There’s a new picture hanging in my kitchen today, a new masterpiece to our mixed media gallery, hanging between Olaf magnets and a flyer from school.

Yesterday was her last Chinese class of the year. Little dark-haired people skitted around the room while soft-spoken Lao Shi tried to shepherd their bodies with seemingly swelling energy. Typically, one of us sits in her class and typically tries to read despite the reason why we’re there. But, with the senioritis that suspiciously attacked even these preschoolers, I was needed.

Lao Shi had brought photocopies for the children to complete and staple together as memory books of the year. Way over the heads of children who can barely write their own names, most of them were scribbling and distracted and alternating between singing Liang Zhi Lao Hu and Let it Go. Lydia clutched a red pen in her little fingers, firmly held it motionless over the ABOUT ME page before her and swung her feet with gusto below her. As the teacher tried to help other kids, I pulled up to her desk to help her, filling in the blanks with the words she supplied to me.

My age: 5.

Where I was born: China.

My parents: Mommy and Daddy.

Brothers & Sisters: Ashlyn, Drew and Evan.

Pets: Mojo and Bebo.

My picture: 

Okay, Lydia. Go ahead. You draw a picture of yourself there.

Pressing hard on the page, she drew her typical person—a round circle for a head, an oval torso, stick arms and legs, eyes and a smile, and some hair around the head. But, then she started intensely working on that torso. I thought she was intent on giving herself a dress that matched the one she was wearing. I watched until she put the pen down with contentment.

That’s a big belly and inside that is a baby that was beautiful called Yue Yue that became Lydia.

It was not a dress she was intensely drawing, it was herself in the womb of her first mother. I smiled and waited for her and for the lump in my throat to dissipate a little. While I waited, she picked up the pen again and went back to her drawing, this time drawing a little body on the chest of the stick figure that was her China mommy.

A doctor helped me to come out of her belly because that’s what doctors do.

Is that your China mommy holding you?

Yup….I don’t know her name.

I know. I’m sorry. I don’t know her name either. I wish we did….

No one stopped to listen. No one there sat with me and marveled at all this little 5 year old girl is processing when she is told to complete a picture appropriate for the title ABOUT ME. This little moment just blended into the energy of the room and class went on without a notice of another step in the journey of a little girl and the woman who is her second mother.

 

There was no getting it out of my head. It had become my heart’s background music.

How great is our God. Sing with me. How great is our God.

Ashlyn had invited Lydia to watch her adoption video again…and again and again. As I buzzed around the kitchen, I could hear the song from the other room over and over with Ashlyn’s sweet narration of the images that have become as much a part of the song as the notes and lyrics themselves for our family.

As I danced between the stove and sink to prepare our meal as mothers often do, a small person ran into the room and hugged my legs tight, forcing me to still as small people often do.

I love being adopted. I want to be adopted again!

Caught up in the words of praise and moving music and dramatic images, she recognized in her little 4 year old way the significance and beauty of that moment when we received her in our arms after years of anticipation.

I told her then and write now to preserve the words and my heart here for when her little 4 year old heart is an 8 year old heart or a 12 year old heart or it bursts one day as a mother’s heart.

I love you “being adopted” too. I am so happy to be your mother. When I see you sleeping in the car or watch snuggled up with your sister or listen to your long prayers before dinner, my heart smiles along with my face and I hear the words of “How Great is Our God” in my heart again. The day I saw you enter that office room in the arms of a woman who had cared for you for a year, wearing your big puffy pants, I was amazed and filled with wonder. Years of desiring you had come to fruition. I remember every moment of that day—the songs of the street cleaning trucks, the echoes in the marble halls, the cough that rattled your little frame. I can get caught up in wanting to relive that day too. But, my love, there is no need now to pine for that day. When we adopted you, it was done. Finished. You become ours. Grafted in. If I were able to go back and do it again, I would because I love you even more fully now than I did that day. But, there’s no do overs with that. Our vows that day still stand today and will tomorrow and forever more as every part of you is every part of us.

Yes, I love you being adopted. I loved that day when we adopted you. And, I’d do it again 100 x 100 times if I could. I love you that much.

At 12 1/2 months old, most mothers are training their babies to take a sippy cup.

When our daughter was 12 1/2 months old, we were training her how to take a bottle from us. Of course, we got nothing but support—she needed the nutrition, she needed the closeness, we needed the closeness, it fostered attachment both ways. No one questioned it.

A year later, at a chronological age of 2 with a family age of 1, maybe some people thought it odd that she still took a bottle several times a day. Being so teeny though, most people didn’t think twice about the bottle coddling going on.

Now, she’s 4…actually, 4 1/3 to be exact. And, yes, while her family age is behind that, it too is now 3 1/3.

Every morning, this little one stumbles into our bedroom, wiping the sleep from her eyes, often with her “ren ren” (aka her most precious blanket friend ever). She climbs into bed between us, gets real close to one of our faces, and says, “Can I have a hot big bottle?”

And, every morning, one of us comes downstairs, searching for one of only 3 functional bottles we have left and give her exactly what she wants. She lays calmly in our bed and slowly sucks down a bottle of warm rice milk as she has done since soon after she came home 3 years ago. Most days, she wants another one in the afternoon when she’s feeling tired. And, she’ll predictably ask for one when she’s upset or is anxious or is just not feeling good. And, I give it to her. Then, every night before bed, she wants one more.

Seems a little strange to give a 4-year-old a bottle still, I know. While she never is a public drinker, I’m sure if she were, we’d turn a few heads. But, here’s the thing—I. don’t. care.

For the first year of her life, arguably the most critical development time for a human being, she was not fed on demand. She was fed on a schedule, because that’s they way things work when you have lots of babies and few caregivers. What should have been comfort-giving early on likely became a race to get as much as she could before it was taken away.

One day, she’ll say to me in a tired voice, “I want my hot big bottle” as she lays on my shoulder, and someone will say, “A bottle? You don’t want a bottle. Only babies drink bottles!” At some point, she’ll hear it one too many times and decide she can’t drink a bottle anymore. But, until that day, when she tells me she’s too big for a bottle, I’ll keep stumbling downstairs to our kitchen, looking to see if any of the 3 bottles are clean to make one for her. And, I’ll hand it to her and watch her quietly drink it as she plays with my covers.

It brings her comfort, makes her feel safe, makes her feel protected, and reminds her that we’ll give her whatever she needs. Yes, my 4-year-old still takes a bottle.