To think my friends have behaved terribly?

[NC543212345]

NC for this, will try and keep it vague.

Basically I don't feel like I can be around our 'friends' anymore after the way they have behaved but dh thinks I am unreasonable.
They adopted 2 girls a year ago, it took a lot of time and effort to get through the adoption process but they finally got their wish and got these 2 gorgeous girls.
One of the girls struggled to settle and would hit out and have temper tantrums. Very much to be expected imo as she is still very young.
'Friends' have decided that actually they can't continue living like this and have decided the girls aren't the right fit for them!

I'm probably taking it too personally but I just can not believe they are giving in so easily and now these girls have to go through more turmoil, deal with more rejection and start all over again. I am furious with them and don't think I can ever look them in the eye again. Dh thinks we shouldn't judge but I don't think I can help it. Are you even able to just give them back?

Worthy of Debate?

I don't think so I think it's a horrible thread and terrible towards the adoptive parents.

And that's assuming the adoption had all gone through - surely at a year it would still be just placement?

Papafran there was a knock at the door and SS forced their way in and their first words were We are here to take your child. There is no point fighting it we have already got a family to adopt her

Absolute fucking shit. In order to get to the adoption stage, the following needs to happen:
-Concerns are raised to SS about welfare of a child
-SS investigate (either due to reports or because courts have ordered them to do so)

• SS investigate and find that child is suffering or at risk of suffering significant harm (the legal threshold for removing a child)
• If harm is ongoing and child needs to be removed, SS may apply for an emergency protection order and then an interim care order (both of which need evidence to demonstrate a real risk that children suffering harm). Both are temporary orders.
• SS apply for a care order for permanent removal. Parents automatically entitled to non-means and merit tested legal aid to fight the case. There will be a series of hearings. SS have to submit a care plan setting out long-term plans for child. This might involve adoption.
• Court hears SS's application for a final care order, all evidence is tested in court. Court will make order if satisfied that children are suffering/at risk of suffering significant harm.

-Children are removed (although may already be in foster care under an interim care order). -Local authority matches child with prospective adopters. Reports are written. Child placed with adopters for minimum period. -Local authority applies for an adoption order. Birth parent consent is needed unless court feels it should be dispensed with in child's best interest.

• Court decides whether to make an adoption order. There is a duty to consider whether child can be cared for by relatives. Child's welfare is court's paramount consideration.

-Adoption made final

So, you can see that the story you relayed is absolute bollocks. Either your friend is talking bollocks or there were some seriously messed up social workers who lied to her (but more inclined to believe the former).

Oliver - yeh right

My children are on the at risk register because I HE and my ds isn't up to date with his vaccinations. I was speaking about this and another parent told me her 6ft 2" 15year old ds is on the at register because he has messy hair. Apparently these are all massive red flags.

I don't believe that in either of these cases, the children are on an at risk register solely for the reasons you've stated.

oh yea missed that aswell Unproper

Yea, chinny reckon that happened

It's also not very nice for adoptees. Hth.

Bollocks is a 15 year old on the at risk register for having messy hair.

Many things can land a child on the at risk register, tbh there isn't a reliable check on SS and they do sometimes get it wrong. It wasn't that long ago a sw gave an abusive ex his partners safe address and he nearly beat her to death.
I have known one family nearly pulled apart by a spiteful SW, during what should have been a routine investigation.

These are rare but they do happen.

Fuck me, there's so much ridiculousness posted here my head might explode if I address it.

I understand the temptation to judge. In the same way you presumably would judge any other parent to a child with special needs who can't cope.

I have seen an adoption disrupt (and horribly only with one of a sibling pair) and it isn't pretty and no parent who has invested several years of emotion into getting and settling these children will do it lightly.

The only thing you can do if find out if you can offer practical support (don't offer any more advice - we are generally awash with advice from well meaning outsiders) and keep your opinions to yourself. And if you can't keep your opinions to yourself then bow out of the friendship.

And please don't do that fucking insensitive thing of "well I wouldn't walk away from my biological child" thing. Over the years, I have seen many parents of children with special needs who are overwhelmed and deciding whether to hand their children over to SS been swamped on MN with offers of support and sympathy.

They may be at their wits end. When DS was referred to CAMHS the reply we got was "well you're coping". Luckily I was - DS wasn't but that didn't seem to matter.

