Disappointed Daddy and Mommy

Well, we had hoped to bring Cai home with us tomorrow. Unfortunately, we are not allowed. As you can imagine, we are very disappointed. The deal is this: we are not yet the parents and as such the orphanage makes all medical decisions for our little girl.

And they have decided to keep her in the Children's Hospital for another 5-7 days.
That will seem like forever.

And we have no choice but to respect their decision. The people who work for our adoption agency have done all they can for us and for Cai and we are really greatful for that, but the orphanage gets the last word, so she stays put- for now.

So, I (Virginia) went to see her today. We can visit between the hours of 11am and 4pm.
Cai has been moved from the ICU to a "regular" room. Let me try and paint a picture for you. As I walked through the maze of hallways, strewn with people sleeping on mats, children being fed or changed, and filled with laundry being dried on makeshift lines, I finally found the third floor of the wing where Cai is staying. She is sharing a room with four other children and their parents/caregivers.

It is NOT a large room. There is no air conditioning and rooms are connected, kind of like a pod-classroom you would have seen in the 70s. So it is not quiet! There is a window that looks onto the courtyard; Cai's crib is near the window. Sadly, it does not let in relief from the heat, so Cai's nanny (a woman hired by the orphanage) fans her with wild abandon.

Her nanny is a lovely lady; I just wish I could understand her! I wish I could understand anyone there. No one speaks English, so my visit was limited to cooing over our poor, sad little girl.

The conditions are far from hygenic and although the nursing staff clearly tries very hard, there are just too many patients and too little space. As you will see in one of the pictures, the nannies/mommies/caregivers stay 24/7. They sleep on the floor underneath the babies' beds (notice the two people under the crib and Cai is in top corner).

Cai is, as you can see, not looking her party-ready-best. While her Mohawk might be considered fashionable on some New York City streets, it is not so cool on a baby. As I said before, we will be shaving that soon! Then she and Tri (and I am told John is going to join them - mommy won't) will all grow hair together.

She is still on oxygen and she has a feeding tube. I THINK I understood that she will be losing the equipment tomorrow. I hope so.

She is responsive - sort of. But the most shocking thing is that there isn't much life in her eyes. Boy are we going to work hard to change that. As I remember, Tri was a little bit like that and now he is quite the little charmer. While Cai seems to be even more distant, I am sure a lot of love will help her along.

Her breathing and coughing still smacks of pnuemonia and I think she is still on antibiotics. I sure hope not as she would have been on them for over 2 weeks, now.

And so, we wait.
It will be a long, long 5-7 days. We really hope that will be shortened.
Until then, we will continue to visit: one of us will stay with Tri and one will go in to see Cai each day. That is the best we can do right now.

Please send your positive energy our little girl's way; she can use all the good vibes she can get.
Virginia