Letterbox

[MissFenella]

Is it usual/typical for letters from parents to include 'when you are 18 and we meet again....' type stuff.

Letter from birth mum included a few 'wonderful future together' type references.

Putting aside the heart crushing 'she thinks I am babysitting' element (because that is about me not the girls) how would you couch the tone to your children?

I just sat down to start composing our 'letterbox' contact, saw this thread and....well.....30 minutes later I feel exhausted!!
I don't post very often but I read as much as I can.....can only ever remember Kew being honest and supportive.

Better get back to writing that letter. I think I may need a though

Good luck excited! There are other, more productive threads on letterbox through previous threads that may be of use. This one, not so much.

I'm waiting to hear more about the nature of love. Please tell us. It sounds AMAZING.

When I look at my children I'm just wondering if they'll go with my new Birkenstocks.

Just completely to change the subject. Is there EVER a time when you'd be able to say 'you fucking twat' on mn and not have it deleted?

Mntowers?

Baffled is so right. The UK SS motto is 'we're finding families for children not children for families'.

Our agency actually states on their website 'if you're looking for white babies with no additional needs, adoption isn't for you.'

I know of only one relinquished baby, from a teenage Mum, being adopted. And lots of approved adopters turned that baby down (even though a match to their family) because of the risk of the birth mother changing her mind. EVERY other adopter I know has adopted children with varying degrees of additional needs.

In the UK if you take the adoption road you aren't doing it to for saintly reasons, you're doing it because you want to be a parent. You also accept that you will be taking the parenting plus path, as it will never be the same as parenting a birth child because all the children have extra needs. If you don't want this, in the UK, you do surrogacy, IVF or you just dont have children, that's just how it is here, where adoption is 99% of the time as a result of children being removed for abuse of some kind. So many adopters go into it with age ranges of 0-7 and ideas of siblings etc. but SW's assess them as a family who wouldn't be the best fit for a child unless they were a single child or of a younger age etc. And I'm glad they do. An adoption breakdown is a tragedy.

I'd give it a go with you janedonne. saturnvista just about managing to start an intelligent conversation and on come you and tangerine with more of your discussion inhitibing rudeness.

Sorry I've been interuppted by my LO's waking up during my posting of the last message and its moved on, sorry

Jane...I think you just did it, surely

Sorry, I should have counted to 100 before sending that.

This is my second 'letter' and for some reason I am finding it SO much more difficult than the first. I have not a clue what to say....everything sounds either boasty or boring!!

Excited did you get a letter back from BF? I've just done our first and will dread the second if we don't get a letter back from BF. It's just so much harder if you're writing one way I think.

Yes we did eventually. It was a number of months late. I was so disappointed thinking that we werent going to get anything back. Then when we did I was so disappointed with the content. Not as bad as the OP but lots of references to BM as 'mummy' and chat about how great life was and how great siblings were. Omitting the fact that siblings are no longer in their care either We haven't been able to read it to LO yet as we feel the content is too upsetting. I would have loved BM to ask some questions we could answer or tell us something about her we could talk about.
I am going to ask letterbox coordinator to give some more advice on content of the letter. That's if i can get in touch with them.

Oh crikey that's hard. I'm hoping we get a letter back but maybe not if it will be like that.

sorry adopted but when a poster has descended to accusing us for shopping for cars, matching our child to our handbag, accusations of not taking on children who are damaged enough then even a subsequent attempt to feign interest in how we actually feel about the system/our children falls on deaf ears more than a bit.

Its disappointing because I thought saturn's (I assume saturn is notanotherword) posts earlier in the thread were balanced and measured. I think she got her back up when she felt I was dismissive of Suzanne earlier, obviously unaware that I have previously posted on her thread (being so boring I can understand that she doesn't remember what I say) and would/will continue to answer whatever questions Suzanne might have. Will you both be engaged on these threads in a year and supporting her then, or in 5 years or 10 years - who knows but I suspect I will. My concern at the time was by posting on this thread her need to talk again about contact will get lost or mangled in the wreck that this thread was becoming - borne out when later posters misinterpreted a general comment the OP made about contact letters as being directed at suzanne. Of course I may have phrased my post clumsily - its happens - I'm not perfect as you have been pointed out quite vociferously (I'm not disgusting but my posts apparently are - a subtle difference which escapes me )

notanotherword - I have no idea which country you are talking about - the only country with potential newborns that could be adopted from as UK adopters would be the USA. I adopted from another country and believe me - there were no perfect newborns on offer, not even ones which didn't match my handbag. My DS had been passed over for adoption for at least 6 months (adding significantly to his institutional delays) because of his horrific medical information. There are even countries with special needs adoption programmes so I'm not quite sure how that fits with your sweeping assertion that adopters won't accept a child with special needs. I know that I wasn't given the option of the perfect child, only which kind of "issue" I didn't think I could deal with. The joy of adoption - that you get to pick which special needs you don't want (it's not a big perk and there's not much that we can control in the process so I'll take that one). Unfortunately that didn't quite work as the two things I said I would find most difficult to deal with were present in DS's situation and ironically the physical disability he was considered to have turned out to be fine but other issues which were not obvious at that time were later diagnosed. I really don't care if you don't like the "matching" aspect - take it up with SS I'm not making up a new word to teach all new adopters to MN to keep you happy.

To be fair she wasn't - she didn't start getting humphy with us until a good 3 or 4 posts in.

I assume saturn is notanotherword
Assume nothing Kew. I'm still waiting for 'he who shall not be named' to pop up.

Oh God that would just be the cherry on the top of this particular cake, wouldn't it.

Bollocks...... I've got a company car, didn't get to pick it.
Little bit like my children, we were told they were a good match and trusted the SW's. Hmmmm bit like I trusted the fleet dept at work.
I'm too trusting aren't i? Can't believe I could have got matching car and children. FFS!

You forgot about the handbag daisie

Oh that one I did pick. It's a Radley you know. It goes with the car ????
Unfortunately it doesn't go with the children. Bollocks again.

I've just picked a new company car. And I've got 11 points.

I score -4 so what the fuck do I know?

Should have left him with the fcs.