Shay Lynne

Shay Lynne, pictured here with her family, is a sturdy eleven month old who was adopted two months ago from China. Their story is an amazing American odyssey.
I first met Jocelyn when she was a parent in my school. Tyler, the oldest boy, is now twelve. Then, he was no more than seven and his brother Ben was a toddler. Jocelyn and Mike, her husband, were the kind of appealing parents a school director loves. Their child was wonderful and interesting and both parents volunteered at school. I was aware that this family wanted another child and that Jocelyn suffered many miscarriages. Then I heard that they were trying to adopt a Chinese child. Everyone at school was most supportive. Tyler grew older and moved on to middle school and Ben came to our school. Still no baby. The difficulties of an international adoption are formidable but Jocelyn and Mike persevered. Jocelyn had attended a wonderful Chinese-American elementary school in San Francisco so she was inclined to include a Chinese child in their family.
It took three years to happen.
Mike is a policeman and Jocelyn is a nurse. When they moved to Florida they bought a house in one of these awful developments such a commute from anything. Everyone was unhappy. "It was toxic," says Jocelyn. They moved to funky Gulfport, put Tyler in SunFlower School, and their life drastically changed for the better. Jocelyn's mom, who still works as a mental health therapist, lives in an attached apartment and she gives a lot of time to help out with the kids.( I am envious of this arrangement in some ways. I would love to have my own grandson on hand more.)
In early September the call finally came. Their baby was ready and Mike and Jocelyn had to go to China to pick her up. They left Tyler and Ben with Mamaw, met up with thirty other parents-to-be, and flew to China. The group was divided into three, and each group proceeded to the place in South China where they would receive their children.
Jocelyn and Mike described this so vividly. They noticed right away how polluted the air was. One could hardly see anything. Barely over jet lag, their group of eleven couples went on a bus to an orphanage in Hunan province. They sat on one side of the room and on the other side were eleven "nannies" with children in their laps. One by one, the families were called to receive their new daughters. Mike said he recognized his child immediately. He had studied the photograph so intensely he caught that tiny little discrepancy in Shay Lynne's eyes. Jocelyn said she couldn't tell.
They picked up their new children and each family was given a packet of the clothes their child wore when left at the orphanage. Then, for the next three weeks, these families lived in a hotel while the visas and other paperwork was completed. They went on bus tours and all around the area. And all the time they had their new babies in tow. For some of them, this was their first child. These families were issued labels they could wear in public so that Chinese could know that these Americans were adoptive parents. Mike and Jocelyn said that so many people were friendly when they saw these.
When it looked like the Chinese adoption would really happen, Jocelyn began to think that she should get ready to breast feed this new baby. So she took the hormones to make her milk flow and began to pump. Her milk came in and she froze a supply. She continued.
By the time she and Mike had their new little girl fresh from the orphanage, they realized that something was very wrong. In fact all these newly adopted baby girls were very sick. They were not urinating at all, except for blood on the diaper.
Jocelyn called her American pediatrician. This was the moment of the emergence of the melamine problem in Chinese formula and milk products and Shay Lynne was certainly affected. Shay Lynne loved the pumped breast milk, and gradually over the next couple of weeks, the bloody urine stopped. When they got back to the U.S. they did all the kidney function tests and Shay Lynne was healing! She is now perfect, plump, dimpled and extremely cute. The doctors think she'll be just fine.
This American family came to visit us today. We walked in the woods and fields, Shay Lynne being passed from person to person. She loved the cows and the leaves. We sat down to a homely dinner of chili, good salad, and home made bread. Shay Lynne really wanted to crawl around the house and pick up specks to mouth. Ben and Tyler wanted to go outside with me with flashlights and look for wildlife. Mike really wanted to go out with us too.
I can see that those boys are going to be very good brothers. This gentle family who came to visit today seems to have the right values.
What a lovely family!