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’m totally agree that people will be dissuaded from adopting, adopting a child is a huge undertaking and that child is then part of a new family, that new family is really their only family in the sense that’s their life. The child has been given up for whatever reason and therefore has a life with their adoptive parents who are the ones who are there on a day to day basis, they are the ones who love and nurture that child. True the child has birth parents but they gave up those rights to involve themselves in that child’s life. The child whee when ld enough can seek them out but it is that child’s choice.

I think I'm a very normal Mum. I hope to get it right as often as possible. Sometimes I get it quite wrong. Sometimes I lose my mind and sometimes I'm proud of what I do with them.

Today I want to go and live on an island on my own as two of the three have been impossible!!

This is a hugely complex and nuanced issue.

I think that for most adopted children letterbox contact is safer and probably best for all parties involved until 18.

Adopted children have a curiosity and for many, a huge gaping psychological wound concerning their birth and early life before their adoption. Feelings of worthlessness, low self-esteem, fear of abandonment are common.

I strongly believe the local authority who place children into their forever families have a duty to provide support throughout the whole life of an adopted person.

If face to face contact is deemed to be appropriate, then the needs to be comprehensive support/couselling/experienced mentor support etc to help the child and the family (birth and forever).

If not, it will create more problems than it attempts to solve.

There are safeguarding reasons. Almost all adopted children are removed, not given up. And the bar for removing a child from their birth family is (rightly) very high.

Adopters are expected to explain a child's history in an age appropriate way, usually with little or no support from so-called post adoption support services when things are hard. So children will know if they have birth siblings.

Adopted children have had a tough start and can struggle for life, they don't also need the responsibility of trying to meet their birth family's wants for contact, especially if birth family members don't accept why their children were removed or that their parenting wasn't good enough.

As an adoptee that’s certainly not how I feel about my own lived experience. I would be open to listening to other adoptees, like your friends, on this but not those who have no direct experience.

Let's call this new policy what it is. Adoption is becoming unpaid foster care. If a child can safely and beneficially have regular contact with birth parents then they should be in actual foster care, not in foster care in all but name. This new approach is exploiting people who desperately want to be parents and deterring people who could potentially transform a child's life but will be put off by the prospect of contact.

We went through the process almost a decade ago and also have a birth son. No way would we have adopted our little boy had the expectation been for annual contact with his birth family. Both parents were drug addicts and had chosen to give him up. in the end, they didn't even engage in letterbox. Their lifestyle choices have severely impacted his health, development and life chances.

I'm not completely against contact in all cases but this new approach will continue to reduce adoption rates and hamper recruitment of adopters. Until the government realise how much it is costing in foster care funding. I'm sure then there will be a move back towards adoption without contact and a new interpretation of 'evidence' on contact.

from this am assuming you have some form of emotional investment here to be so derogatory of adoptive parents?

Maybe have a look at adoptee twitter to have a sense of whether the fairy story of good outcomes from adoption are quite so universal. Or catch half an episode of Long Lost Family to see the impact of not knowing / being connected with your roots - and the often life long need and longing for this connection. If the academic research around children benefitting from ongoing connections with their birth families doesn’t convince you first that is. The ‘adults’ that ongoing contact actually serves are the adopted children when they become adults. Adopted kids aren’t found under a mulberry bush - they have families - albeit ones that can’t care for them. ‘Fresh starts’ don’t change any of that. Adoption is sometimes entirely necessary as a last resort to protect children - and many do have good outcomes. But these children come into our lives in a very different way and it’s truly adult needs that are being prioritised if the prospect of retaining contact with birth parents puts adopters off

You need to fuck off with this shite. As an adoptee this is beyond offensive. What a nasty, vile piece of work you are.

Pay no attention to that nonsense @patroclusandachilles that posters clearly trying to upset people. 💐

I assume you are being deliberately offensive now?

Are you adopted? Have you noticed that Twitter is not always a haven for the well-adjusted and rational from any walk of life?

A lot of this is non adoptees telling those of us who have been adopted what is best for us. They don’t listen to actual adoptees and imo they have no right to tell us what is in our best interest.
For most of us it would not be a good thing to have contact with our birth mother/father.

It should be a case by case basis. The reasons children are put up for adoption vary significantly. My birth mother (single parent, no father on scene), through no fault of her own, had serious mental health issues which left her unable to care for us. I was 6. I went into foster care for just over a year with my younger brother and we were shuffled from home to home until my future adoptive parents decided we were to be their children. We had monthly visits from our birth mother (after school on a Wednesday for a couple of hours which my adoptive mum helped to facilitate by giving g my birth mum lifts from/to a bus station 15 mins drive away!) and I still visit her once or twice a year. I have no idea in whose interest this was done - perhaps both hers and ours as we were a little older - but do think the children’s interests should be put first

she didn't call them zoo animals. You need to re read the post. She meant she took the kids to the zoo to meet the biological family.
And I dont know of a single adoptor who has lied to their child. You make it sound like it is an everyday occurrence .
It is drummed in at assessment level that it is a no no.

