Siblings

[mumofblueeyes]

Hi all. We have had our adopted LO for about 20 months now and he has settled in wonderfully. He is 4 and the process has been fantastic. By a strange twist of fate his birth family live horribly close even though they all used to live the other end of the county. The Birth Dad is in a new relationship and lives about 5 miles away (His partners son is in the same year as my son at school which is not a good situation). His partner gave birth to his son today, so a half brother for our LO. The birth mother lives about 10 miles away and is also due to give birth any day. She is still on a very high dose of methadone and has split up with the baby's father. I only know about these new babies due to Facebook/Local Contacts, not from Social Care. My slightly long winded question therefore is, will Social Care automatically know about these new siblings to ensure they stay safe? Should I let them know or does that look like I am an outrageous stalker. How does this process work (do they ask parents if they have a baby taken away before, is there a database??). We have always wanted to adopt a second so are wondering if we may get approached in the future. Thank you for any advice.

"All the adopters I know use Facebook to 'monitor' BF where possible."

I find that really interesting, I know I don't go near Facebook or any other social media to look up the birth family, in fact I've never given them a thought in terms of wanting to monitor them at all. I have no interest in knowing what's happening in their lives and in the event that they ever pose a threat to my family, I'll deal with that then. I'm too busy with my family to spend life looking over my shoulder.

Interestingly enough, none of the adoptive parents I know feel the need to keep tabs on birth family. None feel an imminent threat from birth families and all take sensible privacy precautions around their online presence but that's about it.

I think perhaps what makes this post feel distasteful is the title "siblings" and the suggestion that OP is monitoring the birth parents with a view to a second adoption of one of their children. This gives the impression that monitoring them - by whatever means- is not about any potential risk but about scoping out the possibility of a second child. That leaves a nasty taste and feels wrong.
As a SW I would also echo the comments about birth families' right to privacy. There are very very few birth parents who pose a real risk of harm to families. Certainly there is no justification for monitoring their social media - it is wrong.
As for sw saving photos from facebook- that is so clearly wrong that I cannot believe anyone would try to justify it. As PP said, I would expect to be sacked and struck off for that.

Certainly there is no justification for monitoring their social media - it is wrong.

By sws or by adopters?

If it's public information that people have put online on purpose without any privacy settings thenI'm not clear how looking at it could be said to be 'wrong' tbh?

Look at it if it was the birth parents looking at your social media and saving photos would that not be wrong? Because privacy has to work both ways?
Like I've said none of my son are public only a couple of profile pics of myself and if they were to use them I would be very cross- also as contact at current isn't shared with my son I would also question their reasons for needing those photos?

My sons parents already have a wealth of information in regards to myself- knowledge of medical conditions, noted within court documents that my mum was too ill to look after my son (she was actually dying)

Photos of myself and our son growing up. I'm fairly open that I'm working but more vague about role- just admin which is enough I feel for them to know and feel no reason they need more info than that. I also met our sons parents so they had a chance to ask questions too and I have told SW I would be open to meeting again if they needed more answers etc

For me, I keep up contact which gives them a chance to ask for these things, and I've already shared a whole load of information so it would feel very intrusive and I would then be much less inclined to share info.

I get though that no all birth parents are able to share this info or do

As Miracle says- reverse it and ask yourself how you would feel if birth parents were looking at your social media. Yes, it may have been put out there, but not for those purposes. I think you only have to consider how it would feel for you , to know it's an invasion of privacy.

I think if someone is creating a fake profile and using that to monitor birth families it sends a clear message that I have the right to privacy but, you've lost all right to privacy heavyset you've gone through the child protection system. If it's about gathering information that's in the public domain, be honest about it and use your own profile, if you have concerns about them finding you - stop looking at them, they'll not have an easy way back. And if they do pose a credible threat poking the bear won't make it better.

And yes, the idea of monitoring a family in the hope of a sibling adoption is as distasteful as it is disrespectful.

