This Napping Concept Could Catch On Bigtime!

Greetings from Wednesday ...

Maeve is slowly getting used to us, and is certainly showing us the wide variety of food she's more than willing to vacuum up. On Gotcha Day we were given the disposable camera that we'd mailed to Maeve's foster family in her care package, back in early December. Will develop it upon returning to Waterloo---hopefully some pics of her foster parents, which would be, for us and Maeve, a priceless keepsake.

We did receive something else from the Foster family yesterday, during the binge of donations and document signings ... We'd posed several questions to the Foster parents, had them translated, mailed them off Dec. 5th. Some of our questions were answered. Apparently, our Maeve is fond of noodles and rice---no surprise there, and her proclivity of palate in those dishes is shared by her Mom. Also, she is a great lover of bananas; so she has something culinary in common with Dad, too!

We tested these favourite food claims out during ensuing meals, and sure enough, Maeve wolfs rice and noodles and bananas down with great gusto. If we take too long scooping up the next spoonful, she's leaning over the whole serving dish, mouth open, demanding more :)

Pic one: going to dinner last night, in a new outfit. I should mention that changing clothes is extremely traumatic for our daughter; she goes into a screaming horrorshow fit that is quite distressing to be party to. Don't get me wrong; I've seen plenty of toddlers get fussy, cranky, upset and throw temper tantrums when being dressed. This is something else entirely. Maeve can't breathe, her temperature shoots skyward, she sweats profusely, tears stream out, she shivers, has tremors ... Worst of all, these clothes-changing/diaper-changing times are the only times she gasps out "Mama! Mama!" wanting to be rescued.

She also vocalizes something else during these moments of torture (Kath and I feel forced into the role of Szell, the dentist played by Olivier in Marathon Man---agh!) ... When things are worst, when Maeve is most terrified (and terror is the only word for it), she not only cries out for a foster mom who will never come again, she squeezes her eyes closed and begins shriek-singing a melody to herself. A few bars only, the same few bars, only when she is slipping beyond terror into certainly help will never come for her.

This wierd, brief, horribly sad humming of bars is her coping mechanism for those times when she feels completely unable to control what's going on. Kath and I have an idea what this bit of melody might be: Maeve's six month medical record mentioned a set of bells as her security blanket. Sure enough, she is handed over to us at 10 months old clutching to those bells as to life itself ... Maeve's six month medical record also mentioned that her foster mom hums her a special song to go to sleep.

When her terror takes over and we cannot comfort her, Maeve tries to hum the song her lost mother always sang to comfort her. This is heartrending because we only hear it at the worst moments our daughter has to endure (we've tried to keep clothes changing to a minimum, but diapers are diapers, and needs must be removed, etc) ... Maeve gives up hope of being saved during the worst moments, tries to save herself, put herself to sleep.

Enough said on that score---and let me soften the above by stating plainly that Maeve recovers from these horrors/nightmares very quickly, and does take and seek solace in Kath's arms afterward. For 95% of our second and third day, she was reasonably content, and taking to us well.

Onto better subjects: Afternoon naps. According to the precious response-letter to our list of questions to the foster family, Maeve likes to nap from noon until four. And she's been communicating to us when she's ready to conk, all right. Right now she is flat on her back in dreamland (hopefully Kath and I are starting to appear in those dreams in a good way, after our second wonderful morning together).

So the upshot is, this post-Gotcha part of our expedition is proving a lot easier on us than the extreme-touring-and-visiting-and-never-staying-in-one-place-uprooting first half of our expedition to Asia. Frankly, lying around cuddling a soft and beautiful baby girl is pretty easy on the mind and body. Restful and relaxing is how we'd both describe our first couple of days with Maeve, terror-fits and hours-required-to-get-her-to-sleep included.

Now, less than two days since she found her way into our arms, we have discovered two powerful weapons to add to the arsenal of our presumed God-given charms when it comes to soothing a child and putting her to sleep:

Music and Motion. Classic weapons, sure; but you never know whether they'll work with the next toddler you encounter.

With Maeve, all we have to do is put on my laptop's playlist (the Dreams of Maeve list, Mom!), and she instantly falls into a drop-dead gorgeous droopy-eyed demure. Then this morning we added Weapon Two, by trying out the stroller, prior to a walk in fabulous Nanchang's Peoples Park. Just pushing Maeve back and forth in the stroller in our Galactic Hotel room as a test of the device put our new Nuer under in under a minute. Wow, she goes out fast when put in motion.

Cars and travel with Maeve should be a breeze ... Go ahead, cackle now, all those of you who've been through nightmare vacations with babes in arms. We'll get our comeuppance, no doubt.

But for now, life with baby Nuer's been a walk in the People's park :)

Pic One: Last night, taking the elevator down to a dinner with the whole Nanchange adoption group; the two babes in my life, happy and ready for Chinese comestibles.

Pic Two: Lucilla transformed into Po Po (Mandarin for Maternal Grandma). So far, only Lucilla has managed to wring a hint of a smile from Maeve Chai Ling. (Smiles are something for us to look forward to in the coming days; hopefully we'll get some in Beijing, on the Great Wall!)

Pic Three: a hint of a smile by our still-a-magical-mystery-tour girl.

Pic Four: Maeve Is Ready For Older Cousins, Oh Yeah! Here, she leans eagerly towards Helena, the absolutely terrific nine-year-old daughter of Beth and James, one of the companion families in our all-Canadian adoption group.

Pic Five: Maeve The Determined, taken this morning. She'll figure out this cup concept no matter what it takes!

Pic Six: Maeve reading, but also watching Mama put out new clothes to change her into.

Pic Seven: Maeve's smart enough to know what's coming, and fearfully clutches her new security blanket, a big inch worm we've given her (safer to suck and gnaw on than metal bells).

Pic Eight: Rock formation at the People's Park.

Nine: Maeve in motion is a Maeve unconscious. A family pic at the People's Park, so named because Nanchang is the city where the Communist Revolution in China began.

Ten: Mom tests out Maeve's noodle-desire factor.

Eleven: Please Mom, can I have some more?

Twelve: Faster Mom!

Thirteen: Maeve loves noodles!

Fourteen: Proud Gung Gung and Po Po (don't know about the spelling, but close enough).

Fifteen: another pic from end of Gotcha Day ... Maeve and Dad in the Galactic Lobby.

Again, thanks to everyone for your comments---it's so great to hear from friends and family loved ones when going through this kind of life adventure on the far side of the world!

Pat and Kath and the Maeveling