6 Month Gotcha Anniversary

So as  continue to read "Parenting your Internationally Adopted Child" it has a short blurb on how the author doesn't like the term "Gotcha" day because it looks at the adoption from the perspective of the parent and not the child as recommended. Hmmmm, I don't know, you can look at it both ways can't you....didn't our son get his family too that day. I know ours did. (I do like the book but don't agree with all of it). So Happy 6 Month Anniversary to our family as we all GOT our family that day!

And on that day we met Claire who is the sweet daughter of our dear friends Leslie & Chris. Claire and Anthony were from the same orphanage although never knew each other (not surprising since there were 800 kids in that orphanage). Definitely not one of the better orphanages. Claire was 4 at the time she was adopted and she only weighed 15 pounds. Her palate was not repaired and from what we understand that orphanage did not take care of girls as well as boys. And there have been reports of multiple kids coming out of there with finger and toe nails that were cut too short (hence our visit to a Chinese clinic -with cats and all- and a Chinese hospital -with dried blood and all - with a boy we just met 2 days ago with an infected toe to the point that he had a red line going up his leg). It was necessary for us to travel with a person from the agency who was the most knowledgeable on the process because not only is the province a difficult one but the orphanage is very difficult as well. OUr agency just stopped working with them for reasons not announced. This is a heart breaker. Hopefully other agencies are able to deal with this orphanage and not just walk away from those kids.

OK....this is suppose to be a celebratory day!!! I can't believe it's only been 6 months. Then sometimes it feels like yesterday! And only six months and already signed up for more! Certainly a celebratory day as another child from China will get to join a family and have all of these reasons to celebrate (and with us, yeah)!

Thank you for checking in and have an awesome day!!!