Considering adoption in the future

[catlass]

Hello all,

DH and I are considering adoption as an option for in a few years but we were wondering if it is truly a realistic option for us or not. I have a few (or maybe it'll end up being a lot...!) of questions.

We have two birth DC who are 3 and 1. We had always imagined ourselves having a slightly larger family with 3-4 kids. Unfortunately my pregnancies and labours with both DC had added complications, we also had issues with miscarriages (one which made me extremely ill) and post natal depression. Despite all this we are still keen to have more children but for obvious reasons are not keen to go down the birth DC route again.

Adoption is something we have considered for a long time. After the birth of DC 1 we actually considered it at that time rather than the birth route for second DC. Financially we have a 4 bed house with a playroom, seven seater car. I currently work part time but if needed to settle an adopted child I could quit work and stay at home.

I know that having birth DC already wouldn't automatically disqualify us from being able to adopt. However I am concerned that with our DC being so young that social services would say we had to wait until they are much older. I've read that we wouldn't be able to apply until youngest is around 2 or 3 and then it would take a long time to actually having another child coming home to live with us. Plus if we did it then this would limit us to the 0-2 category and I guess we wouldn't be first choice for this category given that there are already so many childless people hoping to adopt and they would probably get priority as they could give more one to one attention.

I suppose my worry with this is that ideally i'd like all 3/4 kids to grow up together rather than there being a big gap between birth and adopted DC. Ive been doing a lot of reading about attachment and bonding issues. I assume that if you already have birth DC then social services prefer them to be older so you have more time to deal with any issues that come up with adopted DCs? Also i've no idea if it makes a difference to anything but we are a mixed race family, I understand there are a disproportionate number of ethnic minority children in care, so I wasn't sure if that would go in our favour?

Anyway, if you've read to the end then thank you! Any thoughts would be appreciated. I just want to know if we're barking up the wrong tree in regards to adoption being an option for us.

Hi and welcome

I don't think you're barking up the wrong tree. You've mentionned several things that would be looked upon very positively, not least that you could give up work for a child, which isn't something everyone is able to do, and would be looked upon favourably IME. Advanced reading up on attachment and other adoption related issues, is also good - you'd be surprised how many people don't do that. You've not said anything which would make me think you wouldn't be able to find an agency to take you on, so it's ultimately about whether you come to a definite conclusion that adoption is for you (or not).

I do think you may have to accept a slightly larger age gap than you have been thinking about, because of how things are at the moment with many people looking for younger children. You are right that you would unlikely to be taken on by an agency before your youngest BC is about 3 or 4. There are a couple of people on here whose BC were about 2 when they were taken on, in my experience this is quite uncommon, but it does depend on where you live. From there, the target time to be approved is 6 months (it varies in practice) and the wait for a match is a case of how long is a piece of string, and your own preferences will factor in.

FWIW, there is a very large gap between my oldest and youngest, much bigger than you would have (19 years), and yet they are very close to each other and always have been. DS is closer to her than he is to his birth sister (my other daugher, with a significantly smaller age gap) and that's all about their personalities. So in my experience having an age gap of 4 or 5 years versus 2 or 3 is not likely to be a determining factor in how close they are. Some people find that an extra year or two can be very positive - reducing competition between siblings somewhat etc. If your BC had both started primary school by the time an AC moved in, you would have their school hours to really focus on your new child, which I think is a positive thing especially in the first year or couple of years. I do appreciate it's not what you would have liked in an ideal world, but I'm hoping I can provide some reassurance or something similar that it can be positive to let go of an ideal and embrace something slightly different - I always wanted about 4 children who were relatively close in age. It's obviously not worked out that way for me, but that hasn't been a bad thing.

With your age range, they will want an age gap between your children and a new child, but you need to choose your preferred age range based on what you feel comfortable with, and plan accordingly. If you don't actually want to go through the baby stage again, then waiting would be a good idea, but actually there's nothing wrong with wanting to adopt a child aged 0-2 (would be about ~8/9 months-2 years in practice), and yes you may have to wait longer, but again it's about what you can offer a child and which child would benefit from your household the most, and if that's a younger child, so be it. In my experience, yes, social services will generally prefer your BC to be slightly older - they would probably be thinking along the lines of your BC being in school and you thus having more hours in the day to devote to meeting your new childs needs.

