The girls were up by 6:30 a.m. today! There is nothing scheduled on our itinerary today so we will spend the day relaxing. Hope refused her bottle of formula this morning! She has been licking on her hands like she is really hungry and we can tell she is getting weak. She rarely attempts to stand up or to even set up much for that matter. At breakfast we forced her to eat a couple of small bites of a soft scrambled egg and a mashed up banana. She chewed each bite very slowly and tried to spit it out but eventually we got her to swallow the food. It was much like teaching a small infant how to eat solid foods. She then took a small amount of the formula from her bottle. Just as we were finishing up breakfast she vomited up the formula all over her clothes. We returned to our room and gave her a bath and washed down her stroller. She fell asleep on our bed. She has been sleeping a lot the past few days! I have checked her temperature several times and she has not had a fever. We had heard there was a medical clinic located on the third floor of our hotel that other adoptive parents have used. We made the decision to take her to the clinic. Cordelia called to check on Hope just as I was getting ready to leave for the clinic. She said she would call Hope’s orphanage to see if they had any suggestions. The day the orphanage staff brought Hope to us we asked them many questions including what foods she was used to eating. Miss Lin had given Cordelia the information on the type of formula Hope was used to drinking and we had purchased some of it right after we got her. When we adopted Hannah in 2006 we were given formula along with rice cereal to mix in her bottle. We asked Cordelia to call the orphanage and find out if they had mixed rice cereal in Hope’s formula. I took Hope on down to the medical clinic. I knocked on the clinic door and was led into a dingy outdated and not particularly clean exam room by a nurse that could speak some broken up English. I had to write Hope’s Chinese name, my name and our room number in a book. The doctor was a lady who did not speak any English.. The nurse acted as our interpreter and they asked me several questions. The doctor looked into Hope’s mouth and told me she has tonsillitis. She instructed me to give her lots of warm water to drink. She also gave me three different kinds of medicine to give her. One of the medicines was the antibiotic, Zithromax, one was for congestion/cough and one was to help increase her appetite. They collected 130 Yuan (approximately $20) from me for the visit and medicine. We returned to our room and gave Hope her first dose of the medicine. Cordelia called and told us that after many phone calls she had finally found out from the orphanage staff that Hope was indeed used to having rice cereal mixed in with her formula. She purchased some of the cereal and some more bottled water for us and delivered it to our hotel room. Cordelia also told us the orphanage reported that they have always fed Hope all of her food and that she has never taken any initiative to eat anything on her own!! Although, she can hold and drink from a bottle by herself. We couldn’t believe that the orphanage staff had neglected to tell us such an important detail!!! This poor baby has never fed herself even though she is three years old!! No wonder she didn’t know what to do with the Cheerios or other snacks we have tried to give her! Cordelia called the doctor we had seen at the medical clinic today to confirm the diagnosis and to ensure nothing had gotten lost in translation. The doctor reported to her that Hope does have tonsillitis and also has an abnormal looking throat area that might have something to do with her ear deformity. Hope and Holly both took a long nap this afternoon while I washed some of our laundry out by hand in the bathtub. There are lots of reasonably priced laundries here in Guangzhou but we have been told they all use extremely hot water. When Hope awoke from her nap we attempted to feed her some of the rice cereal. Our prayers have been answered!!!! Praise be to God!!! Hope ate a small bowl of the cereal!!! Afterwards she even walked around the room a little bit!!! The temperature outside was in the upper 70’s today and since Hope was feeling better we decided to take the girls outside in their strollers. We were all glad to get out of our room for awhile. We stopped and ate some dinner at Lucy’s tonight and for some reason it wasn’t half bad!! Hope was not ready yet to eat again but Tracy did get her to drink some water from a regular glass. We believe this is her first time to drink from a glass!! I hope today is the start of many successful firsts for Hope!!! Thank you all for your prayers!!
From China With Love
Ann, Tracy, Hannah, Holly & Hope
Hanging out in the room
Eating all of my cereal for Daddy!
First drink from a cup
Beautiful Christmas light display White Swan Hotel
