Long term fostering or adoption?

[Dimples81]

Hi everyone,
my partner and I decided to look at adoption a year ago and were advised to wait until the summer to apply. Summer came but so did other things that meant we paused again. We are ready to try again now but having read some of the threads on here and seeing what people have said I’m now second guessing myself. I understand that trauma etc can impact on adoptions but there seem to be so many negative things said around BP contact, damage etc that it has got me asking questions. Would we get any support if these became issues further down the line as seems to be suggested? Other comments suggest not?
if we explored being long-term foster carers instead would we be better placed to receive support and help for the children in our care? Does this actually happen? I understand there will always be reasons for children to have ended up in the system in the first place but what support do they receive to support them in moving forward if their mental health becomes an issue?
Hoping for some experiences to help me understand it all. Some of the information seems that lack of support from the system means adopters are set up to fail and then blamed for it later on if there are problems and left with no support. Is this different in long term foster care?
Thanks in advance.

@Dimples81

In my experience, no long.term fostering is no different and in fact its probably worse.
Ive been fostering for about 2 years and on my third placement.
For all three of the young people in my care I was begging for help from pretty much the start. And never got anything. Something Ive read this week shows that Im being blamed for the breakdown of my first placement, despite a senior Social work manager stating at the time they should never have been placed with me.
Fostering in my view is as much of a gamble as adoption. You may be lucky and have a child or children who grow up and become a permanent part of your family. Or you may have very complex children who don't.
Whilst you will have certain delegated authorities you are not the child's legal parent and some decisions are not in your hands. SWs will be in your life forever, often not in a helpful way. A lot depends on how good your child's SW is. They are a mixed bag.
You may be required to take your foster child for family time. You will have no say in how often or even if its convenient for you. It can be very disruptive for your child.
In short, no fostering is not a guarantee of support

A child in long term foster care will
have their own social worker who will visit at least every 3months. There will be an independent review every 6 months by a reviewing officer (IRO). Foster carers have a fostering social worker who visits approx every 8 weeks. A health assessment will happen once a year. There will be regular meetings with school. So in theory, there should be lots of support for the young person.
Good support depends on all these professionals liaising with each other and importantly listening to any concerns the foster carer may wish to raise and acting on these concerns.
PP makes good points about how life with the child could be.

The issue with social workers is the turnover and the fact that they don't actually know the children.
My first young person had 3 in less than a year. The second one was off sick a lot and was terrified of the young person.
I will never forgive the third one for the trauma she inflicted by the way she removed them from my home

The reality is support for children, adopted or fostered, is very thin on the ground and is all too often crisis driven.

As an adoptive parent you’re in it for the long haul which means the child has a security they simply don’t have in care. It means you can fight for them in a way that is harder when they’re in foster care (because you’re often effectively fighting your employer). While on paper corporate parenting responsibilities should mean the local authority has a duty of care, the resources aren’t there.

From an extremely cynical point of view, you can give 28 days’ notice on a placement as a foster carer. As an adopter, when things start to go wrong, usually in the preteen and teen years, you will be threatened with the police for abandonment if you admit to children’s social care that you can no longer continue to absorb the violence, the aggression, the going missing, the verbal abuse, the stealing, the drinking, the drug-taking, and all the other associated dramas in your own home. Both adopters and foster carers face a significantly higher than average risk of being arrested on the basis of false allegations.

OP, please don’t be bamboozled by the likes of Matthew & Ryan and all their ongoing social media antics. Please search out all the recent BBC coverage on adoptive parent blaming and shaming. I’m not saying don’t do it, before I get lambasted, but I am urging anyone now considering adoption to do so with their eyes wide open and in the full knowledge that there simply is no meaningful support.

@ThePieceHall

Yes you can give 28 days notice, its not that simple
For both placements Ive ended, its taken 3 months to get them moved.
With one I literally had to say Im getting on a plane on Sunday and they aren't coming with me.
The second one took 6 police, someone crawling through my hedge, another person climbing out of a window whilst child trashed the garden and tried to pull a pipe out of the boiler.
Now I know you will still say I can ask for them to be removed. True. But adopters can ask for children to be accommodated under section 20.
Having done both, adoption and fostering are different but bring with them their own issues.
What concerns me is that people don't see fostering as an easier option, because its not.
Id say that my experience of fostering has been far more detrimental to my own mental health than adoption because of the point jellycats made. Ultimately I am not the parent of the children who live in my home. I can advocate for them till Im blue in the face and be just ignored and have decisions imposed on me.

