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ITV Wanted: A Family of My Own
Prince Monalulu
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Wanted: A Family of My Own
1/4. New series. Nicky Campbell follows the adoption process, from prospective parents' meetings with social workers to the moment a child leaves their foster carers for life in an adoptive family. In the first edition Nicky, himself adopted in the 1960s, hears the story of Dan and Ania as they choose between two babies with troubled backgrounds. He also meets social worker Claire, who is trying to find a permanent home for a nine-month-old boy.
ITV's website is cack btw useless for linking to IMO.
Did anyone watch?
Found it a fair bit better than the other recent offerings from Channel 4 on this subject.
Seeing the process from the potential adopters side of it and the process of approval, adoption board etc.
1/4. New series. Nicky Campbell follows the adoption process, from prospective parents' meetings with social workers to the moment a child leaves their foster carers for life in an adoptive family. In the first edition Nicky, himself adopted in the 1960s, hears the story of Dan and Ania as they choose between two babies with troubled backgrounds. He also meets social worker Claire, who is trying to find a permanent home for a nine-month-old boy.
ITV's website is cack btw useless for linking to IMO.
Did anyone watch?
Found it a fair bit better than the other recent offerings from Channel 4 on this subject.
Seeing the process from the potential adopters side of it and the process of approval, adoption board etc.
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Me too. Hope Joshua has found a new family.
It's infinitely easier to manage than diabetes these days, usually just involving three sets of blood tests a year and a pill every day.
I didn't catch what the illness was that Anya suffers from that might flare up again. Did you?
I wondered about the process when Joshua leaves the foster couple. The couple accepted sadly that there would be a parting but realistically that it had to be. The process wasn't made clear though. Will there be a transition or will it just be a sudden brutal severance? Presumably there will be no more contact with them afterwards and that it will be a clean break? That must be horrendous for the child even though he is young and in time will forget.
Yes I did. This was a much more positive portrayal of adoption from both the chid and the adopters point of view. My admiration for foster parents knows no bounds, they do a terrific job and Dan and Ania were a lovely couple. Although they thought they wanted a little girl when they were told of the two boys you almost knew in advance they'd be positive and not mess about. Sadly they made me think of those two little boys and wonder are they finally settled with parents of their own.
I’ve read Nicky Campbell’s book about his on adoption Blue Eyed Son so has a great insight to adoption and a perfect choice for the programme.
It's not the social workers job to explain anything, don't know why you were 'amazed'
She was there to ask the questions and get the answers, their first reaction, what they 'thought' they could handle.
Anya even said she felt guilty for turning down certain children, by saying No.
The Social working going off explaining various things isn't going to help, probably going to add to their guilty feelings and possibly agreeing to things they're really not 'up for'
They didn't say, but it's obliviously one that is controllable like Graves or Addison's disease rather than something like MS which might rule her out of adopting.
I thought the social worker was part of the process to give prospective adoptive parents the full picture? (which she did about crack cocaine babies later in the show).
If prospective parents do not have full information it is the social worker duty to provide it.
Any prospective parent who isn't 'up for' taking their child to a clinic three times a year and giving them one pill a day isn't much of a catch as an adoptive parent anyway?
In truth though the amount of HIV+ children up for adoption is tiny, as a well managed pregnancy and proper treatment of a HIV+ mother and child would almost always result in the child not having HIV.
I think the questionnaire might have been drafted in the late 1980's.
See this and this from the 15,000 Kids and Counting thread.
I was rather hoping they'd ask Mick or his Wife (I've forgotten her name), how many, if any of the fostered kids they'd had they still saw, or saw after they'd been adopted.
There were a fair number of tears in that program when the Fosterer's said goodbye to their charges as they went to permanent homes.
In that program the Foster parents were present at the introduction, maybe they didn't want to appear on camera in this instance or they just wanted to see how 'James' reacted when they weren't around.
Joshua was adorable.
Would love to tell the story about my friends 3 year adoption story but I would be abusing their privacy so I can't but its got a brilliant ending.
Hated that question to the Father about his hours of work, flitting out at daybreak and back at night or whatever it was. Christ my husband has to work like that to keep the mortgage paid. I would have seethed inwardly at that. Wonder what hours he worked. Bit smug.
Anyway a wonderful ending for the couple. I wonder why they ruled out the baby with the unknown father though, its not like he would have any part in anything anyway.
I was hoping to foster in about 5 years but I have a member of husbands family with a bad past so guess that would have to be exposed. Put me off a bit now.
Thanks. I was wondering whether Mick and his wife would even be allowed to see them once they were adopted.
Thanks for that.
We tried to adopt a couple of years ago and were told that the children could see their foster parents maybe once a year and certainly not for a long time after the adoption had been finalised.
I am so pleased the adoption process is more straightforward now. We were left bruised and hurt from the process and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.
That's interesting about the yearly visits. Wouldn't really work with a young baby.
Sorry to hear that. It sounds bad. I can only imagine it must be gruelling going through such an intrusive process. In what way has it changed from when you did it?
Let me tell you that in the case of my friend it was a sudden brutal severance. She is an experienced foster mum of 12 years, the great majority have been short term placements but in 2009 she accepted the placing of a 3 week old baby boy. The placing was to be a long term arrangement until he turned 16 with the child's bio mum involved in decision making etc. When he turned three she was informed he was being placed for adoption, by the time he'd turned four the dept had settled on choosing a couple who lived miles away in the country. The 'handover' was not done gradually, no transition period for her or the little boy and she was devastated, she had bonded with him as you would. No support from the social worker, no agreement to her wanting to meet the adoptive couple and a big fat no to her getting any updates on the little boy after he had left her. It nearly destroyed her.
Is it just me that thinks this is the best way forward. Once adopted child/children have new parents, new life, new home, maybe even other brothers and/or sisters. To keep seeing foster family is a reminder of the old life. Foster families know they only have them until a permanent family is found so I don't understand why they would expect any form of long term contact. Of course they will want to know how their new life is progressing but this can be done without long term contact. Its not fair on the child/children.
I know my friends adopted children were weened off foster Mum quite quickly and no longer have contact. They have a Mummy and Daddy and she has new children to foster.
No, I agree, it is a good thing for the children to move on. However, in our case, the children were so distraught at moving on from their foster parents (they had lived with them for most of their 8 and 9 year lives) and the foster parents felt the same way – a long story but the children's social worker had been off sick for a year and the children hadn't received any counselling for that and longer. We spent the whole of our introductory period with the children and foster parents sobbing that we decided it was cruel to break up such a happy family. The children stayed with the foster parents and we had a black mark against our records as an 'adoption disruption' so we couldn't try again.
That is so sad, of course they must bond and I think you did the right thing , just a shame that you have been shut out because of it, that to me is totally wrong
Eta...awww just heard David and Leanne can move forward to adopt Ella and Leah
I suppose it's obvious once it's explained.
Fair play to them 'taking on' children with developmental problems.
Hells teeth those boys are boisterous, wear me down to a nub in a week
I know, me too!! They appear to be very happy adjusted boys though
I didn't realise that either:(