House update, New Family Social, and childspotting

I know I’ve not been as prolific as usual with updates to this blog. Work is busy and the loft conversion is in full swing, which at this moment means we have no roof, no heating, and no hot water (but we’ve had an electric shower installed so no, we don’t stink or anything). Our bedroom is so cold (and has a structure smack in the middle of it propping the ceiling) that we’re sleeping on an inflatable mattress in the living room, where we can put the gas fire on. Oh, and add to it, this morning I was woken up by the dripping of a water leak from the roof. Still, we’ll have more room when it’s all done, which is the whole point. And I’m sure we’ll laugh about it when it’s all done, although at the moment living in a cold house covered in dust, sleeping on an uncomfortable mattress, and being woken up by the builders hammering on the roof is taking its toll on my sense of humour and tolerance...

Last Sunday we met S, J & C for lunch and caught up with them, and then headed over together to the New Family Social get-together. We caught up with a few people we’d met before and also met some new people, which was nice. There were some good news from a couple who are going to matching panel soon and also some shared frustrations among those waiting to be matched.

Last week we also received new issues of Children Who Wait and Be My Parent, the two main publications which feature children who are available for adoption. Be My Parent has several features this month on same-sex adoption, as well as an article on New Family Social, so it was nice to see positive features to counteract the Daily Mail articles of late (although of course the readership is quite different in type and numbers). One of the publications had details of a sibling group we could be interested in. We really shouldn’t be “childspotting” in the magazines as we’re still tied to our local authority for another two months, but we talked about it, read the details a few times, and have decided to contact Miranda anyway to see what she says.

Help a good cause while you shop!

Do you shop with Amazon? The link below takes you to the UK site for Amazon as usual, but every purchase benefits New Family Social, the organisation we belong to that helps same-sex adopters. They get between 5%-10% of the item price of anything you purchase, including books, DVDs and music downloads.

http://www.amazon-nfs-shop.co.uk

So please add this link to your favourites and every time you buy something in Amazon, you'll be helping a good cause without any cost to you.

To read more about New Family Social you can go to

http://www.newfamilysocial.co.uk

The Daily Mail campaign against gay adoption continues

Sadly, the Daily Mail continues its hate campaign. On Friday they published an attack on the social worker who’s been dealing with the gay adoption case in Scotland. They claim that the social worker threatened the family with refusing contact.

Link to Daily Mail story about the social worker

It would almost be funny if it wasn’t so sad that – whilst defending a heroin addict – they see fit to mention that the social worker has two children by different fathers. But it didn’t end there. Their columnist Peter Hitchens wrote the following piece in his column about how we “gays” have been shown tolerance and we respond with tyranny. Seriously unhinged stuff here.

Link to the Peter Hitchens column

And to top it all, an anonymous millionaire and the Church of Scotland have decided to support the grandparents in a legal battle against the adoption.

Link to article about millionaire support

Thankfully The Independent showed a more balanced view of the issue, even though they decided to turn the issue of how the Daily Mail had reported the story into a left / right politics issue, which I don’t think was the right angle for the story but makes much nicer reading than anything the Daily Mail has published.

Link to The Independent story

The whole thing has been incredible. Over at the New Family Social online discussion it has generated a wave of emails like nothing I have ever seen before. It’s weird, because Glen and I have been through a rollercoaster of emotions which is very similar to what other members describe. After the initial outrage, there’s been sadness about the case and the consequences it may have for the couple involved (and the children, of course) and also our own situations. People have reported a shift in attitude among co-workers and other people they know. I experienced something similar when I told a colleague of mine and she responded saying that it was normal for people to react like that. I also sent an email about the story to a friend who is a Daily Mail reader and she hasn’t even acknowledged it. After the sadness, though, there’s been some feeling of “what are we doing?”, “could this happen to us too if we are matched?” and even some doubts about whether what we are doing is right for the children. I must acknowledge here the beautiful message that one of the NFS members left reassuring everyone that we are doing the right thing, and highlighting her very positive experience as an adopter. And she is absolutely right, of course. Like I said in a message to the NFS board, in a way the issue of gay adoption and the effect that being adopted by a same-sex couple may have on children is similar to children from different ethnic origin or nationality who grow up in, say, a predominantly white environment. They may get bullied or suffer some sort of discrimination because of it, but it doesn't make them or their parents "guilty" of being from a different ethnic origin or nationality. No, it makes those parents and children part of the variety of that community. Just like those parents will need to prepare their children for the fact that some people out there will dislike them for what they are, we will need to prepare our children
for the fact that some people (Daily Mail readers, it turns out) will
disapprove of their parents (not them).

