More on a monday

I am still skipping around in the questions.

Atlasien askes:

There aren’t a lot of Chinese-American families blogging about adopting from China, although it can’t be too uncommon… what’s your theory behind the lack of visibility?

It is my educated guess that about 2% of all adoptions from China are expedited due to Chinese ancestry.  I would guess another 1-2% are individuals of Chinese decent or other Asians who are not eligible for expedited status.   So if we are saying that about 3% are Asian, why aren’t they more visible in the blog world?

I think part of this has to do with what makes a blog visible in the first place.  For my blog, I think it has to do with being here early before the adoption blogapalooza got started (e.g. i have lots of links on other blogs) and also because I occasionally write about controversial topics which drives my stats up. 

Off hand, I think I know of about 10-15 other China adoption blogs with at least one Asian parent  The most obvious is Johnny (who is blogging again by the way) who comments all over the place and has had his share of controversy which drives up visibility.   I also enjoy Forks & Chopsticks.

Most of the rest are just plain old adoption blogs though.  Most of the content is updating whoever is reading on the status of their adoption, not talking about other things.  I think the only people who really read that stuff are the friends and family of that person.  And maybe also other waiting parents.  I mean, seriously, who is interested in reading that?

Another factor may be that once a family with an Asian parent adopts their Asian kid, they can pretty much pass as a normal family.  I know of at least 10 families just in my town who are Chinese American/have a chinese parent who have adopted from China and you would never know unless they told you.   There aren’t exactly tons of Asian parents blogging anyway, so maybe that is why? 

Also, there are a handful of Asian adoptive parents who are active on the China adoption lists & boards, but there are many many more families out there who either don’t get on the internet or who choose not to deal with the stupid & sometimes racist bullshit on those boards.  Honestly, who can blame them.  It is like screaming into the abyss sometimes.

I don’t know if that is much of an answer, but I am sleep deprived today, so that is as good as I can do.

Some more quickies from Julie:

2. What is your dream vacation.
3. What 3 things would I find in your dream house (for instance, for me it’s a side entrance mud room, 2 car garage and walk in pantry!lol)
4. What are your “break the bank” can’t resist weaknesses that are somewhat on the frivolous side (a handbag, frivolous, slap me!!lol)? For instance, for some it’s shoes or bags, others jewellery, etc.

2) Around the world with enough money to do it comfortably.

3) Lots of natural light, lots of nice thick carpet, a two car garage. None of which my current house has.

4) Sadly, it is my Bugaboo stroller.  Also really high quality sushi.

The next question is from Kari:

Are you planning on going back to China for visits as the kids get older? If so, at what ages?

Definitely.  Also, M has never been to Taiwan, so that will also be a priority.  We really like to travel and hope to have a few big trips before our kids move on to college.  I am thinking China/Taiwan would be nice when M is in Jr. High and L in late elementary school, so we can save the really hard trip of going to India for when M is in High School and L is in Jr. High.   China is really big and it is fun to travel there, so maybe we will get to go more often to reinforce the girls’ Chinese skills.  I have mentioned the possiblity of spending a summer there immersing them in an all Chinese environment, but Mr. A was not enthusiastic about being left at home working while we get to have all the fun.

Last one for now.  June asks:

I remember reading about L’s attachment issues with Mr A. How has that panned out so far? Is she fully bonded with him now?

You remember correctly.  At first L wouldn’t have anything to do with Mr. A.  The real turning point came when he took over her bedtime routine.  She protested a lot at first, but the forced bottle & rocking time helped tremendously.  

After that, she still had problems with a strong preference for me over Mr. A when she was with us both.  Another problem was that she was very distressed whenever I would leave her with Mr. A, though she seemed fine after I was gone.

We talked about it a lot and we think part of the problem is that Mr. A and I were parenting in shifts (e.g. when he came home from work, I would hand over the kids and disappear.  This probably triggered the same stress L would have had when her primary caregivers left the orphanage for the evening, leaving her with people she didnt’ know as well.  Once we figured that out, we spend a couple weeks where both Mr. A and I were together with L pretty intensively.  We didn’t allow her to cling only to me during those times (Mr. A would carry her in the ergo, etc).  

Also, we didn’t allow ANYONE to hold L until these issues were mostly resolved.  The few times we did seemed to rev up L’s anti-Mr. A feelings.

Now, L seems very attached and comfortable with both of us.  We continue to reinforce the attachment we have by doing the basic attachment stuff that most books suggest.