Well maybe this is the wrong discussion for me because I don't have any information about myself online that I would have any objection to anyone looking at I don't think.

I'm not claiming any protection for myself that I'm not willing to extend to bps. But if you think a FB page without any privacy settings on it, or the information you put here, is private then I think you're mistaken. Anyone could take it and publish it in the Daily Mail if they wanted and there would be very little you could do about it AFAIK.

So the very censorious tone to describe something which is maybe a bit nosy but entirely human seems a bit much to me.

I also don't have anything online that I would object to other people knowing. I also use a variation of my name that's not obviously me unless you know me well - this pre-dates adoption, to me it's just sensible internet usage. I don't put photos of the DC online and only ever use disguised ones of me.

I have a real issue with people posting photos of people who they don't have the permission from. I think it's a really grey area birth families posting photos of their DC on public pages - I would be furious if I found photos of my DC posted by anyone other than us. They have a right to privacy which is why I don't use photos of them.

The internet is a relatively new thing and its impact on adoption is only just becoming realised by a lot of people. Perhaps instead of berating adopters for viewing publicly available information, push for birth families to be given better advice about what they're putting online? I think it's more than a little silly to expect people to ignore the freely available information that may make their job of keeping their children safe because the birth families may be annoyed that someone has seen it.

The upshot is, if you'd be annoyed, don't put it there in the first place.

I'd love to know if someone ever found something on Facebook that actually kept their children safe. I don't mean checking that the birth parent was still where they were - I mean information that either posed a direct threat of actual harm or created a level of real risk. I suspect such instances are few and far between, if indeed they exist at all.

I think the potential risk posed by birth families in general is pretty small, possibly with the rare exception but in my experience by the time permanence has been agreed the birth parents are exhausted with it all and just want it over with.

I don't check bps at all because I don't have a FB account anymore. But when I did, when our dd was placed, I found out what bm shortened her name to. Which is very useful because her first name is really identifying and I wouldn't have been able to use it in dd's life story book.

That's a small thing. And probably you could say it's a violation of her privacy. But I can live with it.

I'm not sure how helpful it is to pretend that online information is private. It isn't.

Hi all. I am always slightly fascinated on Mumsnet Adoption pages how the OP is made into some sort of villain!. In this post I have been called all kinds of things such as disrespectful and distasteful. Maybe I haven’t made it clear in the original post what I meant? I saw on ‘I live in the town of x’ and ‘for sale in x’ that the birth Father’s of my adopted LO has had a new baby, so his half brother. I didn’t seek out this information - this was on a local community page (not his own profile). I was simply concerned for the baby’s safety. Dad has a very violent history, is a drug user and has had his previous baby (my LO) removed from his care within the last couple of years. I suppose my question was around social care tracking - will they realise that the new baby is the son of X or should I , as a member of the public who is now aware of this information report it in? I haven’t stolen any photos, been on his Facebook site and I am not stalking him to cause trouble and steal his baby! Yes, we would like to adopt again in the future but not until we have moved and are settled and certainly not in any sort of devious manner.

Don't worry OP, the board attracts a lot of very "saintly" people. It doesn't represent real life. It is the only board where birth parents can post harsh things about their children's adoptive parents and get a load of sympathy from some of the adoptive parents on the board. Very weird set up, considering it is for people who are parents through adoption, not birth parents who need to have a rant or be critical about things. It's pretty unhealthy really, for birth parents to spend all their time frequenting a board like this. Their own therapy I guess. They should make a birth parent board really as some issues really do massively clash. I wouldn't post a load critical comments about teachers on the teachers board without expecting backlash!

I digress, anyway It's why I very rarely post on here, you can't be remotely controversial or honest. I would try the adoption board on babycentre, you'll get some kindness rather than hostile judgement.

To those have been incredibly harsh on the OP - good for you seeing life in black white, some of us recognise the shades of grey. Some of the issues people have been challenged about are right, sw shouldn't be using FB but the OP isn't a sw.

