BIRSAY, Sask. – Debbie Wood was approaching 40 when she realized something was missing in her life.
The single woman had a 20 year career as a teacher, owned a cat and liked to travel.
“I said there’s got to be more for the next 40 years,” Wood told the annual meeting of the Saskatchewan Women’s Institutes June 3.
She thought of adopting a child but was told that to get a Canadian baby she would likely have to be married and even then would likely receive a special needs child.
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While leafing through a speakers booklet for an upcoming teachers convention she came across a session about one woman’s experience adopting a child from China. She went to the session, asked many questions and came away convinced that this was for her.
Soon after she went on a trip with a couple of girlfriends debating the merits of making such a change in her life. It seemed to be a positive sign that while waiting in the airport they were seated near a group of people just back from China with their adopted babies.
She did some research and on
March 31, 2001, she contacted an agency called Family Outreach International. Wood said it took until Aug. 7 of that year to complete the documentation that was required. She had to hire a social worker to do several long visits with her looking at her job, lifestyle and parenting views. She needed a criminal check, a will, a medical, proof of her financial stability and an affidavit that she was heterosexual. Wood joked that this is the type of class Grade 12 students should take to prepare for parenthood.
At last she was approved on the Canadian side. The agency sent her documents to China and said she had a nine month wait to hear if she had been approved. It was actually 14 months before the call came one day while she was untangling the volleyball net in the school gymnasium.
But there was more waiting in her future. The agency takes a group of 14 families over to China for two weeks to work through the adoptions rather than have individuals go alone. But Wood was undeterred, especially when she found out that her baby girl was born May 1, 2002. That was the same birthday as her grandmother who had left her money to do something special with. Wood had used it to build her documents. She went to get Lian and she and her daughter met on Jan. 13, 2003, an anniversary they now celebrate as “gotcha day.”
The first two days of the two weeks in China were unsettling. Lian cried for hours and wouldn’t take a bottle of formula from her new mother. But she ate the rice that they had with supper, her first solid food ever.
Wood later found out the orphanage Lian came from was criticized for malnourished babies. At eight and a half months, Lian was the second largest baby in the group, weighing almost 19 pounds. Most of them were 12 lb.
Lian only calmed down on the second day when she spotted another baby in the group of 14. It was the girl that had shared her crib for months. The two reached out for each other and then Lian relaxed enough to take the bottle Wood offered her.
Of the 14 children adopted in that group, two had heart problems and one had a cleft palate, all of which were later fixed in Canadian hospitals. Lian’s tongue protuded from her mouth because she never learned to suck properly. The orphanage cut off the top of the bottle nipple and propped it up beside her to accelerate feeding. After six months in Canada with proper bottles, Lian’s tongue no longer drooped.
The agency sends regular newsletters to its clients so they can keep track of what happened to their fellow adoptees. That is how Lian and Wood learned that her former crib mate now lives near Disneyworld in Florida. A reunion is planned.
Wood said 13 of the 14 children in her group adoption were girls. With China’s one-child rule, many families abandon their girl babies. Wood said since her adoption of Lian, the waiting times have increased because the Chinese found evidence some orphanages were buying babies to have enough to adopt out internationally.
Wood is now 45 and happy with her decision to adopt Lian.
‘She had a different beginning but is now like any other four year old.”
