Sibling contact question

[Bringonthesunshineplease]

Hi all. We agreed to 4 yearly contacts with a full sibling to our children who adopted a year ago. Their sibling is a few years older than our oldest child. Our children's sibling had not lived with them for 2 years and ss were actively trying to have them adopted as well. So a year on we have not yet had the agreed face to face sibling contact as their sibling is still with a foster carer and has regular contact with BM. Now we have been advised that there will not be an adoption for them and it will be long term foster care. Also that they would like to arrange a face to face contact with our children. My concern/ question is that our oldest at 4 year's knows their new surname, where we live, nursery they attend etc and if we did have contact how would we protest them when this information could be shared with their older sibling and in turn with BM who is still having contact? We are now considering saying no to face to face contact. Would we be unreasonable to do so? Only agreed to the contact as we believed the sibling would be adopted which is sadly not going to happen. Feel bad but that we must put the safety of our own children first. Looking for others thoughts or experiences on how to manage this type of situation. Thanks.

[butterflyballs]

Could contact take place under your supervision? It's a really tough situation and I understand your concerns about bm finding out where you live, kids go to school etc. I'd talk to the agency that arranged the adoption and if needs be look at changing the order so your children are protected.

[slkk]

I would only accept letterbox under these circumstances, sad as they are. As well as protecting your dc you are also protecting their sibling who could be put under pressure from bm to give information.

[Kazza299]

This was a similar plan of contact with our 2 DCs brother but as he was still seeing BM we decided to stick with letterbox only for the reasons you outlined x

[odyssey2001]

We are in exactly the same situation and we have gone with face to face contact anyway. Yes there is a risk but I could not, in good conscience, say no. Looking at it from your child's perspective, trying to explain this further down the road may be very tricky. What will be will be.

[iwishkidslikedtomatoes]

We have siblings who our LOs can't see because their siblings are not adopted. It is very hard explaining to our eldest why they can't see them and they only have letterbox, so I agree with Odyssey2001 in that you really do need to think about how you will answer/justify this to children now and later. HOWEVER, while us adopters worrying shouldn't result in a blanket 'no', I don't think because of those reasons it should be a blanket 'yes' in every situation either.

The decision with us was not ours, SS decided the risk was too great. Every case is different. Some LOs have parents who've harmed their children or pose a risk to do so, or they may have refused to take any responsibility for what has happened and may believe that their children should still be with them and will actively try to rectify this, in which case what is best for your children may be not to have face-to-face contact.

I would say you need to consider what the risk is if your LO says something as opposed to what the risk of your LO saying something is and go from there. If it were me I would certainly, as a minimum, be sharing my concerns with SW. Very difficult situation

[iwishkidslikedtomatoes]

Having read my post I realise that's nothing you won't already know but I think the same, which is why I posted!

Good luck

[Italiangreyhound]

Bringonthesunshineplease is there any way of assessing the degree of risk that may occur if the birth family did find out where you lived?

Some families have more severe risks, some few.

That would be my deciding factor, and for me, safety would come first.

I would, however, encourage something like shared video letters, where you record a 'letter' video, like a Skpye call which can be posted or emailed to the family who are caring for your children's sibling and vice versa. This way they could ask each other 'allowed' questions, share favourite toys etc by showing it on screen so more personal than letter box. Just my idea, no idea if this is on offer.

[Bringonthesunshineplease]

Thanks all for the advice and messages. Plenty to consider and really helpful insight once again from all so thanks for taking the time to respond!