Had this post in the edit section, wasn't going to hit publish.

I feel the need to chat about China's waiting child program. Something has been on my mind lately.
As most of you are aware, our youngest daughter was a waiting child. We decided to adopt from the waiting child program for many reasons, one of which is that we wanted our second child to be the same ethnicity as our first. Also, my husband had open heart surgery when he was an infant. We initially requested to adopt a child with a heart condition since my husband has lived with that his whole life.
As it turns out my daughter does not have a heart condition, but she will be having many operations over her lifetime.

This brings me back to what I've been struggling with a little. I see so many people commenting about how the waiting children from China have minor correctable medical needs. I love that people are advocating for China's waiting children and yes, some of the children do have minor correctable medical issues. However, many children have medical needs that are a little more serious. My concern is that some families may be going into the adoption process not understanding how involved some of these needs can be.
I also think that we, as adoptive parents sometimes don't like to talk about the difficulties we are dealing with.
We want to talk about the happy times, positive moments, all the good times.

Personally, I am a research queen. I read many books, talk to people (well mostly online since I am on the shy/somewhat antisocial side), and research the issues. Does that mean that I was prepared for our second trip to China to adopt a 2 year old who had spent her whole life in an orphanage? Not so much, yet I felt completely prepared boarding that plane to China. In reality it was a terrifying (for my daughter and us), heart wrenching experience. Yes, my research did show me what could happen but when you are in that moment it is a whole other ball game.
Now, do not misunderstand me, I love my daughter. She is the most amazing little girl, so cuddly, outgoing and happy (mostly), smart and very strong. I would do that trip over again in a second. I'm also not going to sugar coat it, we as a family struggled. It was a huge adjustment for Brennyn, living with a family who spoke some funny language, leaving the only home she had ever known, seeing doctor after doctor. Brennyn cried and screamed a lot those first 4 months home (and I don't mean a little shriek now and than, no I'm talking about a full blown breaking glass scream). She was also a very sick little girl(parasites, etc.).
I just think that sometimes families may be going into a waiting child adoption a little unprepared for the outcome.
As I mentioned in my rambling, my daughter will need many surgeries. Her "condition" is not correctable. The surgeries are to make her hands as functional as possible. Although, if you ask me her hands are just as functional as any other 2 year old but I digress.
There are also some other medical issues that we are working with as well.
We were well aware that our daughter would need surgery. We were also given extra time to have her file evaluated by other doctors. Our agency was very thorough and had given our daughter's file to a few other doctors before we were even given her referral. We had more than 3 weeks to make our decision at that time. This was when some agencies received agency lists from the CCAA and the agency was responsible for making the matches. This is no longer the case (at least not in Canada) as each agency must use the shared list. Our agency and the doctor who reviewed Brennyn's file were very honest about her condition and the fact that they really did not have any answers, it was a bit of a guess as to what her condition actually was and is. I just knew that we would do whatever she needed, no matter what and that she was our daughter. Again, I knew all this ahead of time, so it was no surprise that Brennyn will be spending some time at Sick Kids.

All this to say that sometimes I think by not talking realistically, we are doing waiting parents and the waiting children a disservice. Families need to be prepared for the reality of adopting a waiting child. Not all medical conditions are correctable and minor.