I didn’t realise it was face to face contact, I thought it was only yearly letters. Whoever’s benefit that is for it doesn’t sound like it’s for the children’s.

I have a very good friend who adopted 2 children and maintains letter box contact with birth mum. It’s for birth mum’s benefit- the kids get nothing out of it and there’s no personal information at all incase it gives away something that can be used to track them down- no mention of footy practice, dance class etc, what school years they’re in. Mostly fave foods and what they watch on tv.

I also know/friends with women who have had their birth children removed, and adopted out or who are in longterm foster care. I feel bad for them as a mother to a mother because I can’t imagine that loss. But they were all given so many chances to change things and their children suffered in the meantime and poss still do. Those children deserve the best life possible without harm and trauma. When they announce on SM they have received their yearly letters they’ll insist they’re still the kids’ mums and “mummy is coming for you soon!” And slag off the parents. And it’s sad for these birth mums but having seen the attachment issues my other friend’s children who have been adopted have, and the issues and dilemmas they’ve all had to deal with as a family, the majority of my sympathy is for them not the BM and BD.

Thank you. This is really what undermines adoptees sense of self. It’s pernicious and truly an evil thing to say.

We looked into adoption but as soon as we were told we would have to share contact and Christmases with eg birth grandparents etc, we decided against it.

Now have two lovely children born via donor eggs abroad. We can live as a proper family without those obligations.

It definitely puts people off! Agree with OP.

Years ago my son had a friend whose mum was a foster carer. She seemed brilliant at it. She'd had a little boy since birth, he was about 4 when i first got to know them and they really wanted to adopt him but his mum wouldn't allow it even though she was only allowed supervised contact, i obviously don't know why. His behaviour wasn't the best when he saw his mum and he always wanted to know why his foster mum couldn't be his mum all the time.
He eventually stopped seeing his birth mum and called my friend mum.
His mum was wrong to put her needs before that of her son.

This is about your preferences though and not about what's best for the adopted child.
In some cases there shouldn't be contact allowed but those children will most likely have a level of trauma that will be challenging for you as a parent.
You don't just turn up and request a healthy baby with no birth parents please. That's incredibly naive.

Hi OP. I am the parent of an adopted child andI agree with you. I’m probably gonna get a battering for this.

I understand that in some limited circumstances the biological Mother will sort herself out and it would be beneficial for them to be a part of a child’s life. Particularly if the child was an adopted he aged 6/7 and already spent time and had memories with that person. However, the babies adopted off at a couple of days old to a mother who is onto child number 5 being adopted, and has over a decade history of not being able to sort yourself out, I really do not think direct contact is helping anyone.

My son‘s biological mother couldn’t even attend all of the contact sessions with foster care. She submitted something to try and extend the Court process as as long as possible, ticked a form, and never turned up to any of the hearings. She just prolonged as long as possible but didn’t actually do anything. I met her in person and she said she was really proud and pleased I was adopting her son, and then spent the next eight months messing the court and us around.

It’s of course nice for social services to provide all the details of the bio Mother and letterbox contact, which I’m sure you do too. My son is well aware that he did not grow in my tummy and he grew up in another Lady’s tummy. He knows that she was ‘poorly’ and couldn’t look after him so he came to live with us. To be honest, I think this is entirely sufficient.

at age 4 it would be destabilising for him to have direct contact with someone who is his mum but isn’t his mum. I’m not a psychologist but I’m pretty sure he would not even be able to understand that concept and would find it distressing.

Throughout my adoption experience social services only had the well-being of the bio Mother in mind didn’t seem to give a crap about me. No one asked if I was alright with the process, no one provided me with support, it was all about supporting the needs of the birth Mother. I’m aware this sounds selfish, but I’ve been a buddy to various adoptive parents since my experience, and the main thing I tell them, is social service coukdnt give a crap about your needs.

You have to jump through loads of hoops and everyone elses feelings & needs are taken into account more than you. I think it’s a real shame. When I was at the one at the end of this long process left with a baby that I had to raise and bond with. my son knows his story, and when he’s older I have books and pictures and I will help him understand. And when it is appropriate, I will ask him if he would like to write his own letter to bio Mother.

I would not have adopted my son if we have had mandated direct contact. It was hard enough to bond as a family. Psychologically, I wouldn’t be able to take it.

Are you adopted?

Thank you for this, OP. It's really hard when you hear of people angry that contact wasn't continued but as you say, is this the majority? Why is research often biased?

The rules now around face to face contact with birth families have meant adoption rates have plummeted.

Where is your evidence for this? I think it is far, far more likely that adoption rates have “plummeted” (if indeed they actually have) because single people and couple both hetro/homo can access IVF, surrogacy, sperm/egg donation etc. much, much more easily.

I know countless people who conceived children via IVF. Many of them would likely have adopted if that hadn’t been an option for them.