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?

I think that’s very unfair.The poster has three family members who are adopted. Also people are allowed to comment on a topic even if they don’t have direct experience.

Nope. Of course anyone can speak about racism or antisemitism, but the lived experience of the group with lived experience trumps anything they have to say. Or do you disagree with this?

Oh, hi again Pebbles! Show me where I’ve claimed to be the voice of all adoptees ever? I am speaking from my experience as an adoptee and judging by this thread, many other adoptees agree with me. Sorry if that upsets your worldview. You won’t shut down adoptees voices in this debate no matter how many ‘friends’ or ‘family members’ you know, I’m afraid.

all evidence in a matter like this is anecdotal surely. How else could you gather it ? But you cannot dismiss all of us on here with experience of adoption in one form or another as irrelevant just because you.think you know better and dont agree.
No one has the right to nullify someone else's direct experience.

Of course, it’s a public forum. I’m just pointing out that the ‘my adopted friend says’ / ‘my adopted family member says’ wears a little thin in a similar way to a black person hearing ‘but I’ve got lots of black friends’ so I can comment ad infinitum. It’s basically meant to give unwarranted weight to their view, just like a white person claiming to understand the black experience. If you don’t like the analogy please do show me how it’s wrong.

I did not say you ‘claimed’.

Your personal perspective is absolutely valid - no interest in your birth family, keeping your name, or any kind of contact - but that’s not necessarily the experience of other adoptees.

Far from shutting anyone down I see all adoptee experiences and perspectives as valid.

That’s great Pebbles- so you didn’t manage to find anything to back up your earlier post about me speaking for all adoptees? Now you mention it, as you have such great all round insight into adoption maybe a career in social work beckons? You could talk about your adopted friends in the interview?

Lived experience doesn’t ‘trump’ anything, because it’s not a zero sum game (or a game at all!) and because lived experience is not homogenous.

THANK YOU ++++++++++

Okay, so black people do not speak with more authority on their own experience of blackness than white people do for them? A simple yes or no answer will do.

Ergo, adopted people speak with more authority on their own experiences of adoption than non-adopted people can do for them? Yes or no? That is not saying that all experiences of adopted people are the same, but that the voices of those directly affected, and their multiplicity of views, should be given more weight than someone with no skin in the game.

Btw, are you an adoptee or an adopter yourself?

‘Purport’ means to appear to and I included the caveat that you may not have intended to come across that way.

The thread discussion in general might be more productive if posters refrained from dismissing different perspectives from their own.

I didn’t say anything about blackness, I gave the example of anti-black racism.

Yes, people with direct personal experience of something know about their own personal experience of it. It’s important that’s heard, but it’s not identical for every single person with that experience or characteristic and therefore it’s not the whole story of that experience. Why is your experience as an adoptee more important than that of adoptees who don’t share your views?

ETA the thread was started by someone talking on behalf of their adopted children. Who are babies/young children. Presumably you’re ok with her speaking on behalf of those adoptees?

Yes, I've noticed "families come in all shapes and sizes" increasingly being used to downplay concerns about the effects of surrogacy and gamete donation on children. It's a cop-out. Being told that families come in all shapes and sizes won't stop a "surrobub" from being disturbed to realise that a woman was paid to carry them and then abandoned in a war-torn country, for example.

And parents of donor-conceived children generally stick their head in the sand about the role of biology. They're going to be completely unprepared for the reality that, as their child grows up and learns more about biology, it will gradually dawn on them that the "nice lady who gave mummy and daddy some eggs to help us make you" is actually their genetic mother.

Women who use surrogates insist that pregnancy is meaningless and DNA trumps all, while women who use donor eggs insist that DNA is meaningless and pregnancy trumps all. And they both assume that the children they raise will just so happen to agree with them. We're sitting on a ticking timebomb as more and more people realise that isn't true. There are already online support forums for adults who've been badly affected by being donor-conceived.

