It starts every year about this time, the drive to go back; to return to the hazy, cocoon-like embrace of Tiantan and escape the harsh light of reality.

To watch the sun cast longer rays on the hillside and feel the first warmth of spring feels foreign and wrong.  Spring for me has come to mean cherry blossoms and gritty skies.  It means endless days filled with therapies with the occasional reprieve provided by an outing to the market or park.

We should be planning and making preparations.

For the second year in a row, we won’t be making the return trip to Beijing.  The back that we long for no longer exists.  The therapy is different, the hospital is different.  Returning would only provide more risk than benefit and  we aren’t about gamble with  Tatyanna’s life.

But it doesn’t erase the feeling of longing.

For us, back means fighting.

Six years later the kids still talk about Canada Day at “the lege” in Edmonton and how much fun that day was.

Let’s do something different this month.  Instead of a photo, I dug up a very old blog entry from our life on the other side.   I can still remember vividly how utterly crazy and overwhelming that day felt….it kind of makes me giggle now.

Date: June 13, 2006

It was one of those parenting nightmare kind of days. In the morning I dropped Trent off for his yearly week long work “holiday”. He calls it work but anything that involves having time to oneself, the ability to sleep uninterrupted, eating food that someone else cooks and not having to clean anything is a holiday in my books.

The day itself was not so bad, and left me feeling optimistic about the rest of the week.   But, around 4:00 in the afternoon,  it all went drastically downhill.  Tatyanna has had a rash for the last several weeks. I have tried every natural treatment that I can think of with no success. She was getting to the point where she was scratching her skin raw. I, feeling good about the day, decided that enough was enough and perhaps it was time to consider seeing a regular doctor for some relief of prescribed variety.  I called health link to determine if there was anyone close, taking new patients and was given a list of names to chose from.   Dr. Adams. I figured that it sounded like a pronounceable sort of name and was optimistic that perhaps he spoke English and drove the 30 minutes to the west end to see him.

2 hours.  I waited in a crowded waiting room with 4 kids for 2 hours. It was NOT fun.  Tatyanna kept trying to take her clothes off (because they were itchy) and make “snow angels” on the floor. We read every book in the waiting room, played eye spy with the older two, pretended she was a bear in a cave under the chair and counted everything we could think of. I used all of my usual tricks and then some but after two hours, nothing works.  By the time we got to enter phase two, also  known as waiting in the actual office, I was peeling her off the walls.

At this point I was thinking that the change of scenery might be a positive change and kept Tatyanna busy looking at the bone charts and things on the walls. Then Lexi, who never spits up, puked all over my foot. I was wearing sandals.  Once the doctor came in, it was obvious that English was not his first language (the name Moufasa on the wall gave me the heads up)….or even his second. He barely understood me and didn’t understand Tatyanna at all. I still felt ok about the whole thing…until he started sporadically saying “help me!” and pretending to cry throughout the conversation. Apparently he got a kick out of Lexi’s horrified expression.

After a bizarre checkup, he announced that it was either ringworm or eczema. Excuse me ??!!  As someone who grew up on a farm, I’m fairly familiar with ringworm and as someone who also suffers from eczema, I’m familiar with that too. I felt that given the fact we currently live in a city and have not been near any animals other than the dog in a very long time, the latter diagnosis was probably more correct. I suggested that too him and he agreed. A script for cortisone cream and a few more rounds of “help me” and we were out of there. Once at the medication counter, Tatyanna decided that she’s had enough and started alternately trying to bite me and scratch Lexi. I put her down and ask the older two to watch her. She bolted, forcing me to leave my place in line and chase her down. Fortunately she is predictable and we followed her right to the  toy department.  I gathered Tatyanna on one hip, Lexi on the other and returned to the pharmacy to stand at the end of the growing line.  McDonald’s drive through began to sound like an appealing supper time option…and I’m a vegetarian.

Once home, the older two kids decided that they no longer like each other and resume their regularly scheduled routine of incessant bickering. I finally got them in bed and struggled for another several hours to get the the younger two to settle down for the night .

It was a very late night. Trent called around 10 to see how we were doing and told me how he had spent his evening going out to dinner, watching TV and practicing his kanji.

I was very happy for him.

Tatyanna and one of her grandmas, April 6 2006

There have been many changes over the last six years but one thing has remained constant.   Every moment of her day is spent surrounded by love.

This photo was taken at the end of a truly amazing and bittersweet day.  On March 25, Children’s Wish Foundation granted part 1 of Tatyanna’s wish for a pony.  We spent the day at a farm going riding and then went to a tack store to pick out a saddle, bridle and accessories for pony and rider.    Part 2 was granted on our return from China when we were better able to give a new pony the necessary time and attention it needed.

To see the rest of her wish day follow this link