Newbies Part 2

[resipsa]

Hello! I like starting threads - there are sadly too many of mine littered in conception, miscarriage and infertility.

My story? After two miscarriages in 5 months (both following donor egg IVF), my mind and body have had enough and my thoughts are turning to the idea of adoption because I want two children. DD (my and DH's BC) is 3.

We're at the thinking stage but I have registered my interest with my LA and a VA locally. But for DD, I would be pressing ahead at full speed but I worry about the potential negative impact on her. I never worried about how having another BC might affect her and so am unsure if I need to refocus on me and DH - we want another child - rather than concentrate on the sibling issue.

I hope there are others (Mersea, maybe?) in my shoes who will join me here in supporting each other through the process.

And to Italian - I love your story and hope to follow in your shoes!

An update from me ...

After what seems like hundreds of years (actually only been a couple of months!) of delays, we have introductions scheduled mid - January with our most beautiful, sweet and funny little girl.

Hang in there, newbies. It may feel like it will never happen but you will get there. This last few months has felt like forever, but in reality we applied to our agency in Jan 13, and will have our family in Jan 14 - not bad going!

As always in the adoption process, one milestone is reached, and there is a couple of days of elation before you start worrying about the next one. How do we make the transition to us as easy as it can be for her? What if she hates us/doesn't settle? What size are her nappies?!

Closer, that is fab news! Congratulations. My advice is to make and freeze as many meals as possible as cooking/eating during intros is near impossible.

Thanks, trafficjam, we'll take your advice!

Congrats Closer

We had our matching panel yesterday and intros start on the 5th of Jan for us. We also have an informal playdate scheduled in for the week before to meet him without the additional stress of a formal intro.

Looking back now, it's hard to believe how far we've come but like you, I'm now moving on to the next set of worries about the transition! I guess my mum was right when she said that once you have children you don't stop worrying for the rest of your life! We're just starting early!

Pleased to hear it is progressing for everyone. We have almost finished stage 2 and have a panel date scheduled in (it has changed once already). I am surprised by how exhausting it is. We are being grilled to help our SW understand the child who will fit us. The other day we spent five hours having our age range pushed month by month. For example

SW 'you said you wanted a child the same age or younger than very close niece'.

Us, 'yes as we are a close family and hope our children will be close'

SW 'this means a child under 3'

Us 'yes'

SW 'if the perfect child 6 months older than niece was available would you be interested?'

Us 'well yes it is a guideline'

SW 'how about 8 months older?'

Us 'yes if you think it is a good match'

SW 'is that the same for 10 months?

Us 'err yes, we guess pre school'

SW 'what if they are due to start school in 1 month'

Then we had how young will you go. We have already consider foster to adopt and said we would meaning we could (unlikely) have someone a few days old.
my head hurts! She has indicated we will be approved is this usual? She has also said we are accepting of a broader range of children than most eg with HIV, Mild/moderate cystic fibrosis, leg splints when younger.

Sorry for the rant the age thing is getting me down a bit and I don't know why? This is the first wobble I have had during the process and it came out of the blue.

Congratulations Closer and CK72

Happy Christmas to one and all.

auntybookworm Can I make a quick comment about your post? I feel slightly nervous to say this as you did not ask and I don't want to see rude?

Most social workers will of course have faith you will be approved or would not be putting you forward auntybookworm but the panel for approval a real approval thing so it is best not to go in assuming it will happen. That is how I see it and how we were particularly told about it when we got to matching panel. So I mean you are hopeful you will get through OK but don't say anything that suggests it is a foregone conclusion.

Why do you think the age thing is getting you down? It sounds like you are accepting a fairly wide spectrum, which is something many people seem to do eventually. (I think, maybe others can tell me if that is true.) For example, we went in to the process thinking age 3. Then we heard babies were available for adoption, having been told repeatedly (about 3-5 years ago) that they were not. So we loosened our lower age range to a few months and we also considered 4 and maybe even 5! We were eventually looking at almost 0-5, which was 'technically' the age range we were approved for officially. And we ended up adopting, yes, you guessed it..... a three-year old!

Good luck.

fairly wide spectrum in terms of age I meant.

Hi bookworm, our age range was limited upwards by DS' age, and we always said we'd consider any age within those limits - which were a lot narrower than yours (0-2 effectively). And yet this gave me headaches. Mentally preparing for a newborn is so very different to getting into the right mindset for a potentially walking and talking 2yo. And although there are only 2 years in between, again, a 6 months old just about to start weaning is at a completely different place than a 18 months old with potential developmental delays confusing things even more.

Just in case it helps - you're not the only one who finds the age thing difficult.

We went back and forth with all of the questions and just when we thought we were sure the SW would throw a different light on it but it was helpful because whereas I felt a bit wobbly about it to start with, I felt very confident of our decisions by the end. It's their job to question and question, to push and push but realistically it's because they want what's best for the little one.

I am terrified quite honestly about panel, I have a health condition, I've been on ADs in the past and we've got frozen embies with our IVF clinic so SW has been clear to expect Qs on that as well as something on the dog. Nothing is a certain and I'm a bit fed up of people saying 'oh just be excited about panel, it will be great' 'it's just another step, nothing to worry about'. In reality these people hold your life in their hands to a certain extent. I also don't think people understand that you sit in front of the panel and get asked questions. It quite honestly is giving me sleepless nights now it's closer to the time.

While I'm here.....
How did everyone who is approved find panel? Did you get wsked anything upsetting/difficult to answer/surprised that they asked a certain questions? Did anyone final any of the panel oppositional towards them or get deferred? I'm over thinking I'm sure but its 9pm Boxing Day so I don't think my SW would appreciate a call just at this moment!

Sorry about the auto corrects.....

