> Having said that, the story from the OP does not add up: you don't need to renew the visa stamp to stay in the country. The stamp is for crossing the border.
My story does add up. We needed to leave the U.S. to visit China, and we also visit Canada sometimes, hence necessitating the stamping process to take place at a U.S. Consulate in China. And it was this process that ended up being indeed a massive hurdle. In fact, so massive it is a major part of what kept my fiancee from returning. This is one of the cruxes of the story.
>We were visiting China in January to both see her family and friends and to do the yearly renewal of her re-entry visa.
sounds like the renewal per se was a goal of your visit. If you are saying that you went to visit China and had to get a new visa stamp because the current one expired then it indeed adds up.
It is both. There is a dependency in the sense of us going to China necessitated her getting the stamp. But if she wants to leave the U.S. to any country, Canada for example, and return to the U.S., then she needs to go back to China to do the stamping process to enable that. So it's basically required unless you want to just stay in the U.S. for multiple years straight, which is unlikely for international people and also for people in general that like to travel.
My story does add up. We needed to leave the U.S. to visit China, and we also visit Canada sometimes, hence necessitating the stamping process to take place at a U.S. Consulate in China. And it was this process that ended up being indeed a massive hurdle. In fact, so massive it is a major part of what kept my fiancee from returning. This is one of the cruxes of the story.