Adoption Paradox

I’m realizing blogging may actually help me gain a better understanding of my daughter and our story. After my first blog, I felt quite vulnerable. Vulnerable, not only having put our struggle into words, but also out there in the ether. But then it also sank in how important it is for me, not only to accept my daughter’s feelings, but to let her know I honor them. If she learns or feels she has to deny her feelings at home in order to protect my feelings, how will she ever learn to hang on to her feelings beyond home -- at school, on the playground, or in future relationships?

Sunday night, we were talking again about feelings. She’s wrestling with a lot right now. Not only with feelings around her adoption story – but around some girl dynamics at school. She’s in third grade and it’s a time of heightened awareness. Some kids handle this better than others. Some try to dominate. Some try to please. My daughter is not a doormat -- but she will sometimes compromise her own feelings to keep the peace, to make others happy, or avoid confrontation.

How many of us do that, at our own expense, even as adults?

Sunday night, in the midst of fixing dinner, in the midst of our conversation about third grade girls, I got down on my knees, and looked my daughter in the eye.

You know. I’m not always great about acknowledging your feelings. You need to know you have a right to your feelings. They’re important. You are important. No one else can tell you what’s going on inside of you.

Several weeks ago I noticed she had discovered The Feelings Book: The Care & Keeping of Your Emotions which is part of the American Girl series on The Care and Keeping of You. (I love this series!) I’d buried it on her book shelf. (If I try to recommend a book and place it in her hands, she is unlikely to give it a second glance. If I bury it on her book shelf, she will find it and read it when she’s ready.)

Oh. You’re reading The Feelings Book. What do you think?

It’s good Mom. Its really good. You should read it.

Oh? Perhaps we could look at it together sometime? You could show me the parts you like.

Yeah. That’s a great idea Mom. Let’s do that.

Sunday night, after dinner, after she’d washed up and brushed her teeth, I suggested she grab The Feelings Book and bring it into my room. We often read in my bed together before lights out. (Max is up there too, wedged in between us, his chin on her stomach or mine.)

We read a few pages together from The Feelings Book, taking turns. Then my daughter flipped to the page titled, Grieving. The page talked about what it feels like to miss a loved one who has died or moved away.

This is how I feel sometimes, Mom.

When you think of your birth mom?

Yeah.

Do you like their suggestions?

Yeah.

Maybe we should try them out.

We talked about lighting a candle, about journaling. She wasn’t teary. Just quiet. Thoughtful.

When it was time for bed, she skipped off happily.

Good night Mom! I love you.

I love you too.

See you in the morning!

See you in the morning.

The next day, she woke exuberant. She walked and danced about the kitchen fixing her breakfast, full of hugs and happy chatter.

Monday night, homework, talk of the school day, and dinner were all punctuated with more hugs. She couldn't hug me often enough or hard enough. In the midst of dinner, she walked over and confided:

You know, sometimes this doesn’t feel like my house.

We have lived here together since she came home from China. I asked her to say more about what this felt like for her.

Its like… I’m living in a strange house!

Do you think maybe that’s cause it feels strange... to think you were born in China, to another family, but you ended up here? Like you’re supposed to be somewhere else, with another family and another home, back in China?

Yeah…

I nodded. That makes sense.

She was thoughtful. Then she hugged me again. I gave her a small kiss on the top of her head. (I’m no longer allowed to give her big wet ones on her cheeks – as much as I’d love to.) She bopped back to her seat.

After dinner, her eyes lit up with expectation. I knew what was coming.

Do you think we could have a cuddle on the guest room bed?!

Of course!

This is one of our rituals. We charged into the guest room together. First we helped Max up. He’s twelve now and needs help with his hindquarters. Then the two of us leapt up onto the bed together and jockeyed for space. I settled in on my side and my daughter moved in quickly, curling up close in the crook of my body – her back up against my belly. Max settled in below – nestled in the crook of my legs. He draped his chin over my thigh to make sure he wasn't forgotten.

My daughter smiled and laughed and babbled on, sharing surprises and triumphs from her day, jumping from one reflection to the next. She grew quiet. The three of us lay there, breathing almost as one.

