Gay Adoption

Tiny Tiddler: Oi! Get off! You can't have my brella [umbrella]. You've got no fingers. Or hands.

Tiny Tiddler: Where moon?

Me: It's hiding behind the clouds.

Tiny Tiddler: In sky?

Me: Yes, behind the clouds.

Our three children have been living with us for a few months now; utterly shattered but loving being daddies! We have met up with their foster carers on a couple of occasions, so that the kids knew they were still okay (and vice versa) which went really well and so the plan is to maintain regular face-to-face contact with the foster family.

The eldest child is incredibly testing, but can be equally lovely and luckily we are receiving good support to help deal with attachment issues. The youngest two are bundles of joy, smiles and laughter (although they do produce a mountain of poo-filled nappies each day). Now that my partner is back at work I am at home with the three kids which can often be a very stressful experience, but I'm sure it'll get easier!

This will be the last post for some while, as life is about to become very busy. We recently went to matching panel, and they unanimously recommended the match we have been hoping for. We begin introductions soon, and in a few weeks we will become a family of five! Thanks for reading this tumblr. I will post updates if I get the chance.

We recently met with our new Social Worker who presented to us medical records of the children and their parents. Strangely we were not allowed to look at them ourselves, but she proceeded to read them off word-for-word (which seemed to defeat the object of us not being able to see them). Various pieces information were new to us, because the parents had disclosed to medical advisers information which they had withheld from Social Care staff. Whilst shocking and highly concerning, the new information obviously hasn't dented our determination to adopt these kids. 

The children's social worker has e-mailed us a copy of her Adoption Placement Report which combines information from the Child Permanence Report, Prospective Adopters Report as well as findings from the her meetings with us over the past few months. For a report which is tens of pages in length, it was surprisingly enjoyable to read. It's clear the children's social worker has a deep and accurate understanding of our strengths as prospective parents. We now have to add our own comments to the report before it is submitted to Panel, detailing why we think we are suitable parents for these particular children among other things.

Happy New Year folks!

At the end of 2011, for reasons not entirely clear to myself, I decided to visually map out our adoption experience so far. The whole process started in September 2009, and is possibly close to bearing fruit!

As you can see it's a fairly complex map with plenty of twists and turns. Now imagine if a similar map was produced for each of the three children, and they all met at the point of introductions (the final box on our map at the moment). When you imagine how complex that would appear, it's a miracle that any adoptions take place at all. I look forward to extending the map with joyous data such as the date the children move in, and hopefully no more boxes detailing needless delays.

It's official... Our invite to attend Matching Panel arrived in the post yesterday! In about six weeks time we will attend a 'Life Appreciation Day' where we'll meet many of the people who have been involved with the children's lives over the past few years, e.g. social workers, therapists, midwives, carers etc. This ensures we are fully informed about the children's history before a match is considered.

A few days after that it's off to Matching Panel to answer any questions they may have about why we want to adopt these particular children and how we intend to cope! Then we will nervously await their recommendation. If that's positive it's another few days of nervous waiting while the agency 'Decision Maker' takes into account Panel's recommendation, along with all the related reports and information before coming to a final decision.

Should the Decision Maker deem us to be a suitable match for these three kiddies, the introductions process will finally begin. After Matching Panel but prior to meeting them, the children will be shown our panel book as a way of gently introducing them to their daddies-to-be. We intend to use a talking photo album in conjunction with the panel book so that they can hear our voices before meeting us in person. I'll post more about the introductions process if and when it happens...

On Thursday night we found out the fantastic news that Panel had unanimously agreed to allow a change to our terms of approval earlier that day, therefore allowing us to adopt up to three children. This means we have a better chance of being able to adopt the three kids we're hoping to offer a 'forever family'. 

In addition to that brilliant news, we were bombarded with dates to preliminarily pencil into our diaries including a date for the all important Matching Panel.

Unfortunately we were told a couple of weeks ago that the linking meeting wouldn't be happening today due to 'key personnel' being unavailable. The next meeting is scheduled for four weeks today, so it'll be after Christmas before we find out whether the match with these three kids is a goer or not. Tense times!*

In preparation for matching panel we need to be approved to have an extra child, as we were originally approved to adopt two. As I'm an optimistic type, fully believing that the linking meeting will have a positive outcome, I enquired with our social worker about whether we could have our terms of approval changed at some point during the next Panel day, December 8th. No response. I re-sent the e-mail a few days later, and again heard nothing back. I re-sent it a third time another few days later with a little bit added along the lines of 'Haven't heard from you in blooming ages... hope you're okay?' which did the trick. Unfortunately her response was not what we wanted to hear! The Panel dates were fully booked in December and January so our case wouldn't be considered on December 8th; perhaps February if we were lucky!

We were both utterly distraught. Rather than firing off an angry e-mail, a phone call later our desperation was made clear and rather coincidentally things suddenly fell into place. It would seem that our social worker's manager and the person who co-ordinates Panels got together and sorted it. Despite Panel dates being fully booked until February, it actually looks like our case might be heard this time next week! How's that for a U-turn? If that goes ahead and it's a 'yes' and we are 'linked' at the linking meeting in four weeks, the next step would be 'Matching Panel'. Could it all happen that smoothly for once? Here's hoping so! Moral of the story: e-mails suck, phone calls rule.

Well it's been two weeks since meeting the foster carers, and two weeks of checking my e-mail at every opportunity to see if there has been any progress.

Before going to matching panel, adopters must be linked to the children they are hoping to adopt. Today we met with our social worker and, after being very vague about it all via e-mail, she finally gave us a comprehensive explanation regarding the linking process. 

I was under the false impression that 'linking' was a simple process which involved the kids' social worker having a discussion with their manager before deciding whether or not to make the link. The social worker and manager have met and decided to proceed with us, so they are not searching for other families, however the official 'link' can't be made until there has been a 'linking meeting'. These meetings appear to only take place every four weeks, with the next available dates being the 1st or the 28th of December. 

Our social worker seemed pretty blasé about whether the meeting happened sooner or later with little regard for our anxiety levels; obviously we're desperately hoping that the meeting can take place on the 1st so that we know before Christmas whether we are linked or not.

We had a fantastic meeting with the foster carers and all three social workers this evening. Even the dog behaved, to a degree (once the cake had been removed from the table). 

We inevitably discussed the children’s challenging behaviours and their triggers, but were left with the overall impression of three brave little kids in need of a permanent loving home. It was wonderful to hear all about the children’s personalities, their favourite activities and their daily routines.

It was very emotional to hear about their loving, stable foster family. I can’t imagine how difficult it will be for them to say goodbye to the children they have raised, when the time comes. We don’t know if it will be us they come to, but we’ve told our social worker we’re still 100% certain about proceeding, so patiently await the next step in the process. 

A 'sardine-style' meeting has been arranged for next Thursday with seven people plus a hyperactive attention-seeking dog all squeezed into our little living room. It'll be us two, the foster carers, our social worker, their social worker and the children's social worker, not forgetting the dog. The main purpose of the meeting is for us to get a better picture of who the children are, what they are like at home, and how they all get along.

We have already made the decision that these are the children we would like to adopt, but our social worker won't let on that we've come to a final decision until after this meeting. I guess she is just trying to protect all parties involved, but I'd be happier if we could just start booking panel dates now and worry about meeting the foster carers later! I can understand the importance of this step in the process but after reading detailed reports on the children, and discussing various issues with their social worker, I sincerely doubt we'll hear anything so terrible that we end up changing our minds.