Post adoption contact has ruined the chance of adoption for so many children

[Popcornhero]

I am a paediatrician, Mum of three children (who arrived by adoption) and have several foster carer and social worker friends. I keep seeing children no longer getting adopted now there is an expectation for face to face contact with birth families.

I have seen this through work recently, and today was chatting to a foster carer friend who was saying how many children in their fostering network are no longer being adopted. Shehas a 14 month old in her care, who she's been approached to keep as a long term foster as he's been up for adoption for a year with no one to take him.

The rules now around face to face contact with birth families have meant adoption rates have plummeted. I'm so angry about it. Children deserve a fresh start with their new family & they aren't getting it because needs of birth parents are being prioritised.

Some research suggests adoptees would have liked more contact, but there is a bias in the literature. It's those most affected by the adoption that are coming forward not those who grew up and moved on and adoption is only one part of their story.

I know we wouldn't have adopted it we had had to maintain face to face contact with the birth family. They are our children and they have a lovely protected life. We changed our children's names to give them a better chance in life ( they had for example names like Thor, Loki and Renesmee and are now, Theo, Luca and Esme) **just an example. We never send photos so they can be captured in birthday parties and their identity remains safe. They know their story, they know why we are their parents. We write to the birth family yearly. It would be awful for them to feel split between two worlds.

Surely they need to review the impact this has had,before more children lose the chance at having a family?

It is most certainly not a fact, as many adoptees on here have explained. All children are different. I have never had the slightest interest in anything to do with the people that gave me up. They are not my family, they are irrelevant strangers.

This is exactly the case, I fear that rather than being due to what's in the child's best interests, it is simply the authorities panicking that they are going to be taken to court by the biological parents. Children aren't going to be the ones doing that, so adult needs are put first.

So are you.saying adoptive parents are not real parents then ?
So what are they ?
Free foster care ? Babysitters ?

This is precisely why the child should be put before the biological parent. How ridiculous that they can effectively prevent her from having a safe happy home life and a stable family.

Those children were taken away from their families for a reason. Why do they need to be exposed to them again, idk. What is the reasoning? Totally not ok.
Children would be stuck between 2 worlds I think. This is madness.
I know a couple who adopted 2 children and the children birth mother (a junkie!) found out where they lived, and started turning up at their doorstep at night asking for money. When not given any one night, she broke all their windows! The couple had to move house and went to live on the other side of the country after that.
Who did think it was a good idea for the child to be in touch with their junkie birth mother? Madness!

Totally agree (as someone who was adopted as a baby).

I agree with you.

In the US they have older children on websites who are looking to be adopted and many of them can’t leave the area they are in because they have contact with their birth families.

It’s holding many children back.

what about families where the birth parents have harmed or neglected their kids. Should those children have to.see them ? If you left an abusive partner would you want to be forced to keep contact with them and see them because some random social worker decided it would be in your best interests ?
Adoptors cannot airbrush anything as you put it. Letter box contact and life story works are the v least they are expected to engage with.
Sometimes it may be appropriate to offer direct contact with birth family members but that is ( in my experience of 20 yrs as an adoptor and foster carer) v likely to be a rare exception.

Call me cynical, but is it also to do with funding?

Fostering = local authority funded.
Adoption = responsibility of the new parents.

I’m an adoptee and completely agree OP, I was forced to have one face to face contact session with BM when I was around 7. I remember feeling so uncomfortable at the time and have had no desire to make contact since. Now I have my own DC, and I’ve seen docs from the care proceedings, what little empathy I had for my BPs is now gone and I’m more grateful than ever to have been removed from them.

I’ve never had the urge to trace family that other adoptees describe, but I was adopted with 3 of my biological siblings to the same parents. BM kept having more children who were all removed at birth, but I have at least 4 older and 1 younger siblings that I know of and have no desire to trace them either.

she needs to make an application direct to the courts. If a child has been in placement a certain length of time ( think it is 26 weeks but not completely sure ) you can apply yourself. She doesn't need the birth parents or social services permission. She needs to fill out the paperwork and submit it to the courts herself.
The courts will instruct an assessment of the child's best interests and needs and they will decide. Soc services cannot remove the child whilst the process is ongoing and cannot override the courts directions or decisions.

Not many people know this but we looked at this for our long term foster child who hadn't been released for adoption due to a legal cock up . If she is a member of the foster care network they have a free legal helpline who can help her further.

I agree with you OP. We adopted our child too, no way I'd have wanted to have her meet up with a drug addict every year and the family who were not a good influence.
We also did the name change. From a bizarre name given while high. Our adoption was closed by the judge as the birth mother refused to do anything at all.

It says a lot about the adopter if they’ve changed the names of the children to something they think is more acceptable.