Agreed. The threats and tactics that LAs will use in order to save money is utterly shocking. I’m glad that you and I both know that we are not making up our stories

did you mean to respond to me? I know this women well I won’t say how but what makes you think I “know nothing“ based on what I said?
She is addicted to heroin and crack there’s videos every other week on the local town page of her beating people up and she did brag she didn’t t want to go into labour sober. Fact.
Her child was taken from her as soon as born she told me this herself.
again did you mean to respond to me because I haven’t claimed to know more than I know 🤔

As a foster carer and someone who has seen children through to adoption I wholeheartedly agree with you on this and have said it MANY times myself. As a foster child you expect the children to have ongoing contact with birth family. Sometimes this positive for all involved, sometimes not. Currently looking after a teen where I can say just as a foster child this has had a detrimental impact to his life and his previous placement homes.
As an adopted child, they deserve a fresh start with parents who already are taking on a lot, having a child which isn’t their own, often with trauma which will affect them forever. To them state that these child should have ongoing contact with birth family whom they have been removed from for very good reason (and often these days, much much too late) is absolutely ridiculous. I have also asked who this is supposed to benefit other than the birth family. The children have a constant reminder that they don’t truly belong with their adoptive parents, and can retain feelings/memories/trauma attached to their early childhood.
By all means when an adoptive child is 18 give them all the information they need about birth family, but give them a chance to have a normal stable childhood with their new families.
As another PP stated once adopted it really is up to the adoptive parents how much contact they actually maintain, and social workers have quietly and off the record said, don’t bother in front of me in the past which I agree with.
Even contact with siblings who haven’t been adopted maintaining contact is risky as their experiences in care are going to be very different to the adopted children and can cause issues as they get into teen years.
The system needs to change to prioritise the children as it has definitely swung too far in the parents favour. Some of these kids are SO damaged it just boggles my mind they parents can stay in touch and continue to damage them.

Just to throw another petrol bomb into the fray here…not all adoption is because of infertility. There are huge numbers of same-sex partnership and single adopters.

You’ve completely missed the point - my experience as an adoptee is not more significant than that of other adoptees. Nor are all adoptee experiences the same. However, any adoptee experience IS more significant than the opinions of those who are not adoptees at all (I assume you fall into this category?) Surely you can see that? I am assuming from the fact that you dodged my question that you are neither an adoptee or adopter.

You are very patronising and I say that without any caveat. I know exactly what ‘purport’ means. You have no direct experience on this topic whatsoever - you are not adopted or an adoptee (or even a professional working in this area).

I do know a girl aged 9 at the time and her brother then aged 6 (now both are adults) who were adopted by someone within the wider birth family who had looked after the children for several years before. After they were adopted the girl decided she wanted nothing to do with her biological mother. The LA had tried for years to reunite the children with their mother including allowing the biological mother to have them overnight though there were restrictions on how long the children could stay with her. The girl when aged 7 had come into school one day but her brother had not been taken to nursery so they asked if her brother hadn’t been feeling well that morning and had he been taken back to foster carer instead of nursery. The little girl says “ I walked to school on my own because when I left mummy was asleep on the kitchen table”. The little boy aged just 4 could show and tell what adults get up to in the bedroom. The biological mother blamed the adoptive mother for not letting her see her children without once ever thinking her own actions could be to blame. Contact with a birth family should absolutely be judged on a case by case basis rather than using a one size fits all solution.

Interestingly in Australia many of the sperm donor born babies connected with their biological Father once the anonymity was lifted.
They wanted to know who was responsible for half of their genetic code.
I can’t see why many donor egg babies won’t want to do this as adults, genetics are important, sadly many will find their mothers living in not good conditions, as I mentioned up thread my cousin adopted from Romania was appalled by his mother’s life when he went to visit, he was one when he was adopted from an orphanage, it did impact him.

I haven’t missed your point, I’ve responded to it multiple times. Yes, adoptees have the most knowledge of being an adoptee. That doesn’t preclude others who know and care for them advocating for them or sharing their experiences (as the OP and many others have done). You’ve lambasted the pp for sharing the experience of people she’s close to, on the basis that she has no right to, and ask everyone who has a different perspective whether they are adopted.

I missed your question, though knew it would be only a matter of time before you asked. I’m not adopted (which is the only thing you actually want to know). My adopting fell apart in tragic circumstances which I’m not going to share here.

As an adoptee I agree with your OP. I am so very glad I have never been forced to meet my ‘birth’ family.

I wish them no ill, they made the right choice. I had a wonderful family and the most amazing childhood. I am totally at peace with being adopted.

Ive never been asked my opinion via one of these surveys. Im wondering who gets asked.

But I am genuinely upset that kids, who have had a rough start, cannot get a true family experience without worrying about the feelings of the person who couldn’t/wouldn’t care for them.

I totally agree with this. It is already starting to happen with some of the early donor conceived 'children' starting to be vocal about the impact on them