Adoption problem - have you heard of this happening before?

[bran]

I'm just wondering if anyone out there has heard of this happening before, and if so what was the outcome?

My dh and I have been approved to adopt a toddler, but we have had a long delay and haven't yet met the child because the foster parents are being very obstructive. They didn't declare an interest in adopting the child until after we had been offered to be considered for her. They then spent about 6 weeks appealing the decision of the social services and managed to have our panel date deferred twice (the panel are and independant group who make the final decision based on the social services recommendation). Now that the panel have approved us they are seeking legal advice and because our social services dept. has no experience of cases like this they can't really tell us what the foster parents might be able to do legally. At the moment we are in limbo waiting to hear what the next step might be.

I would love to hear any advice or similar experience - especially ones that had a happy ending.

bran, sorry I can't help - just read your message because my best friend is going through the adoption process. The whole process is so stressful as it is without this obstruction. Are there any adoption support groups you can contact for help & advice?
Best wishes

Thanks Monkey, I've been asking around the adoption contacts that I have but no-one has heard of a case before where the foster parents have behaved like this, although it's fairly common for birth parents to fight for their child until the end. The good news is that they haven't served any papers to the social services yet and it's almost a week since they said they would take legal advice, so hopefully they've been advised that they haven't a leg to stand on.

The introduction is now planned to start this Friday, so things are moving forward again, but I'm now worried that they will just continue to refuse to co-operate. Obviously the last thing social services wants to do is to just go in and take the child away as this would obviously be horribly traumatic for her. Even if they go along with the introduction schedule the child will be taking her cues from them about whether or not we are nice or trustworthy people so it could still be traumatic for her if the foster parents emotions keep surfacing in front of her.

Good luck to your friend, I hope it won't add to her stress if you tell her about our case - it is very rare. Usually the foster parents are a mine of useful information and are very helpful about transferring the affection of the child to her new parents.

how horrible bran. I have a friend who adopted two siblings. The birth mother fought the adoption of one of the children. I do know that SS were very careful to do everything b the book so that the birth mother couldn't cause problems in the future. It meant everything tok longer than it would have, but its all sorted now.

I wish you and your dh the best of luck bran, with your adoption and I am not familiar with the in's and out's of this, but....(I'm a bit afraid of offending you).....if the child has been with the foster family for a long time and they want to adopt the child, would it not be better for the toddler to stay where she is happy and secure?

I wish you all the best with this, Bran. it's so unfair that the foster parents are behaving like this, they've had so much time & so many opportunities to declare an interest in adoption. I understand also your fears on them being obstructive & causing problems on so many levels with the adoption.

Good luck with the introduction on Friday. My friend was so excited at her introduction. Have you had any good tips on it?

That's a good point eefs, when the foster parents first said they wanted to keep her (after we had been found for her) we wondered that ourselves, so no offense taken at all. At the time we know that the child was a racial mix that matched ours and that the foster carers were a white couple living in a fairly white neighbourhood but we weren't sure that that was really a good enough reason to move her from her current home. However our social worker told us that there were several other reasons why the foster parents weren't suitable to care for her long term, although the reasons were obviously confidential to the foster parents so she couldn't tell us.

At the time the child was placed they needed to find foster parents quickly and social services were aware when they placed her that the foster parents wouldn't be suitable to care for her long term, it even mentions it in her case history notes. Since then the foster parents have said and done some things that I think show that they wouldn't be very good at helping the child come to terms with her rather troubled family history when she's a bit older (sorry if I'm being a bit cryptic, but again it's all confidential) and I suspect that even if we hadn't been found for the child, or if we decided not to go ahead with the adoption, that she wouldn't remain with them for much longer.

It's really sad on their side though, there's no doubt that they love her very much and I'm sure that they are only trying to do what they think is best for her.

