To think the way some birth mothers are treat is appalling

[SpringHasSprung20]

A decade ago when I was still in my teens I had a baby removed from me at birth by social services and put up for adoption against my will.

It wasn't me who was the risk, I was being abused by the father and fought so hard to get away, have him prosecuted and keep my baby. I've posted about my story before.

Fast forward to now I'm approaching 30. I have a family and I'm living on the other side of the country with two subsequent children in my care full time with no SS involvement. I have a good life and haven't spoken to the abusive ex since I left him. I'm a different person. A strong person.

SS never allowed to meet the adoptive parents because I was opposing the adoption.

Do you know what contact I have with my son? One letter per year, due every April but it's usually always months late.

All of my letters are inspected by an adoption social work team before they'll be passed on to the adoptive parents/my son. Protocol. Most years they are sent back to me to edit out parts where I've told him I love him or miss him. I'm not allowed to say that, it's too emotional apparently.

I'm not daft, I know it's not in his best interests for me to be emotional in letters so I never am - but I do want him to know he's loved.

They are pedantic beyond comprehension. One year I had a letter telling me he was doing well in school, in my reply I said I was proud and he's such a clever boy. They sent my letter back and made me change "you are so clever" to "you sound clever"

I've had to plead with the adoption team for years to ask the family if I can have a photo, after 8 years of the adoption team saying "we don't let birth parents have photos" a kind contact coordinator finally agreed to ask the family for me.

The family took a while to decide but agreed I could see a photo. I can't keep it though.

I have to liase with an adoption team in my area and ask that the photo be sent to them so I can go into the office and look at it on a computer screen. Once. That won't happen this year because of covid so I have another year to wait before I can even catch a glimpse of my little boy. I have no idea what he looks like other than the sweet 6 month old face I have in a photo album, taken at our "goodbye contact"

I'm not allowed to send birthday cards or presents because it's a pain for the adoption agency to facilitate.

I have a box here that I save his cards in every year but that's not the point really is it? Imagine being a child and never getting a birthday card from your mum.

I'm not allowed to tell him about his siblings in letters. I talk to them about him all of the time but they must be kept secret.

All of the above is wrapped up as being in his best interests of course, but is it really?

I don't think he'll feel that way later on.

If you were adopted wouldn't you want to know that your 'birth' mother loved you? Would you be happy to only hear from her once a year?

I'm not a criminal and I've never hurt a child or been accused of it. I'm a good person and a good mother. I have the backing of SS here completely, after I approached them when I moved here. The senior manager raised her own concerns about how I was treat by that local authority and couldn't believe the way they work.

AIBU to think the way some birth mothers are treat is appalling? I'm not referring to abusive people or people who neglect their children, but people like me and others who were let down terribly.

I cannot move past the injustice of it all.

I voted YABU due to the astounding selfishness of your post. You seem to have no consideration for how your child feels and what would be best for them, only for yourself and your needs.

I will take it at face value that your situation is very hard and unfair and you've suffered. But that doesn't mean it would be good for a child who has been settled for ten years with the only family he's known to have to consider your needs and have lots of potentially confusing or upsetting contact with you. Your child is not responsible for meeting your emotional needs. It's just a sad situation but you should think of your child first and whom it would truly benefit to have more contact: him or you?

Maybe if adoption was reversible if found to be wrongful removal then proper checks would be put in place to make sure mistakes didn’t happen

@WasThereAplan With druggies etc, all sorts of people, they often get a chance after some time to get it reviewed on the grounds they have changed, made imprvements etc. I think this should be the case for everyone.

SS's reasoning is often that they don't like to move a child again. But they're being moved to their mum. Barring some sort of major ongoing issue, that's the right thing to do.

Anyways I don’t think I’m being in any way helpful to the OP - who I have the deepest sympathy for.

Do Op please read posts from those who’ve actually been in the process rather than those aggrandising on a load of “I’d do this and that” bollocksz

I don’t know if you’re coming back to this OP, but just wanted to say my heart goes out to you.

I hear that you understand your son in loved by his adopted family and that you aren’t trying to get him back.

I hear the pain you are in because he was taken away from you so very unjustly and you were tricked into a situation in which you had no chance.

I hope you find a way to make peace with the limited contact you have. For your sake and your younger dc’s, moving on from this is the best thing you can do. That doesn’t mean you forget him or feel that what happened was ok, but just that you concentrate on the present and make it the best you can.

I wish you all the best

Ricki I'm not going to pretend any system is perfect or all the individuals in it.
That would be daft.
But despite working in a fairly struggling LA I did find that this was how the system worked.

I wanted to highlight that SW really are there for the dc not the family as whole when it comes to child protection.

