Slowly Improving

Just a quick update - every day Michelle seems a little better. She is still not wanting much to eat, but tonight she did have a little pureed soup. She also slept 7 uninterrupted hours last night. WhooHooo!! She is doing well with just plain Tylenol now. I think we may be in the home stretch.

A couple of sweet memories from this past week. I'm writing these mostly to remind myself some day, so I won't forget that there were some good times along with the not so good. First, I have the sweetest friends. We had dinner brought all week long, and I'm pretty sure it would have been pb&j if not for those meals. Also, my friends Julie and Laura got me through those really tough days. Thank you both!

And even though Michelle has been pretty miserable this past week, she has still had many sweet moments. She gave me 2 kisses yesterday. She is super stingy with her kisses - she will give them to the stuffed animals, but I've only gotten a very few, so 2 in one day was a big deal to Mamma. Also, she's still not big on watching t.v., but she has fallen in love with Elmo. (from Sesame Street.) Today when she discovered she has an Elmo, or Melmo as she call him, square on her quilt, she had to give it a kiss and tell him, "night-night Melmo".

I'll post a few pic's tomorrow.

From a Friend

Chris and Joann Grassano are two good friends who wrote recommendations for our home study. They have been following our blog, and their daughter Janna felt moved to make this drawing of Michelle. What a nice bit of encouragement!

Survival Mode

I remember just before our adoption trip to get Michelle, we had the chance to have a telephone conference with Josh & Lily, the founders of CCAI. They had lots of good advice, but the thing I remember most was Josh reminding all of us that this trip was about one thing only, adopting our child and bringing him or her home safely. He said we would probably all have some ups and downs, and all we had to do was survive the trip. We had a really good trip, and for the most part I enjoyed our time in China, but there were several times when things weren't great that I remembered his words, all I had to do was survive.

So, that's kind of where we are now in Michelle's recovery. The last couple of days have been a little rough. Michelle hasn't slept much, and it's hard to tell if she is really in pain or if we are revisiting the night terrors. Our biggest challenge has been keeping her hydrated. She hasn't wanted to drink, so yesterday I spent most of the day walking around with a cup of water and a medicine syringe. She won't drink water out of a cup, but she will let me squirt a teaspoon at a time into her sore little mouth, so that's what we have to do.

While it's not easy, I do think things are slowly progressing the way they should. I am so grateful that so far she seems to be improving a little each day. I haven't seen any openings or leaking through her nose, so that seems to indicate healing. Yeah! She also seems to have a little more energy - last night she was laughing and playing with her brothers. I just have to keep my eyes focused on the goal - a healthy, whole mouth for Michelle.

No fun!

Today was kind of a lousy day. Glad we get to start over tomorrow.

mmmmm.... Jello!

Michelle seems even a little better today. Still not completely off the pain med's, but certainly taking less of them. I could tell today she was hungry - I heard her tummy growling, but she still doesn't seem able to tolerate much to drink or eat. She is still taking the Pediasure - something in the consistency agrees with her. And she is eating a LOT of jello. I don't think she has ever had jello before - it's fun, it wiggles, it is not nutritionally wonderful, but at least is has water which is what we are going for at this point, to just keep the child hydrated.

On a different note - o.k., WARNING! I'm going to be a little gross here - she had her first BM since before the surgery. I have never been so happy to change a poopy diaper!

My mom went home today - thank you Na-Na for all your help! When Bill came home after taking mom to the airport, she looked around him and asked for Na-Na. I think it was good for them to get some Grandma time!

Late this afternoon I took a little trip out to Target for some retail therapy. I realized I may be very much housebound for the next week or so, and I'm always on the go, so I need to just get out for a while. I found the cutest video for Michelle called Ni Hao, Kai-lan. It uses Mandarin chinese words throughout and introduces the kids to chinese culture, put out by Nickelodeon. Michelle doesn't really show much interest in t.v., but I thought we might need something to entertain us besides food for the next 3 weeks, so it's worth a try.

Lastly, I've had several people ask us to continue the blog. I had said I would probably stop blogging once Michelle has recovered from surgery. We really want to keep in touch, especially with all our special friends we made during our adoption trip. (I heard you Sara and Renee!) At some point we may start more of a "family blog", because I would like to include more pic's and updates for the grandparents from my other kids. For now, we'll continue to keep you all updated on Michelle's progress, and we'll certainly let you know what our future plans are for keeping in touch.