What does it say?
that maybe they understand that life may be a bit difficult if you go through life with a name like Desire, Orgasm,Twizzler or Galaxy to name but a few uk ones?

Although changing name isn't the usual thing (identity) if a child / set of siblings names are very unusual it can be better/safer for them to be changed.

If you search for Thor you'll get a load of stuff about Gods. If you search for Thor and Merry you may find the MN baby names thread where a poster (who by other posts lives in Tenby and has a sister nearby) saying 'My Dneice has a Thor in her class who has a sister called Merry!!'. and thus you have found the location of the children.

are you an adoptor ? what experience do you have regarding adoption, fostering or the care system ?

Our two are adopted, they have regular contact with their birth mother, not birth fathers as we don’t know who they are unfortunately. Our contact tends to be video calls and emails due to distance, although we have done some in person meets, we have one arranged for easter. It’s very beneficial for both of our children, their birth mother isn’t some mythical creature, she also isn’t a monster or an amazing super person, she’s just a regular human like the rest of us, and its beneficial for them to see that. It was particularly useful during covid as our son was really worried about people getting very poorly, so knowing she was okay was very reassuring for him.

Yes there have been some minor bumps and there will be more, but that happens in all relationships.

The one thing I never forget as an adoptive parent, is that my children didn’t ask to be placed with us- that was our choice, not theirs.

They shouldn’t be ‘grateful’ anymore than a birth child should.

I know that’s not exactly what you were saying, but even though they were a nice couple, it was never her choice. I always keep that in mind.

It's really offensive to describe adopters as 'thinking they've just got a shiny new baby to show off'. Anyone who's been through adoption training and assessment process knows much better than to think that. Adopters know plenty about attachment disorder and trauma.

It's a mistake to think that children who remember or have had a relationship with birth family will benefit from keeping in contact with them. For example you could have a birth mother who is not dangerous but who didn't keep the child safe from a dangerous father. You could say the child is at no risk from direct contact with her: but if the birth mother is unable to see why her child was removed, is unable to see how her parenting was unsafe - she kept them fed and loved them, what more is there? - the risk is there. I think more birth parents fall into that category - low intelligence, having been poorly parented themselves so no understanding of what good enough parenting is - than birth parents who deliberately inflict harm.

My DCs birth mother didn't physically harm them, she loved them, but she had no capacity to understand the harm she was subjecting them to by being in contact with their birth father. She didn't comply with what social workers asked her to do - not let him in the house, do the freedom program - because she didn't understand why she should. She's got no frame of reference of good enough parenting. So you could look at her and say she's not a danger and contact would be ok, but that's too simplistic and doesn't take into account the birth parents who don't or won't understand why their children were removed and the emotional and psychological damage their narrative could do to a child. You see them on the 'stolen children ' type websites, people who have no understanding of why their children had to be out of their care. My DCs birth mother wouldn't physically harm them but being subjected to her belief that they were taken for no reason and that they should be with her and will instantly come back to their 'real' family at 18 would, being subjected to her wants and her grievance would. Adopted children have a hard enough task making sense of their identity without burdening them with the warns of adults who are unable to put them first.

That description of adoption may apply world wide, I can't comment on that

But in the UK, children don't tend to be given up voluntarily. I've only heard of it once in 15 years working in this field

In the UK, children tend to be accommodated due to two, sometimes three, out of (1) substance misuse, (2) domestic abuse and (3) poor mental health. Generally, I'd say that the birth parents do love the children, but are unable to meet their needs. Birth parents have usually had very challenging lives themselves

Until around early 70s (?), babies in UK were given ip for adoption due to societal pressure, lack of support for single mothers, repectability etc. It was a completely different landscape

I also work in this area and actually that isn't true many parents have relationships with their children and indeed return to their care at 17 or 18. Not all but lots of parents have sorted themselves out a bit and got clean in the intervening years.

Those that haven't have often sadly died before their children are 18. Adoption isn't perfect the rate of those children returning to care is difficult to measure but thought to be about 10% ( this is most frequently in teenage years). The erasure of their previous identity is catostrophic for those children who end up with no sense of belonging at all.

When we suffered secondary infertility we explored adoption. The chances are the child would be coming from a highly dysfunctional family. We didn’t want that brought into our child’s life. The adoption system in this country is screwed and so many children are missing out because their, by definition unfit parents “ have rights”

Even though you've read stories of underground contact between children and birth parents? Do you not think it would be better to meet them with support from their adoptive parents?

There is no adoption in Ireland unless the parent surrendered their child, it’s sad as you’ve children in foster care until they’re 18.
It’s a shit/show. My cousin has her foster children since they’re were under 3, they’re 17/18 call them mam and dad but can’t adopt them, the mother is dead and the useless father wouldn’t sign them over.

Well, you can see why, though, given the history of mother and baby homes, Magdalene laundries, forced adoption and baby sale.