Oldham mum losing 2 year old to adoption unfairly

[boysown]

www.oldham-chronicle.co.uk/news-features/8/news-headlines/38254/news-full#comments

Mum loses out in fight for her son
Reporter: COURT REPORTER
Date online: 16/03/2010

A 25-year-old Oldham mum was told yesterday that her efforts to change her life had come too late to ever have a chance of getting her two-year-old son back.

The woman, who can?t be named to protect the child?s identity, made an emotional plea to a top family judge.

She sobbed as she told Lord Justice Ward that she had not had a fair hearing last October, when an order taking her son into care and placing him for adoption was made.

The mother said that she had been in a psychiatric hospital prior to that court hearing, at Oldham?s Family Court, and had not been in the right frame of mind to make any decisions. But Lord Justice Ward, sitting at London?s Civil Appeal Court, said the case in favour of adoption was ?overwhelming? and the correct way to proceed.

He told the woman she had made her submissions to him ?passionately, eloquently and heartbreakingly,? but that the positive steps she had taken towards changing her ?chaotic? life had come too late.

Addressing her concerns about her state of mind at the hearing, he said: ?If she was unwell, a guardian would have been appointed for her, but her disability was never so grave as to reduce her to that state.?

He said the mother had tried to adjourn proceedings at the Oldham Family Court so that an assessment of her mental health could be carried out, but this had been refused.

A judge at Manchester County Court also refused her permission in January, this year.

Lord Justice Ward said those decisions were correct, and that both court hearings had been conducted in a ?careful and sympathetic? manner.

Describing the case as ?distressing?, the judge said: ?If I were to give permission to appeal for every litigant I feel desperately sorry for, I would be granting permission to everyone.

?The sadness for me is that this mother has demonstrated she is a loving mother and does have an ability to look after her child.

?She had lived a chaotic lifestyle, mainly due to the pernicious influence of the man who inflicted violence on her, and she has made great steps towards improving her position.

?The tragedy is that all of that has come too late for this little boy to be returned to her.

?If sympathy was the Litmus test for granting permission, I would give it.?

He refused the sobbing mother permission to appeal and told her he was ?very sorry? as he left the court.

Have Your Say

So what more can we do to fix all the harm that can come from this mere "accident of DNA"?

Surely all children have the right to proper state-sanctioned parenting?

harimosmummy - there is a world difference between being toxic and leaving your child open to abuse or neglecting them. They don't take children into care lightly. The children I know who have been adopted don't have a bond with their mothers - mostly because they can't remember them. Or their mothers were conscious so infrequently that they didn't really get a chance to bond.

See I think what you are talking about is attachment theory

You call it a 'natural affinity' but it's not - a child removed from its mother as soon as it is born and looked after by someone else will never feel a 'natural affinity' to that woman.

Attachments form over the first 2-3 years of life. It is vital that parenting is consistent, loving and safe during this time. If it is not, attachments are not formed in a normal way. That does not mean they are not formed, hence why children cleave to abusive parents or want to discover birth parents as adults. There is an attachment. But overwhelmingly (in the case of abuse/neglect) the attachment is fucked up and is actively damaging the child.

The mother is not the only possible attachemtn figure and children can attach to more than one parent (obviously). Mother is usually primary carer though during this time which is why we talk about the unique relatiosnhip that mothers have.

But children can and do develop healthy attachments to adoptive parents. And thank god they do.

I find rather frightening that someone one here believes that the state has no right to remove any child from their birth parent.

So, no matter what said 'parent' does to the child, despite inflcting cruelty, neglect, violence (not in reference to this case but in general child cruelty cases - and believe me, having worked for several child safety organisations I have read stuff that has kept me awake at night) they have the right to continue this without intervention?

'Surely all children have the right to proper state-sanctioned parenting? '

what do you mean by this?

By harimosmummy Fri 19-Mar-10 08:38:16
AF - I didn't mean that children shouldn't be removed. Obviously, if it's felt the children are unsafe / at risk, then they must be.

But, It's never too late to try and make amends with your kids.

I'd hate to think of any mother just giving up on her kids. You only have one mother.

If you mean me, Luckyblackcat you are wrong.

I don't think ANYONE suggests that kids shouldn't be removed from failing parents. Just that those parents should not be erased from the kids lives.

they aren't erased. Usually they have the option to write and/or send pictures once a year, and most adoptive parents do acknowledge the birth parents to their DCs.
It would not work to have BPs any more involved than that. It would disrupt the stability of the adoptive placement.

FFS they are not erased from their children's lives. Most adopted children maintain contact with their birth mothers by post.