In terms of ethnicity/religion/culture, it all depends on which ethnic background you or your DH are from, AND which county/area you live in now. There are many children from certain ethnic backgrounds waiting, but very few children from other ethnic backgrounds. There are fewer children with ethnic minority backgrounds living in rural areas, and many many in London, Birmingham etc. Does anywhere in Eastern Europe/the Caribbean/Pakistan feature in your family background (that's not an extensive list by any means). Many places are desperate for Muslim adoptive parents, there's a massive shortage. If your family make up is half Japanese on the other hand, there are very few children who are going to be an ethnic match. If you live in an LA where 95% of waiting children are all white British, it will also be more difficult for you - in that case you may want to consider going with a voluntary agency who can look to other counties immediately, or with an agency involved in a consortium, or who will let you look nationwide very quickly or who are comfortable with you adopting a child who is not an ethnic match. Basically, research your agency/area carefully, don't be afraid to ask them questions.

Thank you so much Lilka! Very informative and helpful. Just read it all out to DH.

I'm surprised that the timing for approval is generally 6 months. Thats much better than I had imagined. I guess the matching stage could be a horrible waiting game though. Ideally I wouldn't want a bigger gap than 3 years between youngest birth DC and adopted DC but like you suggest I guess we would probably need to get used to the idea of a larger gap. Actually I hadn't really thought about the fact that if the older two were in school when an AC moved in that that could be a positive in regards to having more time to devote to AC. So yes thats an excellent point to think about.

Ethnicity wise DH is from a south-east asian country (don't want to say where exactly as theres already loads to out me on this thread lol). Suspect theres probably not many kids with our exact ethnic match. Not something we're actually too bothered about to be honest but had wondered how that might affect the process.

Just thinking we have one spare bedroom so does that mean we would be able to adopt one DC only or could we adopt two of the same sex? Or would already having two children stop us from being able to adopt more than one anyway? I suppose I'm a bit worried that if we had just one AC they might feel like an odd one out. But on the other hand would two AC be too much considering we already have two DC IYSWIM? We wouldn't adopt two just because of this obviously but just something i've been pondering on.

Hello, we have quite an age gap between birth and adopted dc and this has really reduced some jealousy and competition I think. We are also mixed race ( dual heritage) and chose a nearby la that would have more children of a similar ethnicity - we were in great demand and linked immediately. Ds moved in 13 months after applying. So I agree with lilka, choose your la carefully. They did not insist on an exact ethnic match but were looking for cultural similarities.
We were also told adopted children need own room. Friends of ours have adopted children sharing but have another room for use in the future. Good luck with your journey.

Hi,

For us too, the process was quick: about 9 months I think from official start, to placement (a bit over a year from first inquiries). Our BC was 3 when we applied and just due to start school when our AC came home.

But I think things have changed meanwhile. And they may change again! So past experiences aren't really that good to go on.

It sounds like you have thought through quite a lot of stuff already. One thing I would say though: It sounds a bit like you may have to learn to let go of 'control' (or the illusion of it). Could be totally wrong, it's just a feeling I got, and I'm saying it as something for you to mull over and potentially discard as 'not applicable'. It's just the way you wrote about having this ideal family (with ideal age gaps) in your mind. There is nothing wrong with that, just you need to be prepared to throw it all over board at some point! That is true with BC of course (e.g. I had certain expectations of myself in relation to my children's gender, but once my first child had arrived, all my previous assumptions were immediately out of the window) but perhaps even more so in relation to adoption. On the surface, you might feel that you have MORE control (e.g. you can 'choose' the gender of your child, you can choose the age gap (within limits), you know already about any disabilities, ...) but in reality, much of the process of approval and matching can be experienced as having to hand over control over the most important things in your life, to a random SW. Who you may not even like, and who may not really get you, and whose work may not be terribly efficient.
And once a new child has arrived in your family, there is nothing you can do to change your child's past. It requires a degree of acceptance, to take the child as he/she is, including any baggage, and work from there. That includes accepting that some issues may be long term/forever, despite your best parenting. Even some issues that aren't apparent yet at the time of placement. There is just no way of telling.

Regarding age gaps in particular, I always had this ideal of small age gaps - similar reasons as what you wrote. Saw many friends having their second DC with age gaps between 14 months and 30 months, and now in comparison our age gap is a bit bigger - and I am totally won over. My two children adore each other, have done so from days into placement; I think they will have a strong, strong bond. They also play with each other beautifully, but rarely get in each other's way; and the elder looks after the younger with so much tenderness and pride, it makes my heart want to burst.
I never could imagine a large-ish age gap. Until it was there, and it felt like the most natural thing in the world, such a great thing to happen.