Thank you all for your sweet notes and prayers. I know we aren't finished with the recovery process, but every day seems to be getting a little better. We are so grateful that God has brought us this far! We are so grateful for Michelle! God is good all the time!

We are home

Just a quick update on Michelle - we came home this afternoon. It's amazing the difference 24 hours makes. Last night she was still in a lot of pain, stayed on morphine through the evening and part of the night, and had lots of swelling. She was awake a lot and I spent much of the night holding her. This morning she was a little better, but wouldn't drink much. The 2 criteria for her coming home today were that she had to be off the morphine and she had to be drinking well. Shortly after lunch she started drinking and even ate a little applesauce. She is happy to be home. She is still far from 100%, but doing very well.

They did not put her in the arm restraints. I was very glad for this, although it means mom has to be all the more vigilant to keep her hands out of her mouth. I can tell the hardest part of all this will be the food restrictions. As we walked into the kitchen this evening she did the sign for "more" - meaning, give me a snack. She did have a Pediasure tonight and seemed to like those.

She is quite the fighter! Normally she is such a sweet little girl, and almost always very agreeable, but when she is mad, look out! She let us know yesterday she was not happy about the whole situation. Today when the resident came in to release her from the hospital, she was sitting on a blanket playing, and he talked to her for a moment and then asked if she could "give him five". She gave it to him pretty hard - he said he detected some attitude with that gratitude!

Thanks for all your prayers - please keep them coming!

Surgery Day

We woke up at 3:30 so we could leave the house by 4:10 and be in the pre-op ward of Walter Reed by 5:00. Michelle stayed awake for the whole ride.

She was a doll during the in-processing and everything went smoothly until they put us in the actual pre-op room and all the doctors in gowns came to see her before surgery. At that time she decided that this was not fun after all and she started to get upset. One of the nurses offered to let her play with a water-base pen. The nurse assured us that the ink would wash off and it did distract Michelle for a while. She happily drew on the bedsheets, her pajamas and her own hands and feet. She even tried (with some success) to draw on her parents clothes and skin. It was great fun! Then she smeared some ink on her cheek so I got a wet paper towel to wipe it off; and it didn't come off! It just smeared more and lightened from a navy blue to a royal blue.


After much scrubbing with soapy wipes she settled into a series of baby blue smears with darker blue pinstripes. She didn't seem at all upset. When they took her off to surgery she yelled out "Mama!" one time, but she was pretty sedated by that point. Midge and I spent the next 3+ hours in the waiting room.

The surgery seems to have gone very well. They put tubes in her ears and repaired her palate. Michelle was pretty upset as the anesthesia wore off, but Midge was there to comfort her in the post-op area. We are now all upstairs in her room and Michelle is sleeping peacefully thanks to some Tylenol with Codine. She has had a few sips of water which is a good sign.

Daughters

Two months ago today God blessed us with Michelle. Seventeen years ago today God blessed us with Elizabeth. We are blessed!

Prayers for the Kids

It's amazing the connections we have made with other adoptive families through the internet. We were part of an online group through Yahoo that introduced us to many families who were adopting at the same time we were. It's a place to ask questions, but mostly to give one another support.

There were 4 families who adopted kids from Luohe the same day we adopted Michelle. One other family was in our group, with our agency, and 2 of the other families were with another agency. We saw them several times in our hotel and at various places along the way.

Of those 4 children, 3 of them were cleft kids. I met Ben and Stacie in our hotel one morning and they seemed like such a sweet family. Ben had his cleft palate repair surgery done about 10 days ago, and we just read last night on the Yahoo group that it is not going well. He has an infection in the tissue, and most likely some of the tissue inside his mouth will be lost. It means he will have to stay on a liquid diet for at least another month, and most likely he will have to go through this same surgery again at some point down the road.

Please keep Ben and Stacie in your prayers. I know she must be discouraged and sad, seeing her child who has already gone through so much having to endure yet another difficult time.