Thanks for the best wishes monkey - I'm hoping the introduction does start on Friday. I haven't met anyone who adopted who had anything other than helpful foster parents so not tips yet, but our social worker is coming tomorrow talk us through strategies for dealing with them. Mostly patience I suspect.

thanks for not taking offense Bran, i regretted posting it as soon as I pressed refresh. Judging from what you say it really would be the best thing for the little toddler to stay with you, and the best thing the foster parents can do for her now is to make the move as easy as possible. It also a bit unfair of them to throw up these obstacles at the last minute when it doesn't benefit anyone. At least the little toddler obviously got a lot of love from then of they wouldn't be upset at her leaving.

My childminder is currently fostering a little baby and I can see the heartache she has everytime a child leaves here - but as she says, better to have loved the children and given them some light in sometimes fairly depressing lives than to have stayed detached from them. My childminder is not allowed to adopt because of her age - perhaps it's a benign reason like that preventing the toddlers foster family from proceeding.

Bran - best of luck with this and I hope you can bring your little girl home with you soon.

Thanks for the messages of support so far. I thought I would be putting a happy ending to this thread this weekend because the foster parents agreed to go ahead with the introduction. There was supposed to be a meeting on Thursday to discuss the schedule, which they cancelled at the last minute because because the foster father's mother was ill. So everything was rearranged, and we were to have the meeting on Monday morning followed by a visit to the foster carer's home in the afternoon to meet the child for the first time. However the ill mother turned out to be a ruse, what they were actually doing was submitting an application to the courts to apply for an adoption order and they told social services late on Friday afternoon.

Dh and I are trying to fill the weekend with distractions because we won't know what the social services will be able to do until after they've met with their legal people on Monday. Hopefully then we'll have some idea about how long the whole process will take. It's especially annoying because I started my adoption leave just before the panel (almost 2 weeks ago) and now it looks like I'll have to go back to work again, not to mention that this is the 3rd time that DH has booked 2 weeks off work and then had to cancel at the last minute.

I've definitely lost almost all sympathy for the foster carers. I used to think that they were only acting on an emotional basis, because they loved the child so much, but now looking back I think they have timed all of their appeals and delaying tactics to cause maximum disruption not just to the process but to the emotions of all involved ie last thing before the weekend, or just before our social worker went on holiday, so that there is always the longest possible time where things are unclear and likely to cause maximum anxiety. Still, if they think we're going to pull out to save our nerves they have completely underestimated how stubborn DH and I are.

Anyway, further updates when I know more.

What a nightmare, Bran. I'm so sorry for you. I'm also really impressed at your stubbornness.

I really hope tho' that the soc. services & courts can at least appreciate how badly they're bahaving - lying, messing you & soc workers around etc etc that this will count against them. I mean, they're not exactly up front.

All the best. Maybe going back to work would be a good thing to help take your mind off it a bit? The tension must be unbearable.

Just to say that I won't be posting again with any updates as this case is now wading through the court system, and nothing will be decided for at least 3 to 6 months. Thanks to monkey, eefs and Jimjams though for your kind thoughts.

I'm back to work on Thursday, and not looking forward to it at all. I've asked the Head of Human Resources to send out an e-mail telling everyone that I don't want to talk about it, so at least I won't have to go through the whole story 40 or 50 times. I have to say that my work is being very good about everything, just taking me back on short notice. It must be very tough on them because I changed my leaving date 3 times with all the delays before the panel, and now depending on how the judgement goes I may have to leave again with less than a day's notice. It must be costing them quite a bit, if a project has to go out an agency it's more than twice as much as someone doing it in-house and if they have to get a temp in on short notice it's about £400 a day - but nobody's complained at all. At least not to me. The team I work with have been great too, in a gruff, techy, blokey sort of way, so I guess it won't be too bad. It just feels like going backwards because I didn't think I'd be back there so soon after leaving.

Anyway, keep your fingers crossed for me.

Fingers crossed here x. Sorry things are being made even more difficult for you and DH. I hope the court case brings good news. Best of luck with your return to work.

Keeping my fingers crossed & thinking positive thoughts.

Fingers corssed here as well. So sorry this is being made so difficult for you.

Bran just read through this thread and I wanted to say my thoughts are with you and will have my fingers crossed for a happy outcome for you. Take care. x

I'll be thinking of you and the little girl. Good luck. Thank goodness your work are being so good. Hope the courts are too .......