FWIW you need to move and I would definitely keep an eye on bp if they lived so close to me. I would want to know the places they went in order to avoid them. You must live everyday with worry, especially if birth parent is violent.

I dont think anyone has been harsh on you OP, or on your OP....this has been an interesting discussion which progressed when a FC said she knew SW were taking photos off FB and using them for childrens life story work as they may not have piccies otherwise etc...

OP you were advised to take a step back from the situation if you could - look into moving away, avoid the children being in the same school, not stalk them on FB, and leave SS to consider the welfare of your childs new siblings. How is that harsh? That is good advise from several posters?...You also said in your first post you had looked on FB, and now you are saying you haven't - whether you have or haven't - makes no odds to me...but it gets confusing to follow your posts....

And this is an adoption board - not adopters......anyone is free to post, it is open to any member of the public....there are other forums with closed boards is you require - or adoption UK if you prefer privacy.

Thank you both. Boston, I haven't looked on personal FB profiles but info has come up on community FB sites which I am on. Anyway, thank you both for your comments x

With respect you didn't find out about the birth mums medication on community boards and you cited your child's former foster carer as a source of info - which is inappropriate on the FC's part. Your situation sounds too close for comfort and you've been advised to create as much distance as you can by not monitoring the birth parents.

The discussion about SW using photographs without permission is pretty clear cut tbh, as a SW and service manager, the SW would face disciplinary proceedings in my team and rightly so - the SW has a duty to build good, cooperative relationships and to respect service user autonomy which means if they can't get the birth parents permission they don't go behind their back.

For my part, I'm surprised at the idea that birth parents loose all right to common decency, dignity and respect by virtue of having children removed for adoption.

I'm surprised at the idea that birth parents loose all right to common decency, dignity and respect by virtue of having children removed for adoption

I'm surprised by that too - who said it?

OP I think in fairness Miracle has had a few more difficult comments to deal with you have. In all honesty your OP came across as quite opportunistic. It came across poorly to more than one poster and so possibly you should take on board all the comments rather than feel demonised.

sweeterthanthis this is not just for adopters. Adopters, adoptees, birth parents, SWs - they all come in all shapes and sizes, and for any of them to be typecast as anything in particular is very simplistic and not reflecting reality.

I don't feel we lose all of our rights however there is a very emotional and traumatic portion of our lives shared in court and then with strangers which of course makes us very vunerable- we are then asked loads of deeply personal questions for our child to know as much about us as possible and this info is passed on too.

Not all birth parents are able to understand security and safety either- think of those with complex learning needs

I would expect that if a professional was to share information or photos without consent they would be reprimanded and this includes foster carers. I do wonder how SS would react and BM if they were to know her medication was being discussed without her consent.

I think there is a bit of a misconception here about social media pages. If you post a photo on social media it is not private and people copying, saving or using it is not a breach of that person's privacy. The way you can safeguard against people not seeing, using or sharing such photos is not to post them in the first place. This is not the same as taking a photo and putting it on your sitting room wall where you have a reasonable expectation strangers would not see it.

I fail to see how social services essentially using social media (on which people, of their own free will, have posted photos of themselves) as a research tool to obtain information about birth parents for adopted children and their parents is some sort of gross unprofessional act. My son's social worker made no bones she used facebook to try and fine my son's birth father. She had very little else to go on and wanted to have done everything she could to identify/locate him. I make no bones about the fact I have saved screenshots of the stuff birth mum has posted publicly on Facebook about songs she likes, new stories she is interested in, nice things her friends have said about her. She is putting it out there for the world to see, why shouldn't my son also have the right to know something more about her than the brutal, sad facts about why he was removed from her? There is nothing unprofessional about using this information and the idea a social worker should be "disciplined and deregistered" for doing so is ridiculous. It is not like she broke into birth mum's house and took photos off the wall. This stuff is not private if it is put on the internet.

