SURVIVAL TIPS FOR ADOPTING PARENTS

This post is a list of tips for other parents who are embarking on an international adoption. Having done this once before, I like to think we are little wiser, a little more prepared and a little more organized. We'll see. Below is a list of things that should make life easier before/during and after travel.

• Read as much as you can about international adoption and the effects it has on kids and families. Don't let it scare you, but use it to set realistic expectations. (this was the single best thing we did before adopting) Here are my favorites:
Attaching in Adoption: Practical Tips for Today's Parents, by Deborah Gray
Toddler Adoption: The Weaver's Craft, by Mary Hopkins-Best
Parenting the Hurt Child, by Gregory Keck and Regina Kupecky
Raising Adopted Children, by Lois Melina
The Lost Daughters of China, By Karin Evans

• Stock the freezer.
Your child may need you to hold them constantly once you're home. They're afraid to be away from you. At all. You won't have time or energy to cook. Freezing meals ahead of time will be a life saver. (on the other hand, the 24-hour-holding-child-diet was the most effective I've ever been on.)

• Get all your annual doctor/dentist appts./car repairs/home improvement projects, etc. out of the way before you travel.

• Line up some friends or family members to be available to run errands (groceries, pick up prescriptions, etc.) for the first week or two after you arrive home.

• Start researching daycare if you'll be going back to work. It takes a while to find a daycare you trust as well as one that understands the mindset of an internationally adopted child.

• Research a pediatrician who specializes in internationally adopted kids.

• Use yahoo to find a message board for the orphanage you'll be adopting from, parents who have gone before you know tons and it's a great way to feel connected to your child. You never know what you might find (I've heard rumors that you may even come across a photo or two of your child : )

• Buy several gifts in China that you can give your child over the years to come. We bought Clara a pearl necklace and earrings to give her on her wedding day. (don't tell her okay?)

• Once home, keep a "log" on the kitchen table for feeding/medicine/sleeping times for your child. When tag teaming, it's a much handier (and far less crabby) resource than waking a comatose spouse who's very life depends on the couple hours of sleep they're trying to get.

• (my personal favorite) Subscribe to People magazine.
Getting children to adjust to new time zones is tricky business. Be prepared to be awake (although not alert) at all hours, gossip magazines are about all your brain can handle as you hold your precious child, fearful of moving them less they wake for the ninth time that night. Bonus tip: I keep mine tucked neatly under my New Yorker issues when company comes over.