Initial meeting

[EggAndCressRoll]

Apologies I do appreciate similar questions have been asked 100 times over - I have read lots of old threads.

We have attended an information event with our RAA and left feeling quite positive that adoption is a good route for us, and we are in a good point in our lives for it. We have actively chosen not to pursue fertility treatment.

We have our initial visit to discuss our expression of interest booked in. I’m feeling more wobbly about this now and whether the social worker will be positive about our situation or looking for barriers.

How common is it to be told to go away and do xyz before applying, vs doing these things alongside the assessment process? The main one that stood out to me was experience caring for children - we do have some experience with family children, and I work and volunteer with children - but I imagine they will want more for my husband at least.

Also, what do they want from our references? Our “best” references - in terms of people who spend purposeful time with us as a couple, see us at our rawest not the polished hosting/social version, see us with children - are more weighted within one side of our family and I’m worried if they want more friends references they aren’t going to be very helpful.

Unless it’s something really obvious I doubt you’ll be told to go away and apply after competing some actions. I think it tends to be things that surface as you’re going through the process that require more from you.

Re care of children, we have nieces and nephews but DH works in a school. There was a mention of me volunteering but it just wasn’t doable around work initially and in the end they were happy that ad hoc childcare, family outings, taking the family kids out here and there was plenty.

With our references they wanted a few things - to check the ‘village’ we said we had were really onboard and we had support and to confirm other people’s views of us as people and as a solid couple were the same as ours.
Our references were DHs parents, a friend we’ve both known for 20+ years, my best friend and a close friend of DHs. There were no queries about them at all.

Only thing I will say is if the process hasn’t changed, the references will take a bit of time. If I remember correctly, ours had to write one and submit it in stage one and in stage 2 they had a video call with our social worker and each lasted around an hour.
The family also took part in a training session where basic ‘things to expect’ were shared and they learned about therapeutic parenting approaches and why we use them. It was helpful but it took an afternoon.

Good luck!

Thank you that is reassuring.
The social worker did use childcare as an example on the phone - saying for example sometimes people have no experience with children so we ask them to go and do that first. Which threw me a bit!
We’re happy to actively increase how much time we spend with other children during the process and have local friends I’m sure will be glad of the baby sitting - just would be really disappointed to told to go away and do all that for 6 months rather than move forward!

Our RAA do the family training too which I thought was a really good offer rather than me and DH having to explain everything ourselves.

Our agency told us to go away for 6 months and clock up meaningful volunteering with under 5s as we had experience with older children not as much with little ones. I have to say talking to other adopters this is both a legimate ask - we were asked about this experience at our approval panel - but it is also definitely a ploy for agencies to manage their capacity and to weed out those who might not go the distance in the process. So don't take it as the brush off if you are asked to volunteer, its actually the first hurdle of the process.

Re the training, if you get to that stage and it’s offered, definitely take it. Our social worker ran ours and used it as an opportunity to explain why they wouldn’t meet LO for a while, why we would need to ‘close ranks’ and limit interactions, how we’d been advised to introduce family in stages and for them not to be offended by it.
She also advised them what support in the early stages could look like (doing washing/bringing meals or food shopping/evening phone calls once LO was asleep).
She also explained the need to parent in ways that aren’t traditional and that LO was likely to regress so not to be surprised, not to judge and just treat him as the age he’s presenting, forgetting about his actual age.

Sounds pretty straight forward but I’d bet a lot of money that there would have been drama about having to wait to meet him/questions about our parenting approach if the training hasn’t happened.
Plus they all took it on board, FIL & SMIL provided cooked meals and ironing services for a long time, DM did washing for us and DF would drop off mini food shops twice per week and it made everything easier.

With childcare experience - the process is slow. Be proactive and plan some babysitting and time with children now so when they mention it you can say you’ve done X and have Y and Z planned to address this already.
They may ask you to get it under you belt first buy you could do it alongside the process - but as pp said, sometimes I think it’s used as away to manage capacity (although I’m not sure where you are but where I am they are crying out for adopters so it may be different).

Just to add there are government targets for how long it should take from stage 1 through to approval and so agencies can ensure they hit these, weed out those who might go the distance and so on by asking potential adopters to clock up some volunteering and then come back in 6 months to start the process proper. My partner and I had a fair amount of experience with kids and we felt that we were being asked to volunteer and start the process in 6 months for exactly these reasons. The reason they gave was we didn't have much experience with under 3s or children with additional needs (although I worked with adults with learning disabilities at the time). In fact once we had our social worker assigned to us and she was looking at our experience - we had to list every role we had had that required a dbs for some form or other - she said this is all great. I am not sure why they got you to more volunteering. At times the approval process is a frustrating box ticking exercise, and we consciously leaned in to accepting that as otherwise we knew we were going to spend a lot of time railing against it. Hold steady and try not to take it personally and it will stand you in good stead for going the distance.