Good luck with it all! :)

Hi Catlass,
I can't remember all of your questions but you're asking whether you can have BC and AC close in age I think, and what your chances are of approval.
We have two BC age 2 and 4 when AC arrived. Children are now 5, 3 and 2.
In my experience it depends on the LAs you approach as to whether you will be desirable as adopters. We approached several and were told to wait by some ( for five years!) ( our youngest was 1 year at the time), but the LA who took us were very keen as they a) had a lot of young children to place ( at the time) ( due to the demographics of the area let's say), b) had a reputation as a more pioneering LA with very inclusive policy on its adopters, c) they had had some good previous experiences of adopters with bio children. To be honest, all the LAs showed more concern about our age as parents rather than our young bio children ( we were in our 20s and I think that's more why they were initially saying wait !)
Things that you've said that stand you in good stead (based on just my experience, and according to just my one SW, others may report differently)
-your openness to having more than one AC. Our LA liked this as it suggested we might consider a future sibling to Ac.
-working part time. LA liked that I worked part time. Sw said this helped show what life would be like for an AC child, as did having existing children as it helped show what our routine, activities, contact with school etc was like ( not sure I'm explaining that well- sorry), but SW saw it as a positive anyway.

• four bedrooms , playroom, big car- great: we got asked about finances a lot. Ours were very tight but due to our age and points in our careers, likely to increase, so SW let that go a bit, but again, those things offer clear evidence of your commitment to this big family idea.
• having two existing children as opposed to one- SW felt this helped show we understood all children are different whether Ac or Bc or both . As it turns out, my Bc 1 and AC 1 are extremely similar!
• having a loud and busy household already, due to multiple children - SW said this was more similar to the types of environments likely in foster care, and also more similar to the natural birth order the children are in their birth family.

Something I feel will really move your thinking on, as it helped me no end - know that the adoption process is about finding the right families for the children, not the right
Children for families. I was riddled with adoption guilt throughout the process as there is no reason for us not to have another Bc, we just wanted to adopt. I felt incredibly guilty that I was taking a child away from a family that had been brought to adoption through infertility etc, and struggled with this guilt a lot during the assessment. In the end our SW really hammered home to us the importance of knowing that it takes diverse families and reasons to adopt and diverse groups of people to have a good selection and range of adopters ready for the children. It's all about the children.

Lastly, age gaps, we really liked the idea of repeating the two year age gap with Bc2 and Ac as we knew a two year gap worked well for us ( kinda contradicts above point , but anyway!), we knew it was manageable and what we were used to. I have read time and time again and been told a lot that the bigger gap is much preferred based on 'evidence'. I've looked for this evidence. ( briefly, haven't done a thorough lit review or anything!) and would still love to find this evidence. Our SW said she expects it's based on evidence from the 1960s, when the adoption process was all very different, and that there are no modern day studies on this age gap recommendation as there have traditionally not been the families to research on, because the recommendations have prevented those families from coming about. ( eg. Chicken and egg!).
I do worry about my tight age gaps, but only because I'm forever told that this Ac- bc tight age mix is 'proven' to be a bad mix. Sometimes I feel like I'm sitting on a time bomb just thinking, when is it all going to explode then? In reality, and at the moment, the age gaps are working really well for us. Ac is a happy, bossy little thing, holding her own against the older two. Yes, I agree that time and attention wise Ac is probably getting less attention than what might have been on offer elsewhere, and yes, giving time to ac should be a priority, but, hmmm..there's my guilt again.,.all I can say is at the moment it is really working well and we feel happy ( though loud and shouty !) as a family.
Good luck with all your decisions, and please remember that my experience does seem to be a minority one, so speak to more people, keep researching and enjoy the littlies that you've got all the while too.

Thanks all so much! Just finished a night shift but I will have another read through tomorrow and reply properly.

I really appreciate it!

Right thanks again for all of your replies. Very interesting and insightful.

slkk That is really interesting to read about your larger age gap reducing competition between DCs. As I said before thats not something we had really considered so certainly something to think about. I suppose my reservations with this though are that will mean it could be many years before we complete our family and we're keen to get on with completing our family sooner IYSWIM. Thank you for the info on the ethnicity point too. Hmmm lots to think about!

64x32x24 Thats fantastic that the process was so quick for you. Ive been reading lots of horror stories of couples waiting and waiting and waiting for a match. I think you've got it spot on with the control thing, definitely. I'm a typical type A and the thought of handing the future of my family over to social workers already makes me shudder a bit ;). I think you're right I would need to get over this a bit, especially in terms of age gaps. Also things like not being able to chose your AC's name and their history. All things I would need to learn to let go of. Thanks for your post. Really helps to hear of someone else who wanted a smaller age gap but the slightly bigger one is actually working instead.

Welovelego Very helpful as you have the type of gaps we're thinking about. I had no idea that you could try so many different local authorities. Is there a limit on how close you have to live to an LA? Interesting what you said about age as we're actually only in our mid 20s so I wonder if that could be an issue. Just thinking if theres a benefit to chosing a LA further away as less chance of bumping into birth family? Thats a very interesting point about AC coming from busy, multiple child homes already so they might feel more at home in a house with children already in it. Also interesting about the evidence about age gaps coming from the 1960s. Hmmm. Thanks for your help.

Thanks everyone, lots to think about :)