@SoulofanAggron

Maybe if adoption was reversible if found to be wrongful removal then proper checks would be put in place to make sure mistakes didn’t happen

@WasThereAplan With druggies etc, all sorts of people, they often get a chance after some time to get it reviewed on the grounds they have changed, made imprvements etc. I think this should be the case for everyone.

SS's reasoning is often that they don't like to move a child again. But they're being moved to their mum. Barring some sort of major ongoing issue, that's the right thing to do.

From the child’s POV, they’re being moved again to a complete stranger.

@SoulofanAggron

Maybe if adoption was reversible if found to be wrongful removal then proper checks would be put in place to make sure mistakes didn’t happen

@WasThereAplan With druggies etc, all sorts of people, they often get a chance after some time to get it reviewed on the grounds they have changed, made imprvements etc. I think this should be the case for everyone.

SS's reasoning is often that they don't like to move a child again. But they're being moved to their mum. Barring some sort of major ongoing issue, that's the right thing to do.

There also are not enough mother and baby placements to assess parenting skills so babies are often removed rather than parents being supported and they fail at the first hurdle as how can they gain parenting skills when not with their child and then they fail the assessments. It’s cruel and wrong and honestly needs a massive overhaul 😞

@SoulofanAggron Is it the right thing, though, after ten years ? I don't think OP is thinking straight. No matter how unjust the original circumstances of the removal might have been, it is in no child's best interest to be taken from their family of ten years. It might be good for the mother, but NOT for the child. How selfish.

You seem to have no consideration for how your child feels and what would be best for them

This is just ridiculous. She hasn't been able to see or talk to her son in years. So how does she know how he feels or what would be best for him? That's the whole point.

I think they should have got their children back actually. The children would probably have been happier too who is the judge of whether they’d be traumatised.
If my child was taken now who is lived safe secure and happy and ripped away say for years I know they’d spend each day wanting to be home and not understanding why they’d been taken and if returned would then be happy.
I know why you think this is right, and why people want to believe it, but this has been researched and studied extensively over the past few decades and you are wrong. The child would suffer if they were taken from their secure home, even if they were going to another loving home. The damage would be irreparable - which is why it doesn’t happen, even in cases where injustice has occurred.
The child must always come first.

'If my child was taken now who is lived safe secure and happy and ripped away say for years I know they’d spend each day wanting to be home and not understanding why they’d been taken and if returned would then be happy'. - You absolutely don't know this and you seem to have a very romantic idea of family life! After years have passed even if an injustice has occurred (which hardly ever has) you can't just move children so the parents don't suffer. We all have children to put their interests first not ours. You cant take a child from an adoptive family (often with adoptive siblings grandparents cousins etc) for the sake of birth parents. They cant be taken from schools after many years, moved from friendship groups, located in a different part of the country because it suits -you just cant surely you can see that? Repeated moving is of itself very traumatising.

Hi OP,
I'm sorry for what happened when you were so young and vulnerable, you deserved better than what you've described. I am an adopter, my DC are around your son's age. We have letterbox twice a year with their birth mum, letters are written from me, not DC, though I always ask if they have anything they want to contribute (they have not chosen to as yet). We have only had one reply, though I know this isn't because she doesn't want to reply or doesn't care, she just finds it so difficult and painful to do so.

My children's birth mum is not a bad person, at all; she was very young, and very entangled with their birth dad and his family (who are not safe people). She wasn't always parented adequately herself, so didn't have the ability to fully realise how far from 'good enough' the situation was. She now has a younger DC with a different dad, who is with her and they have no SS involvement.

For your own sanity you have to find a way to process what happened. I'm not saying that lightly, I do grasp how wrenchingly painful it must be to know you could have kept your child with more support. But whatever the rights and wrongs, the end result cannot be undone now, and burning with the injustice is hurting you, not SS or anyone else. My DCs birth mum attempted to overturn the order 4 years after they were removed from her care, the legal case went all the way to the court of appeal. I feel she was victimised in that process too, given false hope she might get the DC back and unable to really understand (like a couple of posters on this thread) that no matter if the wrong decision was made (and it wasn't, several different judges have checked!) it couldn't be undone, the DC would have been horribly damaged by even the suggestion that they might lose their 'forever family' and go to the care of their birth mum who is to them a stranger. In order to be in a good place if/when your son seeks you out, you have to process what happened so your feelings and needs don't overwhelm him and threaten you building a relationship in the future.