Hi Raspberry. I went to approval panel 3 weeks ago, I was absolutely terrified but it was really positive and no where near as bad as I thought.

They gave me the questions they were going to ask before I went in, so I had chance to think. They aren't trying to catch you out or interrogate you at all - any tricky questions go to the SW first I think! They asked me how I found the training, and practical things (I run, and they asked how I would still do this as a single parent) and what I was looking forward to most.

The things I worried about (past depression, not having a huge support network) didn't even come up. Still now, I worry about them occasionally and realise I don't need to. It is so much easier said than done, but please try not to worry. But just a few weeks on, approval panel is a distant (happy) memory.

Thanks Etihad. That's reassuring. Our SW is seeing is soon to help us prepare for likely questions, it just seems so scary to sit in front of all those people and be judged! The interview of your life! I just want it done now, it's been a while since we finished Stage 2 so I've had far to much time to think about it!

We didn't have any confrontational questions and they were generally lovely. It was slightly daunting sitting opposite 13 strangers (12 panel members and the secretary) but most of them only spoke at the end to confirm their support

Slightly?! Blimey you are braver than me. We are expecting about 8 on ours apparently.

Raspberry, you are not alone in feeling anxious. Our panel was lovely and said they understood how stressful it is talking in front of so many people. We did similar to you - we tried to identify the areas that may be of concern and came up with answers to them. Then, of course, they asked completely different ones (including "where do we see ourselves in 5 years" which threw me completely! When is your panel date?

Raspberry you asked How did everyone who is approved find panel? Did you get wsked anything upsetting/difficult to answer/surprised that they asked a certain questions? Did anyone final any of the panel oppositional towards them or get deferred? I'm over thinking I'm sure but its 9pm Boxing Day so I don't think my SW would appreciate a call just at this moment!

I found it OK. I felt we were as prepared as we could be. I felt quite ill with an upset tummy so did not have any breakfast and I was just relieved I had made it there as the night before I had felt really rough and thought I would need to 'send' dh alone! Which he would have really disliked.

I also forgot to turn my phone off and it rang at a really inappropriate moment!

Really truly they are not there to catch you out and I am sure they want to approve you! They just need to feel personally reassured that you will make good parents so your social worker has the job of talking about you to reassure them.

You will be asked questions and you just need to answer sensibly and confidently. They will know you will be nervous, that is normal.

Just answer all the questions and try not to worry. I am sure you will be fine.

Thanks all, I think I will remain a bit nervous but I guess it's one of those things that will happen really quickly then I'll wonder what the worry was about. I had been told by the SW that it's not so bad but it is different for them. We've got a print out of the people who will be present and it has a photo of them all and says a bit about them so they seem a bit more human. Panel is early Jan so only a few weeks left to stress now. DH will just take it all in his stride and can't understand why I'm stressing but I am a stressy person. Actually the SW did say that she'd noticed I was a stress head and the panel may ask about that!

Raspeberry do you have other kids yet or is this your introduction to being a parent? Kids are stressful, they get ill in the middle of the nighht (sometimes), they fall out with school friends (sometimes), they do all kinds of things that worry parents (sometimes), so showing you can manage the stress, be calm, think logically, even when stressed is a very mum thing to do! Try not to worry. The fact you have got this far is a very good sign.

You do not need to answer this but have you and social worker talked through the frozen embryos etc? We had two fresh and one frozen cycle before going for adoption, and have a 10 year old birth dd but all our embryos were gone before we went for adoption. No criticism here at all but have you talked about it?

This is our first child so very excited. We've had lots of chats as a couple about the stressful times, how we will cope and what we can do if things get difficult. We've built up a brilliant support network but are realistic that things can change when children arrive and to a large extent I guess it's just best to take it a day at a time because we won't know how we'll cope until we get there. I had counselling early on this year and GP support to work through the not being able to carry a baby which helped hugely and chatted through all the issues with our SW.

In terms of talking about the embies, we haven't kept them because we hope to use them in the future, at the moment thy are just stored. Making a decision to destroy them requires taking up headspace that I jut don't need to use. They can stay there for the 10 legal years then the law takes the decision from me but if SW said we had to destroy them then so be it. I am very clear now in my mind that I can't and will not go through IVF again. It wouldn't be a case of them shoving an embie back in, because my first round ended rather dramatically they wanted to pump me full of all sorts of crap to maintain a pregnancy and it's just not for me. Don't get me wrong I went theough a period of grief and had to come to terms with my body not working properly but during counselling I realised I'd developed an obsession with being pregnant but genetics doesn't really bother me. I'd be a high risk pregnancy so a danger to me and any baby and it's just not worth the risk. DH was very much for adoption rather than IVF from the start but it took me a bit longer, as I say I think I needed to grieve properly first.

So all of the above is what we first went through with the SW and to be honest they just didn't seem that bothered which made me edgy to start with to the point that I rang the team manager to double check but she said it was obvious we had talked it through, I'd had counselling with a counsellor who was known to all the SW in my area so I think they were confident of the support id had. I still sometimes feel surprised at how far we have come but IVF isn't right for us. We also aren't adopting to replace a birth child, we are clear about that. We though a lot about whether to be a childless couple because we have a good life and being childless has its perks! But we came to the conclusion that we wanted children in our lives, we have the money, space and most importantly the love, time and patience so this is the route we decided on. There are plenty of children who need a good home so we are here with open as now and the support we've had from friends and family has been unbelievable, I think everyone saw how awful IVF was for us and is happy we've taken this road too. It's scary but exciting!

Blimey....essay!!

Sorry for the hideous typing, I'm on my phone which doesn't make reading things back very easy!

Raspberry, that's the perfect answer to the embryos question if they ask you! Very eloquently put. Have you had your PAR back yet?