Well, it's been a couple of weeks since the last post and I'm pleased to report that things are moving ahead quite quickly - well, more quickly than they have previously. Both Max and I have had our first one-to-one with the SW and spent three hours talking about our childhood experiences, our parentage, schooling, family setup and work experience.
I think I've had a varied, interesting life, moving around quite a bit, attending a number of different schools and busily creating a CV that makes me look either unemployable or ambitious depending on your take on things. My SW thinks that my career history shows that I'm 'wanted' by employers. He doesn't know the employers!
We've had some more, yes more, training over the past three weeks - one very good session on Attachment Disorder which went on a little too long to my mind but was interesting all the same. We were shown a video of a large American woman who, from what I could make out, has a child re-programming ranch in Colorado where she has adopted or fostered several dozen children and now runs courses for families looking to deal with attachment issues. I've got to say that her technique is quite unusual and abrupt but, hey, she showed it working and unless these difficult children are talented actors on the side I'm inclined to believe her.
My favourite quote from the video: "If a child comes at you a'screaming and a'hollerin' don't get upset by it, just say "OK. I can see you have a lot of issues right now. I suggest you go away and think about what they are and come back to talk to me when you've calmed down", then walk away. Don't let their anger/frustration become yours". Genius.
Last week's course was all about the Adoption Triangle - the relationship between birth parent, local authority and adopter. This is a two/three session course led by a trainer who was clearly passionate about her subject. She happens to be the new team leader for the LA's adoption team and is adopted herself so she delivered the course with a strength of conviction that made it very powerful and believable. Hoping we have a few more sessions with her along the way.
What else? Well, we have a panel date booked for 8th March. Not sure whether to be scared or absolutely petrified by the prospect of becoming approved to adopt in around 12 weeks' time. Seems like we've gone through a year of very little happening and then bang, it all happens at once.
We're still waiting for information about the five year old girl we expressed an interest in at the Parents for Children evening. Apparently there are four couples who have expressed an interest but we are the only ones currently in the assessment phase, none of the others have begun yet. Not sure what that implies so we'll just wait and see.
We were pleased to hear that our SW is the one who has been allocated to working with her, too, so that could make things quite interesting. He's not her SW but he's working through the people who expressed an interest. We have to meet her actual SW and make him/her believe that we're the best parenting choice for the little girl. I never thought this would become a competition but it really has - we're going to have to fight to be considered better than regular heterosexual couples. We don't really know enough about this child's particular situation to know whether a gay male couple is what she needs but we'll soon know.
I went for my medical on Friday and discovered that my GP has adopted three children. It was helpful that he understood the process and was able to talk about what's important, medically, and what's not. It was even more helpful that he measured my height a full 2cm higher than before which meant my BMI came down to 29 and I'm only 'overweight' rather than 'obese'. A big step forward!
I wasn't sure what to expect of the medical but it was quite straightforward. Urine sample, blood test (taken previously), check ears/eyes, listen to chest/heart, take blook pressure, weight/measurements, quick look in the mouth and a feel around my groin...stopping sure of a full fumble on the basis of ongoing self-examination. Quick chat about any psychological issues, medication or ongoing treatments/consultations and a couple of emotive questions - am I fit enough and healthy enough to work and parent and is there anything that could affect my ability to continue doing so. That's it.
We've applied for CRB checks here, sent of fingerprints and other documents to South Africa for Max's police check over there and all our referees have received their reference request forms, too.
All we have to do now is continue the assessment process, complete the 21 page soul-searching document that the LA want us to fill in with questions such as "Why do you think your mother formed a relationship with and married your father?". It's quite tedious and I'm not really sure where they're going with most of the questions but we're happy to oblige if it helps them to get a better picture of who we are and what our families are like.
Going through the process is taking more and more of our time, which is fine, but it's something you don't really appreciate until you're in the middle of it. We're regularly having at least two 3 hour training sessions each week together with a session with our social worker, spending time attending medicals and completing forms and question documents and, who could forget, the form asking for every major (and minor!) life event "from birth to now" with the very helpful advisory note saying "list every school, every home, every place of work, every academic exam (with result) and any other achievement whilst at school, deaths or major illnesses of family members or close friends and even minor events - anything you can remember, with dates." Well, as a couple in our late thirties that shouldn't take long, should it.
Anyway, it's all positive stuff and we're closer than ever before to becoming a fully-fledged family providing we get through the assessment and panel, of course.
We've got another three sessions this coming week so I'm sure there'll be plenty of exciting updates to pass on by next weekend.
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