Life story book

[Cassie9]

It feels like I've been waiting for my child's life story book a long time. Is there a time frame in which you are meant to receive it?

Same here, post adoption order and still no sign of it...

Where i am they have to be completed by the 2nd review before the AO paperwork can be submitted.

In our training we were advised to not put in for AO until we had the lifestory book. It did make it a very long time until we put in for the AO but at least it got it sorted

We've just asked & agreed to make the life story book ourselves & have been sent templates, photos & content but they've said we can do it however we wish. Judging by the other things I've seen their team produce I'm pleased I get to make it rather than have to live with their rubbish rushed version. It might be worth asking if you can do your own as it will definitely speed things up

Our AO granted jan. Been told we might get life story book by Aug-makes me cross

Sounds like I'm not the only one waiting.
I don't think I would have had the patience to wait for the lifestory book before applying for AO. That took far longer than I'd been told.
I may look into making it myself.
Thank you

I know it should sound obvious, but what goes in these things?

11 years ago now, so things might have moved on:

Ours had about BPs and their back story.
The birth of the child.
All the house moves.
All the reasons why they went into care.
The help the family were given.
Moving into foster care.
Life in Foster care.
Moving to us.

Ours were written for an 8yo, the age DD1 was when placed. DD2's was a bit of a cut and paste job from DD1 but the back story was important for her too so OK.

Included a few photos, but there weren't many pre-care anyway.

Around 60 (!) A4 pages, but with lots of white space and clip art and stickers.

We also made a very cut down one for DD2 with one photo and sentence per page. But DD2 has never really been willing to engage with life story work.

I suspect that in this world of facebook that now they might not be so free about including surnames, exact dates of birth for relatives and exact addresses.

We added in copies of their birth certificates before they had to be sent in for the adoption order.

Here you get it after the celebration hearing

We put in for adoption order after 10 weeks and got it within six months.

I am pretty sure life story book came after the adoption order. So over 6 months.

I would not delay adoption order unless there are genuine reasons relating to the child. But I would offer to do book myself if necessary.

Ours is like a photo album and with clipping of stuff from internet, real photos and text.

Starts with son with us, our lives together, looks back to his birth, birth family, reasons for going into care, foster family and back to us.

It is nice to have but at 7 he has only looked at it a few times.

Good luck.

Ps I love the name cassie!

Thank you

It took us a while to get ours - we had to request it a few times from the sw, they did get it to us eventually, and the later life letter came a while after that (again after a few more emails).
Maybe it is worth contacting the sw to see where they are with it!

We’ve been told we have to write our own as no social worker funding for them to do it!

My daughters been with me 8 months AO has gone through and only now are the working on her LS book, however i’m very impressed so far, real attention to detail and the theme is just perfect for her.