Anyway, we also heard from Miranda on Friday. She said she’d been working on our report and she’ll be in touch this week. So here’s hoping we have some positive news to report soon!

A lovely visit

Today was the day we were supposed to finalise our home study. We had an email from Miranda apologising again for the delay, and thanking us for some information updates we sent her, but still no date for our rescheduled interviews.

I went to the school today for the first time since late December (the past couple of weeks I could not take the time off) and had a great time playing with the kids. I was with the 5 year olds today and they were learning about hearing (the theme for this term is the five senses), so we played games that included recognising different sounds.

At the weekend we met up with S&J, two guys we met at the New Family Social who adopted a boy last year and live near us. They invited us round for coffee and we chatted about the adoption process and everything they went through. Their son is a very sociable chatty boy who was very happy to talk to us, show us his toys and even the book that S&J had made for him just before they were introduced. We went to their local pub for lunch and chatted some more. They must have answered a thousand questions for us. They've not had any issues at school (with the other kids or their parents) with their son having two dads, which is something that has always worried us. Their son has really settled with them now and it's a pleasure to see them together as they make a great family. After such a disappointing start to the weekend last Friday, it was great to spend the afternoon with them.

Medicals, volunteering and NFS get-together

On Friday Glen and I filled in the forms to have our medicals done. We have read about people getting a bit worried about their medicals and indeed as I filled it in I kept wondering if anything in there would not be to the liking of the medical advisor. I think it’s unlikely, but of course it’s natural to wonder. I took the forms to our surgery and it turns out that one of their secretaries is on leave and the other off sick, so who knows when they’ll actually do anything with our forms. They really need to be done by January, so let’s hope there aren’t any delays. I do think it’s a bit strange that our local authority leave the medicals until so late. On the one hand I understand they don’t want you to spend the money (£73.86 each) until they are sure that they want to take you to panel, but on the other hand it leaves little room in case of delays. I know other local authorities ask prospective adopters to get them done earlier on in the process.

Also on Friday I went to the school where we volunteer and I was asked to help out with Class 3 (where the kids are either just 3 or still 2 coming up to 3). It was great to have the opportunity to work with younger children as I am usually with the 4 or 5-year-olds. I played games and read stories to them and worked mostly with J, who has CHARGE Syndrome. His face is somewhat deformed, he can’t walk or stand that well unaided, has a hearing aid and has to wear a bib as he drools constantly. His speech is quite hard to understand, but he is so lovely and so bright. It’s misleading, because when you first see him you feel pity for him and assume (mostly because of his facial deformity) that he will not be fully developing cognitively, but he is really on the ball, and clever. I really enjoyed spending time with him, but I have to admit that I wouldn’t want to care for him 24/7. In that sense, the fact that adoptive parents can (to a certain extent) choose what physical limitations they are prepared to cope with is really an advantage, as I’m sure J’s parents did not intend to bring up a child with CHARGE Syndrome.

Yesterday we went to the New Family Social gathering. It was a bit of a Christmas do as well and the kids and parents seemed to have a good time. We caught up with some of the people we had met last time we went, people whose messages we have read online, and also the couple that we visited last month. We also met another couple of guys who have adopted, live near us, and were really nice, which was great. Once again we came out of the meeting feeling really inspired by all these people who have successfully adopted and are getting on with their lives. It’s a really welcome shot of optimism about the process.

Had a call from one of our friends whom we named as a referee. Miranda is going to visit them this afternoon! Fingers crossed that all will go well.