As for photos of birth mum which were provided to us by social services, I would not share those or show them to people (exception being my son's birth sibling's parents) and neither would any adopter I know.

Our Miracle, we adopters are not given things like birth parents' home or work addresses. Even the court documents which the judge ordered social services to provide to us (because they contained nice details about birth mum's contact sessions with our son and how she had shown love towards him and the judge thought my son would want to know later in life) were heavily redacted, quite rightly. So the answer is, barring incompetence, this information will not be shared with adopters. So, really, the way to protect your privacy is to be careful what you post online.

OP, I think you are getting a really hard time and I am a bit confused about why everyone seems to be talking about a gossiping foster carer. Unless I have missed something, your info comes from things birth mum and partner have been posting on facebook. It seems to be that it is out there in public so why you should be castigated for seeing it I am not sure!

Barbadosgirl - in the OP 3rd post she states that one of her 'local contacts' is the previous foster carer....who is/has passed on info re BM

whether people choose to put their info on FB or not, there are many professions which forbid you from looking up your clients - SS (in some LA's,so I read here - I assumed it would be nationwide) NHS staff are forbidden from looking up their patients, GP's, and there must be other professions - oh teachers, some schools have policies where you cannot be 'friends' with parents (mine doesn't) ...it protects the staff and the client.

While judge's do instruct SW to try and find BF/BM in order to go ahead with the final hearing prior to AO, they can do that via Dwp, FB is simply not needed by SW in order to find someone, there are better more official ways....

Just for clarity, there is both case law and HCPC guidance which prohibits the use of facebook or social media by social workers to find information about any service user - even profiles with no privacy settings. It is a breach of data protection law and a breach of our ethical standards. Thanks however for your comments - you perhaps ought to consider that maybe those of us who are trained, registered, and work as social workers have some additional knowledge about this !

The real thing is though that I KNOW that despite court instructions not to disclose my address and contact details SS messed up and sent my address to my ex. They redacted our addresses but then sent us both the wrong paper work, leaving me at immediate risk- my ex had previously already attempted to take my life and they were aware of this.

We use databases at work and it is a disciplinary and sackable offence to look up anyone you know or are related to on the system, including yourself.

I'm glad my privacy is set high though and I'm glad I don't use the name they know me by either, I am very careful what I post online and all post are friends only- or locked to Just myself.

I feel they could trace my work address if they were to know my work pattern, work doesn't get put on Facebook until a few months after I've left the role- to protect myself.

Your son isn't in a relationship with her any more, he's entitled to the information she chooses to share with him if/should he decide to pursue contact when he's older. Social media is notoriously unreliable in giving an accurate view if someone's life and well being, very often the same issues that impair a birth parents capacity to care for their child presents difficulties in responsibly using social media and managing their online presence. They may well share stuff publicly not remotely expecting that someone is pulling pictures etc for use with a child who was removed from them years previously.

And yes, there's long case examples about professionals misuse of social media - not at all ridiculous to suggest using social media to gain information about service users without their consent is a disciplinary matter, at least not for those professionals who have found themselves on the wrong end of a complaint and investigation.

The board comes under the "becoming parents" section under "adoption". To me, that means being a parent through adoption. Whilst it is often extremely useful to have views from adoptees and social workers, it is not useful to have birth parents coming on and using it as their personal sounding board. It is inappropriate. I'm absolutely amazed that anybody could argue otherwise. Occasionally, a well thought out post from a birth parent can provide matters to reflect on but it is complete bollocks that they should be able to come on to have a bitch. I wouldn't go onto a board for birth parents and have a moan about my child's bp.

But the op isn't a social worker. And nor is Barbadosgirl AFAIK. So it's okay for them to look at public information that's out there in public right?

It's lovely that there are so many of us with such incredibly high ethical standards of this board but we shouldn't allow that to make us unnecessarily censorious of those who can't quite be saintly.