Adoption has changed dramatically in recent years - children are no longer brought up believing their adoptive parents are their bio parents, nor does anyone pretend that the bio parents don't exist.

Please educate yourself before spouting off

AnyFucker there is nothing right wing about those views. Yours is an argument for massive state intrusion in family life, perhaps more accurately described as Stalinist.

I'm not arguing for the rights of inadequate parents, I'm arguing for the rights of all parents. If only children have rights, and those rights are decided and enforced exclusively by the state, and it is accepted that parents have no rights to their own children, then effectively the state is the parent and we are all just minding our children under temporary licence.

That's not appealing to me. I don't like being told that my children are just my "bio" offspring and that the fact that they are my flesh and blood is irrelevant. I think I know better how to raise them than any number of government agencies and I think they rightfully belong with me.

You can protect children without allowing forced adoption. Other countries with far better child safety records than the uk manage it.

You can protect children without allowing forced adoption. Other countries with far better child safety records than the uk manage it.

Really? Examples please?

What the fuck is your alternative to 'forced' adoption? Children remaining in foster care until their parents have got their acts together to have them back? No matter that foster care is impermanent and does not provide the stability that children need, that can be gained by adoption? Never mind that some, or in fact most, parents never get their acts together?

I work with teenagers in care, and there are very very few parents of these teenagers who would now be any better than they were 10-15 years ago, Hence a cohort of young people who have poor attachemnts and many and varying behavioural/emotional issues which might have been avoided by early adoption, had that been an option.

skid...if you parent your child effectively, then why do you think the State will interfere ?

there are minor irritaions, sure...like the Govt trying to tell me what to put in my kids lunchbox

but I just ignore all that claptrap, as do most sensible parents who intrinsically know how to parent their children

we are talking here about something else entirely...and in my view, different rules apply

if you put your child in danger (not meaning slipping a packet of crisps in a lunchbox...), are unable to parent safely with maximum state help (and there is much of it available if you seek it), then that child deserves a better chance in life

and I say fuck the rights of the natural parent in that circumstance

because there is nothing natural about an abused child and I wouldn't want to live in a society where a blind eye was turned and no action was takne

skidoodly, could you link to info about countries that never under any circumstances remove children please. Other countries is a bit non-specific. It sounds like 'everybody else's mum' much used in children's arguments with their parents.

The crucial word here is "permanently"

I do not believe children should be forcibly adopted. I have never argued that they should not be removed from dangerous situations.

Loving a child isn't enough.

some people will never be able to parent a child

what would you suggest in that situation, skid ?

So you think it's better for children to spend a life shunted between foster carers of varying quality than be adopted into a loving home where they can have stability?

Nice.

Harimosmummy, no not at you

I'm going to bow out of this one.

My natural reaction is that love IS enough and that a mother always loves her child.

I know that I'm not right.

SO, I just don't think I can comment.

I just don't think I can comprehend a mother not putting her child above everything / anything / all.

Harimosmummy, imho it is the natural reaction of every loving mother to feel that they cannot understand another mother not putting her child first.

Maybe unless you have seen it firsthand (own life or work) it remains the stuff of DM readers nightmares. Unfortunately I have experience of both enlightening factors, hence my vociferous disagreement that love alone is not enough.

harimo...that is because you are a good parent, or good enough

of course it is outside of your comprehension...I am certainly very, very glad it is outside of mine

unfortunately, I know intellectually that not all women/men can look after a child and give it a good enough start in life

I think it is better for society as a whole that children can't be permanently removed from their parents by force.

Long-term fostering should not be such an unthinkable option, particularly as many children will have no alternative.

I know too many people who put their new partners first. WHo put their social life first. Who put booze first. They love their children. But not enough and not in the right way.

Sorry can't do links, one handed in phone and ignoring increasingly insistent family. May return later with more hands.

Well it badly fucks up kids to be long-term fostered. I'm really saddened that you think their wellbeing should be sacrificed on the offchance their parents get their shit together.

harimosmummy - I know it is unthinkable to most of us but some people don't know how to love properly because they've never been loved themselves. And like Orm says, they don't love their children enough to put them first.

Some of the children I know who have been adopted are not allowed to ever use social networking sites because they are so at risk from their birth families. It's really, really horrible to contemplate but it happens.

This makes me sick to the stomach. Really sick. MOThers are just treated with contempt all over the place. She is the child's mother, does that count for nothing anymore?; She carried him, laboured in pain and loves him dearly. The woman needed support, help before and if she is now better then the child should be returned to her, without question.
Sick.