Samantha's Story
By John & Carol G
Our Journey to China was a little different than most; we got to experience China and its medical care system. My husband John was ill before we flew to China. He developed a bacterial infection that we didn’t know about until receiving our daughter Samantha Jing Xiu and he collapsed two hours later on September 4, 2006. Needless to say, this is not how we envisioned starting this new chapter of our lives with our daughter. We were very lucky to be traveling with our WHFC guide, Marney Toole, and our wonderful group who are now our extended family. The group helped in so many ways with looking after Samantha while I traveled back and forth to the hospital to visit with John. We could not thank the group enough for their support and concern. We also had a wonderful national guide, Candy, and local guide, Jenny, who were very supportive and assisted with the language barrier in communicating John’s medical issues. We have made life-long and close friends.
My most memorable experience besides receiving my daughter has to be the ambulance ride. They decided that John would be transferred to a second hospital and I was to join him on the ride. The ride would be one I would never forget. I got in the back of the ambulance and John told me not to watch the driving; I couldn’t resist especially when you see that NO ONE PULLS OVER for ambulances or anything else in China. The driver did what he had to do to get my husband to the hospital. He was dodging cars, buses, motorcycles, pedestrians and even going up on sidewalks to get to the hospital. We arrived at the second hospital having people crowd around my husband because he stood out, not being Asian. They were interested in watching to the point that they followed us into the emergency room. The medical staff removed the spectators from the room. In spite of all this he got great medical care and the staff was very professional and compassionate. Even Samantha got to experience the ride to the third hospital in a taxi cab and didn’t seem to mind at all; she was very curious about things from the 1st day we met her.
This whole experience was a wonderful example of the advantage of traveling in groups. The support of the group and WHFC made everything just a little bit easier and we can look back at the experience and feel confident that WHFC is prepared for any "curveballs" that may come your or their way.
We were very happy and will always remember all the support we received from WHFC; the seminars, the "while-you-wait" meetings, our social workers, Martha Lawton and Nancy Thompson, the Waltham office and Linda Lin’s wonderful China staff. The support made the long, long wait a little easier to handle. And when we received our little angel it made everything worthwhile. We fell instantly in love with Samantha and our love for this “gift” continues to grow. She is growing so fast and soon will be off to school, then to college, and navigating through her own life. We feel so blessed to have her and every day she amazes us more than the day before. What a wonderful way to complete a family.