Fostering to adopt

[chocaholic2011]

i have posted similar on the fostering board as I am a FC

Thought it might be good to hear the views from the adopters on this new scheme David Cameron wants.

Whilst in theory it sounds great, I would wonder whether adopters would want to do the six day a week contact, have the allegations from desperate families, experience the care plans being thrown out and endless family members being assessed and reassessed for an indefinite period etc etc

But obv it would be fantastic if babies could go to their forever families as early as possible, I wonder if this scheme is really workable for adopters. What do you think?
X

This already happens with very small babies who are on the at risk register pre-birth. I assume they are suggesting it based on that scheme. There are big disadvantages - possibility of bonding with a child, returning them to birth family then facing the thought of having to go through it all again; having to have one parent at home virtually permanently until an adoption "sticks" as it were. That all reduces the pool of potential adopters.

However its obviously a better solution for the childrne which is after all what the system is supposed to focus on.

I know one person who has done this. It has been monumentally difficult, but she believes it was the right thing for the child.

I would be prepared to do it, yes, if I hadn't had another child already at home. i think that multiplies the problems.

I looked into it seriously and it just wasn't practical for me as a single parent who needed to work at some point. I couldn't run the risk that I have 1 or 2 or 3 failed adoptions.

I certainly think that foster parents should be given first option to adopt children who have been with them more than a certain amount of time. I presume LA's don't encourage it because you lose too many foster carers out of the system.

I think it's a recipe for disaster when people who would make wonderful adoptive parents are asked to foster instead. My parents wanted to adopt a fourth child in the family - i.e., they wanted a daughter. Instead they ended up fostering children and it was second best for them - they didn't have the heart for it because they wished to be adopting. As an adult, I have fostered and know first-hand that you cannot hope to get parenting needs met through fostering. This new scheme might work for a few children, but it's inhumane to prospective adopters and isn't fair on children who might be going back to their families and need to know their foster parent is 100% behind this happening.

I typed out a long post about this but it dissapeared.
Anyway to keep it short. Our family were a fos/adopt family for ten years. I is an amazing thing to do and totally worth it.
We are still in California, waiting to moe back to UK and did it here untill three years ago. We adopted our now 7 year old this way, she came to us at 6 months and we finalized her adoption at 14 months.
Most of the babies we had were drug exposed, it's hard work and I loved it. You have to remember it's not about you it's about the babies.
We stopped 3 years ago, we were offered to keep the last newborn we got and I was so tempted, but we said no and I got to meet his forever family and do the handover myself, we all sat in my living room with him and the social workers for a couple of hours before they left with him.
The day they leave is always the worst for me, I do a ton of laundry to get the baby smell out of the baby's bedroom, lots of tears, and the family leave me to it. then I'm better. we had so many babies I have a thick photo album full of my babies pictures, names and dates I got to mother them.
It may not be for everyone, but if anyone is offered this program I'd encourage you to try it, if it deosn't work for you then you can always stop. But you never know till you try.
It is so much better for the baby to only go into one fos/adopt home and from there either go back to the birth family or to stay forever with the only family they know. It also gives the foster adopt family a chance to parent from birth in many cases, where if they had to wait till the baby was free to adopt they wouldn't even meet till they were alreadt a toddler.

Oh another thought, I never did any of the visitations, the most I dropped off to was three days a week, usually it was weekly visits. the worker took the baby from me, or even picked up from the house and I rarely ever met the birth family I did meet a few who were in the process of the babies going home, like the last couple of weeks. One of the first babies I had still lives locally, I see his Mom at the bank, she makes a bee line for me, tells me how he's doing. He knows all about what happened and who I am, she went on to marry and have three more children, he's just turned 10.

Thanks for your replies!! Very interesting points made!! I can't see it being a very viable option for most unfortunately :( xx

I can see how it should work, but personally I would have found it too hard, both in terms of the possibility that s/he might be returned to the birth family after living with us for a long time, and the fact that you aren't parenting in the same way (visits / contact with someone else who is "mum" etc) as an adoptive placement.

I didn't think I could do it either but we took a chance.
It helps that I learned to ignore a lot, and let go of more. I didn't think about what went on at visits, I didn't know where they went off to live after going home. As Dh put it, I lived with my little rose coloured specs on, it worked for me. All my babies went to live in pretty cottages with a white picket fence and rose bushes. Surrounded by loving families and Grannies who baked.
It worked for me!

I am a bit confused here because this "new scheme" of Cameon's sound very much like concurrent planning where babies under 2 who have been removr from birthparents are placed with approved adoptors but are also approved as short term foster carers Also that the baby is placed with them on the basis of short term care. Foster/Adopt families have to agree to co-operate with the LA in their endeavour to return the child to the birthparents in the first instance and there will be the usual numerous assessments of the birthparents.

IF the LA are of the view that the child cannot be returned to the parent, then at the final court hearing they will request that the Judge makes a Placement Order which means that the child can be adopted, and if this Order is granted then the child remains with the Fost/Adopters and then it is a simple matter of the family going to the County Court with their adoption application, which is a formality as it has already been agreed in the final hearing of the care proceedings, that the child can be adopted.

IT is a big ask as the child may be returned to the birthparents but all of this is explained before the assessment process of the fost/adopt families begin, and so they are very aware of the risks that they may have to give the child up. However in my view it is absolutely the best possible start for a young child, that they remain in the same placement and are not moved around as many children are. In terms of attachment, this gives the child and the fost/adopt parents the greatest chance of a secure attachment being built between them, which will be a protective factor for the child throughout the life span.

The CORAM voluntary organisation specialise in concurrent planning and some LAs carry out this scheme.

SO is the new thing of Cameron's (I would distrust any idea of his anyway) the same as I have described.

I know he has this notion of adoptions being speedied up and whilst there is possible a need for this, he doesn't appear to understand the need to recruit, train and assess potential adoptors is a very complex task and assessments need to be wholly comprehensive, and yes sometimes this does take a long time. However maybe he is hoping to turn the clock back to the 1940's 50's and 60's when adoptors were "assessed" by health visitors and adoption officers, who carried out very superficial assessments and so long as the house was clean and the garden tidy, and the couple had a reference from their family doctor and the Vicar, that was it - done and dusted and all that was left for them to do was go and choose their baby from the Mother & Baby Home in the days when single women were in the main, forced to give their babies up for adoption.

Trouble with Cameron and his ilk they are slashing budgets of all public services but want improved services at the same time.....cannot be done!