Possible match, mental health

[Purplerainagain]

We received that phone call today 😊 we are absolutely over the moon after 2 years of home study and panel we never thought this day would come!! Our SW said our possible match is a 2 year old girl, her birth mum has mental health problems as does she. I've never heard of a child so young having mental health problems and just wondered if anyone has any more information or a website that would shed some light? We are meeting with our SW tomorrow for more Information on the child so will know more then. Is there specific questions we should be asking our SW? Many thanks in advance.

I would be looking for as many details as possible regarding mum's problems. Birth mum of my youngest had severe mental health problems after birth. When DD was taken into care by social workers she had attachment problems and obviously only time will tell whether there is a genetic element - so anything you can find out on the family history for mental health is useful. Also, if they are already identifying the child as having some problems, what ongoing support will they be putting in place to support you and her during the transition, placement and beyond.
Congratulations and good luck moving forward.

If you are happy to can you elaborate on what they mean by 'mental health problems'? It does seem like a very odd thing to say about a 2YO! But without knowing exactly what they're getting at it's hard to say x

Congratulations!!

I would also be asking questions regarding child’s mental health. Is there concerns regarding a learning disability, developmental delay, attachment or something else? The reason I ask is I’ve never heard something so vague. Ask lots of questions and if your not sure take time to think it over. You need to feel you are a good match for the little girl (which I’m sure you are).

This is the most exciting part of your journey so far. In the coming weeks, you might meet your daughter for the first time. Again, congratulations!

Thank you for taking the time to reply. It was only a quick call today from our SW to tell us we had a match so we are meeting with our SW tomorrow where she will go into more detail. We were told that she has been in FC since birth and is meeting all her milestones, no developmental delays or learning disabilities. We were told she has a brother who is 5 and has been adopted, are we allowed to ask about him and his mental health? There is no Information on her birth father so it will only be her BM history they will be able to give us. We are first timers so this is all new to us. It's very scary but so exciting!

Yes you're absolutely allowed to ask about brother's development etc although they may not have masses of info. Are they actually suggesting that there is a mental health issue with this child though? I'm still a little confused as the only things they could really be querying at this age I would've thought is learning difficulties/autism/attachment difficulties. If there are learning difficulties in the family then these are very much heritable but don't tend to fully show themselves or rule themselves out until the child is at school age so I don't think they could really say at this age. And if they're querying any of the above then I would've thought there would be a degree of of developmental delay or atypical development noted. If mum has more of a functional mental illness such as schizophrenia/bipolar then again these can heritable to a degree but almost unheard of to emerge in childhood and there'd definitely be no way a 2 year old would show signs of these or give any indication of her likelihood of developing it at such a young age. It's just a theoretical risk you'd have to take on board. I would just.be finding out as much as you possibly can about this little girl and her biological parents (as with any match) I would pay particular attention to whether mum drank/used drugs in pregnancy and any possible developmental/behavioural issues with the child. I'm not suggesting that any of the above should/will put you off but these are probably the important things that you would be advised to consider. Massive congratulations btw and good luck. Keep us updated if you can xx

I’d be asking exactly what they meant by the child having mental health issues - children that small are way too young for MH diagnosis so what are they talking about. Who’s made that assessment and how did they do it. I’d fully expect the child to be having normal trauma responses - which can be quite full on but doesn’t constitute poor mental health, I’d also be cautious about the rest of their assessment of this child if they think a 2 year old can be mentally ill.

As a mental health professional, i find it impossible for them to have been formally identified into having any mental health problems as a 2YO.

I'd be asking lots of questions about BM, extended family & LOs brother.