Matching before panel

[Ladyg89]

Hi all.

I've been reading these forums daily and trying to find a journey that is similar to mine (silly I know but was hoping you can kind of predict next steps).
Me and DH are looking to adopt a sibling group of 2 with our LA. We have panel next month and have asked a few times about potential matchs (due to seeing more and more matchs before approval mentioned here) and we keoe getting told we cannot see real children's profiles until we approved. Is this the Norm? Or does it depend on the LA and SW. If you have expressed interest adopting 2 will you be shown profiles of single children aswell?

Thanks

does it depend on the LA and SW. Yes.

We were provisionally matched before approval panel both times (first time we'd already seen 20 ish profiles before approval), but I've heard of many adopters who didn't even start looking at profiles until the SW got round to them many weeks after approval.

If you have expressed interest adopting 2 will you be shown profiles of single children aswell?

Again- that depends. One of the reasons we looked at quite a lot of profiles the first time is because we were really struggling to narrow our matching criteria- so we looked at a range of groups and ages.

It's better to get approved for a broad range at panel (e.g. 1 or two kids 0-6 years) and then start looking for what you specifically want because you then have flexibility if you change your mind.

Don't be pushed to consider matches that aren't right, but do be open to being challenged (DD1 had a risk which was one of our hard nos) Ask plenty of questions about health, background etc.

We've just started the adoption application and are hoping to adopt 2 boys who I know through my work. Our SW has said we won't be able to look at their full profiles until after we are approved so we basically get no more information on them or their situation until after panel which will hopefully be in November.

I was at our first ACs delivery and looked after him for 3 months on SCBU so I knew more about him than the Social Worker, did cause some confusion as he didn't know him.
.
On a serious note we have always identified a child prior to panel but they have all been hard to place children( love em )

Thanks for your comments.

Ready these wonderful forums has given us some indication of how each step will go but when the social worker said no profiles until after panel we were a bit taken aback. All has been very positive up to this point so we were worried. Although I supposed every LA is different. We had profiles to discuss as part of the assessment. Guess we'll just have to wait until panel and hope we get to view profiles fairly soon after. Xx