Please also pray for Michelle as she prepares for her surgery next week. I'm looking forward to having this next part of our journey behind us and I'm excited because I believe this will greatly improve her quality of life. However, I realize it may be a rough few weeks getting to that point and that these things always involve risks.

We are praying for a smooth and successful outcome for Michelle, and we continue to pray for healing and comfort for little Ben.

More thought about Walter Reed

Bill did a great job of posting yesterday about our visit to Walter Reed and Michelle's upcoming surgery. Here are just a few more random thoughts from me. (Midge)

*We woke up at 5:00 a.m. so we could leave by 6:00 a.m. to be at our appointment on time at 7:30 a.m. Army Doc's are wonderful but why must everything be done so early in the morning?

*We woke at 5:00, and my daughter Lizzy woke at 5:05a.m. to begin her bout with the stomach flu. I was really torn about leaving her or not going with Michelle. In the end we decided to take 2 cars and check in with Elizabeth periodically. It was the right decision, but a tough one to make. I think having 4 kids means often being pulled in several directions at once.

*Doing hearing testing on a 2 year old is like trying to herd cats!

*In one of the waiting rooms, we noticed they had a foam mat with interconnecting pieces. They had letters and numbers. Bill reminded me it was exactly like what we saw in Michelle's orphanage for the kids to nap on. Almost immediately after we spotted them, Michelle did too! She got really excited, and started laying down and saying "night-night". Then she wanted me to come lay down beside her and "take a nap". She seemed so excited to see something that reminded us of her past, and it was amazing how she communicated that to us.

*I'm so grateful Michelle now has a bed to nap in every day!

*The timing of her surgery could not be more perfect for our family. Bill is traveling a lot starting in March, and my mom is already going to be up here the week before, so she will just stay to help us with the other kids. Isn't God so good to put all these little details together for us?!!

*I saw a LOT of very young soldiers walking around the hallways on artificial limbs yesterday. It amazed me to see how far the technology has come in such a short time. Most of these guys were walking with a very normal gait. If they weren't wearing shorts I would have not realized they were missing legs. I'm so glad we live in this day and age when there are so many medical advances.

*It broke my heart to realize most of these guys are not much older than my kids. Please pray for our soldiers and their families!

Chinese New Year Celebration

We had a nice Sunday lunch with two other adoptive families to celebrate the Chinese New Year. We met at the Golden King restaurant in Sterling, Virginia, and had some delicious Dim Sum.

The next day, Michelle went to Josh's after-school Chinese class. They had a Chinese New Year celebration complete with a Lion Dance. Michelle thought it was great fun!

Walter Reed

Today we met with the cleft team at Walter Reed. It was an all-day affair, but we left pretty impressed with the caregivers there. We started bright and early with a consult with the head of Plastic Surgery who will repair Michelle's cleft. We then rotated through Audiology, Speech Therapy, Ear Nose & Throat, the Social Workers, and the Oral Surgeon. After lunch we sat down in a conference room with all the specialists that we had met with during the morning. The team had compared notes and made sure that they were all on the same game plan for Michelle's long-term care.

The first big event will be a surgery on February 19th to repair the cleft palate. They will also put tubes in her ears. The tubes are necessary to help alleviate fluid build up behind her eardrums. Cleft kids often have issues with their eustation tubes which can lead to excess fluid and frequent ear infections.

Hearing testing on two year olds is difficult, but our audiologist is pretty sure that Michelle has some hearing loss. Some of that is probably due to the fluid behind the ear drum and impacted ear wax (yuk!) in front of the drum. Both of those will be cleared up when they put in the ear tubes. We are very hopeful that her hearing will improve significantly after the ear tube procedure.

After her surgery Michelle will have to be on a liquid/soft food diet for a few weeks. That will be tough because Michelle loves to eat with the rest of the family and we haven't yet found a food she doesn't like. We may have to invest in a good blender.

There are more surgeries and procedures in Michelle's future, but not for a few years. She will need an orthodontic device installed to expand her palate when she is about six. She will also need a bit of bone grafted into her top gum line when she is around seven. We may even elect to have some cosmetic surgery on her lip and nose at some point, but we are still thankful for the great lip repair that the Smile Train charity did in China while she was an infant.

It was a long day, but we left the hospital very impressed with the Cleft team.