And I’m equally concerned that prospective adopters don’t see adoption as the easier route. Try to give up and you will be threatened with the police for child abandonment, which is career ruining if you work in any role involving vulnerable people. Also, I hear you re: the police. I had six officers in three police cars turn up under blue lights to arrest me and I was in custody for 21 hours. You have had a positive experience of adoption but very many of us haven’t and we need to be allowed to tell our individual stories with significant collective themes of LA & police threats and lots of parent blaming and shaming.

@Ted27

Also, I was punished by my LA for seeking a s.20 after my arrest when I could no longer keep my younger daughter or myself safe. The LA did not care. We were collateral damage. I still burn with shame at the fact that both of my children were put on Child Protection plans. My crime? Asking for my AD1 to be reacommodated. My story is not unique. There are many thousands of us from all four home nations who have been punished and persecuted in similar ways. Our stories speak for themselves. Please, OP, check out the Adoption Blame Game across the BBC.

@ThePieceHall

I know.
And a lot of bad luck stuff can happen to foster carers as well.

As I saud up thread, Im just concerned with ensuring people don't pursue fostering instead of adoption because they think its easier or that support will be more forthcoming. Because its not.

Agreed. I have done both for 20 years, interchangeably. Personally, in the prevailing system, I wouldn’t recommend fostering or adoption to anyone. I actually don’t think that adoption, in its present format, will exist in two to three decades. And I fully expect that there will be a Post Office-type scandal, whereby systemically abused adopters and adoptees stand together to seek justice and retribution.

The main point i think is that present day adoption and fostering can mean dealing with extremely challenging behaviours and there is often nothing that touches these behaviours. People talk about support, but what if it doesn't actually exist?

I did loads of courses, attended so many seminars, got a huge amount of support from the placing LA and locally from all sorts of services - both my girls had EHC plans for example, and they both had loads of therapy, adhd meds....

Still lots of really, really challenging behaviours which I dealt with - i gave up work because no one would do child care for them.

They didn't go back into care but it has been utterly life consuming for me. I don't regret it but anyway, even with loads of support, you are still having to parent these kids and their behaviours and I think you have to be set up to understand that's what it means to adopt or foster.

I think fostering is harder in many respects, because you don’t have parental rights and there are always professionals of varying knowledge and competence who have more say than you do. Couple that with the uncertainty for the child in not having a truly permanent home and it’s no wonder it’s a struggle for all involved.

Yes adoptive parent need to parent in challenging circumstances but as a parent I decide how I’m doing that. If I think my child needs time away from screens, or I limit their online access, or ground them it’s my decision. I won’t have someone telling me I’m breaching my child’s rights or have to follow well meaning internet guidance from the local authority. I can decide if school just isn’t happening without having to explain myself to all concerned.

I also think a home based placement just isn’t the right environment for some young people. They struggle with the intimacy and attachment relationships in family, but not family, settings. Really the whole concept of caring for kids say from their family of origin needs a proper rethink, with a combination of fostering, adoption, respite care, small residential units (ie one or two children) and accessible therapeutic settings with thorough assessment of the child’s needs rather than putting them somewhere where there’s a warm bed. Children and carers are effectively set up to fail in the current system.

100 per cent agree with the final sentence of your post.

In my previous post I put what ‘should’ happen in a foster placement. Sometimes the child I’ve looked after has had all or most of this happen and I’ve become a strong advocate, speaking out when working against the tide but have no final say in the outcomes but try my very best. I am a fighter.
It shouldn’t be like this and in my 25 years of fostering with 60ish children through my door - from one or two nights to several years and of various ages, I’ve found the support levels vary greatly from those responsible for the child and fostering needs massive resources put in to ensure every single child and carer gets the support they need and deserve.

I am a Foster carer and adoptor . I have an adopted child with complex medical needs and disabilities and an.older one who has been with us in Foster care since he was 18 months. Again complex needs at the extreme end of the scale.

To be completely honest the Foster child ( now actually a shared lives placement as he is post 18. For the uninitiated shared lives is like Foster care for adults ) has received v little support unless we have battled his local authority to the bitter death. We have had 18 yrs of failings on the authorities part and I cannot even tell you.the stress it lhas caused.
Out adopted one is so much easier as no.SW involved at all. I manage everything and access whatever support I need for my son without having to rely on anyone else.
Personally I have found it much easier .
But like others I am not sure I would recommend becoming a Foster carer to anyone . It is a v tough job to do and you are constantly being assessed and evaluated. You have to have an annual review to keep up.your registration not to mention the endless training courses that have to be done every year.
And at the end of the day you.have no rights and no say on what happens to the child .
I would adopt everytime if you want a family.