It occurred to me that the more I make room in my heart for the dissonance she feels -- for whatever may be separate or broken or lost -- the more she can then accept us -- and take us wholly into her heart.

Why a "Pack?"

I meant to start this blog two weeks ago. No, the dog didn't eat my homework. But as luck would have it, my daughter, nine, came down with a horrible case of the flu and we were in lock-down mode for eight straight days. (Aaaaaugh!) It's a scary thing to watch a normally exuberant, even ebullient child, grow feverish and listless. I found myself running endless laps about the house, washing sheets, towels, my hands, pajamas, my hands, dishes, my hands, cough medicine cups, and yes, my hands, again.

I bear raw, chapped knuckles like a badge of courage.

When it all migrated to her head, neither of us slept. She went through five or more boxes of tissue. Then I ran laps supplying tissue, Sudafed, emptying trash, supplying more tissue, more Sudafed, more tissue, etc.

She recovered (finally... whew...) and bounced off to school while I looked in the mirror and saw ...a train wreck. I tried to clean up, dig out, and get my bearings. And begin this blog. Which, appropriately enough, is about the life of a single mom (me,) my daughter who was born in China in 2001, and Max, our Portuguese Water Dog (he was born here.)

How did I come to choose the name Pack of Three?

We're a family. A happy, loving, boisterous family. At least that's how I think of us. And my daughter, obviously a key part of this equation, is also happy, loving, and boisterous. At least most of the time. The truth is, she also struggles with the facts of her adoption, with the loss of her birth family.

She's always been proud of the fact she's Chinese. (Yes, I've tried to instill that and encourage it.) But she's sensitive and perceptive. Over the years, she's begun to process the loss in her story at a deeper level. And so, sometimes, in the middle of dinner, in the car on the way home from school, or even at bedtime as I lean down to kiss her, she'll pause and say:

Sometimes, I think you're just the babysitter.

I miss my real mom.

Sometimes I wonder if you stole me from my birth parents...

Now, I should be clear. I adopted my daughter legally. I am not an abusive parent. If anything, I am at times an overly attentive parent. A worrier. Perhaps, even, an overachieving parent. Most of the time, my daughter writes me poems, love notes, "you rock" notes, you're the "awesomest mom ever" notes. She draws pictures of hearts and flowers and happy children. We laugh. We cry. We love each other.

It pains me to hear her say these things. To know she struggles. To know there is only so much I can do to help her resolve these losses. At the same time, I'm human. Having turned my life over to her most every need for the past 7 1/2 years, I have to admit the first time she called me the babysitter.... a voice in my head nearly screamed:

Are you kidding?? I'm sleep deprived, cranky, fat, and frazzled, trying to keep three steps ahead of you. The sitter?! I could be on a beach in Bermuda right now! I'm your mother damnit!

Of course I realize I'm supposed to be the adult in this relationship. So when she said this the first time and asked, Does that hurt your feelings? I denied my first reaction and offered the empathy I also genuinely felt, offering her the validation she needed, the opportunity to express her feelings.

But I've had other moments since. Where I've slipped. Where I thought she was only mad at me for not getting what she wanted, when I thought she was trying to play the 'other mommy' card.

How do you compete against a phantom mommy, a mommy who never says no? So yes, there have been those moments when I have fought for the title of mommy, arguing...

Who's there when you go to bed each night? Who's keeps you safe? Who's there when you wake each morning? Who's there at 2am when you have nightmares? Who's there when you get a bloody nose on the playground? Who's there when you're sick with a fever of 103? And who nags you to eat your vegetables, to watch for that mug of boiling hot chocolate, to watch for the car in the street?

Then, one day, in a more enlightened moment, I let it all go. I thought,

Who cares what we call this? A family? A tribe? A pack? I know what we are and I know I'm in it till I draw my last breath. That's what counts. Someday, whatever she calls it, acknowledging the depth of her losses, my daughter will also see what we have -- in all its beautiful, complicated glory.

Welcome to our blog. Our stories. Our little Pack of Three.