All complete and attachment

So, we did the "swearing in" oath yesterday at the US Consulate. Once
she lands on US soil, she will be an American citizen. All we have to
do when we get back is a simple court procedure to re-adopt her
there...this will give her an American birth certificate with our
names on it. Having this will both give her parents of record
(remember, she was abandoned here -- more on that in a later post-- so
she has no listed parents on her Chinese paperwork, only an orphanage)
and it will make her life easier in the US (think of all the things we
need birth certificates for...school enrollments, marriage, adoption
paperwork, etc). So, the paper chase is really over! I even had an
emotional moment when we did the swearing in ceremony (usually, an
adult would swear for herself, but as she is pre-verbal, and we are
the ones who actually applied for her citizenship, we did it for
her). I suppose there are some moments when I really am happy to be
American. Now she is an American too. (Don't worry, I am slightly
conflicted about this -- I really wish the Chinese government allowed
her to have dual citizenship, but alas, this is not an option).

So, today we prepare to come home.

And in doing so, I'd like to prepare you all (okay, y'all) for her
arrival. I guess this is my first real experience with being a momma
bear, and the protective instincts are already alive and well. In
addition, it is good for me to write things out...it makes them take
shape both in my head an in my life (see millions of children's books
where writing the story makes it so...)

Zi is beautiful, and we are completely in love and attached to her.
But, remember, we had her picture for three months before we met her
(not to mention the 4 years preceding that as we prepared for a
child). We had a lot of time to prepare ourselves for her entry into
our life. She, on the other hand, is not really attached to us yet.
As another mom here so elegantly said, she has become an expert in
self-soothing. That towel/pacifier is really what she is attached
to. It is what has been constant for her over the past 10 months.
Now, we fully expect that with time, she will become attached to us,
but this takes work -- and a building of her trust that we, unlike her
biological mother and unlike the nannies at the orphanage are trust
worthy. We will not abandon her. To do that, we have to parent her a
little differently than a securely attached child. This means we go
to her when she cries (immediately), and we try to soothe her. There
is no crying it out. More importantly, this means that for the first
few months, Charles and I need to be the only people who meet her
basic needs (feeding, bathing, clothing, diaper changes, nap time
rituals, etc). This means that we will not force her to be held by
anyone other than us (and right now she has no problems going to other
people, which may sound healthy, but what this indicates is that she
has no attachments to us -- yet), in fact, we probably won't leave the
room when someone else is holding her. This does not mean that we do
not want you to come visit or to hold her, we do. We just need to let
her learn in her own time that we are her parents now, that we are
worthy of her trust.

In additional to all of this, we expect that the first week home will
be pretty monstrous for her. A new home, a new room, a new dog (oh,
and she is terrified of dogs), a new language, a new family, a new
time zone, you name it. Her world is about to go full tilt. This may
help her to attach to us (we will be the one constant in the move), or
it may just send her spinning out of control. There is no way to know.

So, please come visit us (or, let's be honest, her), but don't be
surprised if I put you to work grocery shopping, doing laundry,
cleaning my house, cooking, etc instead of letting you bond with Zi.
It isn't personal. I'm just trying to help her attach to us as easily
as possible and without confusion about who is her mom and dad.