Keep your fingers crossed for these children and their parents and be as practically supportive as you can - these children's best chance if for the parents to be supported as much as possible not judged.

If you think back a few generations, before abortion was widespread/legal and in a different set of social conventions, many children were put up for adoption because their mothers were young, or unmarried, or both.

Nowadays, children are generally only put up for adoption if their parents cannot cope or are unsuitable for very extreme and severe reasons.

For example, of the various adopted children I know personally, two of the kids (in different families, not connected at all) were born addicted to heroin.

Oh, and my kids weren't up to date with their vaccinations until they were mid-teens, and one has messy hair, but we've never had a visit from SS.

It also strikes me that you piously say you would never give up on an adoption while being fully prepared to cast aside your friends. That's not friendship.

This.

Are you even able to just give them back?

the same recourse to social services that is available to any other parent. There is no special PO Box number for adopted children being returned..

This is so sad and will be awful for the girls. There should be more support for the parents to get through this difficult time. Surely there are many parents out there who go through hell but keep going because that is what you do for your children. Very sad. None of us are perfect parents and none of us have perfect children.

but we've never had a visit from SS - bet there one hiding in a bush outside your house just now photographing your DC's hairstyles.

CAVEAT: - I have known officious social workers who were mind-numbingly unbending so I can quite believe miscarriages of justice. But the files going to be a bit thin if there's one piece of paper with "Messy hair" written on it.

I don't think I could remain friends with them either OP. It would feel weird meeting them and not talking about their dc.

I'm sure they would have considered it but a year is not a long time. Hands up who wanted to hand back their own dc in the first 12 months. I would feel like they haven't tried.

I think you should be supportive to your friends they must be absolutely devastated.

Surely there are many parents out there who go through hell but keep going because that is what you do for your children

yes and around 90,000 parents who are unable to cope and their children are in care. So please don't imply that it's only adoptive parents who cannot cope with their children and all birth parents miraculously struggle on. Because that's not true and insulting.

I have a friend whose adoption broke down and I saw the level of judgement and vitriol she was subjected to by people who did not have a clue what she had been/was going through.

OP - if you can't look them in the eye and feel anger towards them then step back but try and accept that you really really don't understand what it's like and you haven't been through what they have. It's a terrible shame though - they are probably in real need of good friends at the moment.

OP they could probably do without your 'friend'ship. How awful for them (all).

Well I will just have to ring SS and tell them Mumsnet says bollocks

I can assure you everything I have said is true. In both cases it was reported to SS from same minor injuries clinic after both boys had a sports injuries.

I saw the report on my friend. It had her nationality, religion and colour of her skin down wrong it stated that she was wrong on keeping her DD from her father because he was a drug addict as there was no evidence that he took drugs. Then 2 pages later it referred to him as being known to every authority as a known drug addict and not safe to be around his dd.

Last week I would have called bollocks but if it can happen to me and friends it can happen to anyone.

I was just giving an alternative suggestion as to why adoptions break down

What a pile of bollocks oliver.

I think the OP has been given a very hard time. It is a horrible, horrible situation and so so unspeakably awful for those poor children who have been told over and over again that adoption is forever and that this is their family for good now. It's so upsetting to hear about.

There was an adopter on the mn adoption board who disrupted during introductions. She was given quite a hard time by other adoptive parents.

There was a boy in my class at school who was adopted along with his siblings and later the adoption was disrupted. Everyone was so judgemental, including my dm who was a social worker, all our teachers and friends' parents.

Everyone is assuming that these friends are wonderful people who have tried everything. We don't know them, we don't know that.

My first reaction was similar to yours OP....especially given that nobody goes into adoption without knowing how traumatised their children will be and what they might face. But I can see another side...they were probably promised support that hasn't materialised, for the children as well as for themselves...it is likely that the children aren't even safe and that disrupting the adoption is the only way to get any intervention for them?

You would never give up your child...but if it was the last straw to clutch at to try to give him a slim chance of a future? If staying with you would end in certain disaster and possibly his death or that of others? In that extreme situation, would you? I don't know the answer...it's just desperately sad.

Kewcumber when I say parents I mean everyone!!!! I am not separating adoptive genetic why would I. All parents!!!!

All of these 'oh your poor friends' posts and bugger all for the actual dc who are being sent back to care after a year.

No wonder so many people give up then. Sure it's perfectly fine if you find it too hard

Some days I would give all of mine back..

..no one would take them