One of my DC remembers their birth mum, and currently has no wish to have anything to do with her or even acknowledge who she is - refused to even look at the letter we got or photos of their half sibling she sent. Other DC has no memory of birth mum and sometimes expresses curiosity about her - nothing is hidden from DC about their story and I answer any question age appropriately. This makes me wonder whether what you've been told about what is allowed in letters etc might be the adopters trying to shield you, in a way? Eg I would never write that my older DC doesn't want to know anything about her, never wants to talk about her, gets cross if I even mention anything about adoption - that would just be hurtful to birth mum, so I'm quite circumspect in what I write. Similarly other DC has significant behavioural needs, and I am truthful but also careful when I write to birth mum, as I wouldn't want her worrying. I don't think she would be able to understand why having more contact with her wouldn't be right for the DC at the moment, so I'd rather she think it's because I'm mean or insecure, or that SS are vindictive, than her have to face that they don't see her as their mum, they don't miss her like she misses them, they don't care if she loves them and would be terrified at the thought she wants them back.

Anyway this has turned into an essay! I hope you get some support from this thread, I have written this hoping it helps and I'm sorry if it doesn't

@endlesssnow

Ricki I'm not going to pretend any system is perfect or all the individuals in it. That would be daft. But despite working in a fairly struggling LA I did find that this was how the system worked.

I wanted to highlight that SW really are there for the dc not the family as whole when it comes to child protection.

I believe you.

Probably it varies between LAs and between teams, without reference to budget.

When things go wrong in organisations it’s pockets of problematic behaviour that crop up. Most professionals in most sectors are doing their best. Even in the isolated offices where bad practice takes hold, it’s not intentional but it does cluster, because there is a common cause.

I’m sure you’ve read more Serious Case Reviews than I have. It’s just so insulting to say “this doesn’t happen”. We all know it does.

If some team somewhere has a manager with a belief that DV victims are at fault and shouldn’t get chances, that’s an issue.

SpringHasSprung20

“Yes he's settled but he should never have ended up there in the first place“

Says it all.
So sorry, SpringHasSprung.

@SpringHasSprung20 I can’t believe the responses I have read on here!

I’m sorry you have lost your child and have been grieving for him the last few years.

It’s lovely to read that he refers to you as Mummy Spring

I agree some contact would be good for you both, you’re his biological Mum after all. I’m so sorry, this sounds unbelievably hard.

Can I just say that I think some posters who are calling the OP selfish are mixing up her situation with that of a hypothetical child who has been with an adoptive family for 10yrs and may be hypothetically returned to their birth family.

They are different issues. OP is not asking for her son to be taken away from his adoptive parents and returned to her. She also never said that the system is biased against birth parents (which I don't believe it is), she only asking if birth parents are sometimes treated terribly (which they are).
She is only asking for more contact with her son, I don't think that is unreasonable.

@Allthepopularkids

WasThereAplan we have always been at that point. Women have always been treated like shit and other women have always looked away because it doesn’t effect them directly.

Look at the Magdalene homes. They were paraded through the streets once a year where the town people spat at them and called them sluts. When the girls spoke about being abused by the priests they were called liars and put in psychiatric wards because they spoke out against authorities. Normal every day people viewing young women like that. They were treated like trash.

The same for this thread, the OP comes on and shares what’s she went through and still is yet she’s pretty much been called a liar and to move on - the child’s got a new mum.

I honestly despair at this site sometimes

What you’re failing to recognise @Allthepopularkids is that birth families were usually the ones committing girls and women to Magdalen laundries and mother and baby homes. Not unrelated authority figures, or anonymous ‘town people’, but the girls’ and women’s own parents or siblings.

@Allthepopularkids

2021namechanger Christ you’ve got some deep seated issues love.

I think 2021namechanger is very astute.

I’m really sorry you had such a rough experience OP. However if your son is about 10, it’s going to be 8 years till he will have access to your details to contact you, and of course he may chose not to, or not to for some years after that.

In the gentlest way I think you need to face that reality - and also face the reality that he has a mum who loves him and very possibly siblings and cousins etc too. Again, in the gentlest way possible, your focus seems very much on yourself rather than your son. This isn’t a criticism, I can see you didn’t get a chance to prove yourself as a mother - but the reality is that active communication with a birth mother struggling to cope with the fact she had to give him up would be confusing and unhelpful for your son right now.

Please don’t waste money on legal action - adoption is for life so it won’t change your situation. Have you / can you arrange some counselling to process the difficult feelings you are experiencing?? Could your local SS help with this?

You sound like a great mum to your younger kids OP and I hope you find a way to live alongside this.

No one is saying it isn't terrible for you op. Its terribly sad. But it cant be remedied for you by upsetting your son. Just because you have been unjustly treated can't be allowed to impinge on your sons life now. You say it has been 10 years. Your loss matters - and you can fight to clear your name if that would help you. But you cant let your loss impact on the happiness of your son can you? Surely putting his needs first is the mark of being an adult and a parent.
If he does contact you in the future, its still going to be about him isn't it? You finding out what he needs, not you trying to justify yourself to him. You may build a good relationship, but you cant even as an adult expect him to take on board the traumas you have suffered.