Excited!

Andy has just organised for us to go to a meeting about adoption in Birmingham. I am really pleased! I had just about run out of energy for this stuff so Andy having some energy to drive things a bit is just great. It will feel real to go down to Birmingham and meet other people starting out on the same path. How exciting!

LLandudno

Andy and I went to the sea side! We had a day off today and decided last night, after church, that we'd like to go to the sea side, so we did. We stayed in a lovely B and B in LLandudno, North Wales. It was so good to get away and have some time together.

We've been reading a book by Heidi Baker. Really challenging. She is a completely amazing woman. Made us realise just how much further there is to go with God... And how poor we are in the west, spiritually.

Nightchurch

Andy and I co-ordinate and lead this mad and exciting thing called Nightchurch. Our church, Church Without Walls, uses a shop unit which is in the city centre in a street between the pubs and the main night clubs in town. It's all cosy with coffee tables and sofas and on a Friday night we open it up as a drop in / sacred space for anybody who wants to come in. We start at 10:30pm and shut between 3 and 4am on a Saturday. The vision is to provide hospitality and to allow God to reach and touch people as we create a safe space in which that can happen.

It is such a huge honour to be invited by God to join in His mission to reach out to people. And it amazes me every time how many people really are spiritually hungry and seeking something more. We don't do pushy evangelism at all. We don't need to. The guests start the conversations about life and God and we just join in. It's fantastic!

Two weeks ago, a girl came along and was really blessed and touched by God. She came along to church the Sunday after and was back again last night. She joined the team for the pre-nightchurch prayers and was simply radiant with God! It was uplifting just to be with her!

We're starting to get quite a crowd of people who know us and keep coming back. There was quite a lot of heated debate yesterday and some really productive discussions as well. Including a couple of conversations with people genuinely searching for God and wanting to know more. And half a dozen people from the Czech Republic who are Christians and like singing about God. One had a fantastic voice!

Marital Unbliss

Andy and I have been so ratty with each other this week. Trying to give up smoking makes him grumpy and causes horrid mood swings, which I recognise instantly as nicotine withdrawal. We will not be allowed to adopt a child under the age of 5 if Andy smokes. The limit was 4 when we started the process. Although we're not wanting a baby, I really don't want to be faced with that sort of age restriction. And it will only be a matter of time, I'm sure, before smokers are not allowed to adopt at all. The fact he's not managing to stay 100% cigarette free makes me feel grumpy/angry/upset/desperate/despairing/depressed/powerless/frustrated/enraged/needing to smash things. All of which I try very hard not to express because it really doesn't help.

The questions about whether or not to go to Africa and Andy's job security being in question and adoption agency frustrations don't help either. All in all the Cowell household has not been pleasant place to be!

Afirca - decisions decisions

We decided, before Christmas, that we were going to spend this summer in Africa (July, August, September) to work with kids and young people. Andy had been asking whether as a Christian one should be living to work or working to live and God said, basically, the answer is neither. Live to give. What a fantastic mission statement for life!

So from that came the decision to take some time out and go to Africa.

It all seemed fairly simple, once I came to terms with leaving my fledgling business for a whole 3 months. Particularly as Andy's employer has a sabbatical policy, whereby employees can take a period of unpaid leave of up to 2 years so long as they give a months notice and negotiate it with their manager (how incredibly generous is that!!!).

The drugs service Andy works for, however, has just lost its contract and department is being taken over by a different organisation in May, which doesn't have a sabbatical policy and only allows unpaid leave in emergencies.

Tricky decisions to make then. Andy felt called to go away to serve. I thought it would be a great thing to do. Left with the prospect of Andy having to give up his job in order to do it and therefore neither of us having secure employment when we come back, ups the stakes a bit. We're going to need to raise a lot of money just to go and to keep things in order here whilst we're gone. If part of our life's mission is to adopt children, I really don't want us to jeopardise it by throwing away our financial security at the beginning of the process. That would seem irresponsible. Not going to Africa just out of fear about money would seem equally dumb. We don't know for sure that God wants us to adopt. Perhaps he has another plan entirely.

Anyway. We've thought and talked and prayed. Don't know what God's plan is. We've decided we will go to Africa, unless God makes it clear that we shouldn't.

After we'd made the decision, Andy's current manager told him that she has been negotiating on his behalf to see if the new organisation will allow him to take a sabbatical. No promises yet, she says. The fact she's negotiating at all is really encouraging.

So here we are trusting God and trying to be sensible!

Agencies

Andy and I have now had our medicals with our lovely GP. Just waiting for the verdict on that from Staffordshire. We've also had some more information from Birmingham, including a DVD about adoption. Andy spoke to someone at work who thinks that Birmingham are really good.
She does fostering for them. They have about 150 children waiting for adoption at any one time, half of whom are part of sibling groups.

Do we stick with Staffs, or do we try somewhere else? I really don't know what to do any more. Birmingham's information seems really good. The person I spoke to, however, was deeply annoying. Although to be fair, that doesn't separate her from anyone else I spoke to at adoption agencies that week! Lots of kids sounds like there's the possibility of a good match. Apparently if we swap, the new agency will probably want its own medical doing.

To have actually completed our medicals feels like a good step forwards. Goodness knows how long Staffs will take to come to a decision, mind. And if we were to start the process with somewhere else, our current medicals would probably have to be re-done anyway. It will be good to get an opinion as to whether we would be seen as fit medically to adopt.

P'raps we'll wait and get the medical back and then decide...

AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH

Two conversations with adoption agencies today. The first was with Birmingham social services, who I accidentally contacted last week, because barnardos (a charity) gave me their number. Their process seems to have extra bureaucracy. You have to go to a meeting about adoption before having the initial meeting with the social worker, then they want a CRB check to ensure we're not criminals, before we start the training. And there seems to be endless different allocation of social workers. And they would want to do a CRB check on our lodgers.
"The lodgers won't be with us if we have children."
"But they are there now."
"Yes, but if we get approved, we won't have lodgers in the house."
"Because they are there now, we would have to investigate them."
Plus they are in Birmingham, which is about an hour away. On the positive side, they're not short of social workers at present.

Then spoke to the Together Trust again. They sounded really positive last week. The guy I spoke to today doesn't want to do anything at all if we're going to Africa in the summer, until after we come back. Because it "would make the process disjointed". Like it's not already. But he seems to think that once we started the process it would be finished fairly quickly, because they are a small organisation.

I know that in a couple of days (or even hours) I will calm down. But right now I want to throw things. I knew someone once who drove to the top of a large hill when feeling like this and screamed. Perhaps it's worth a try. Spoke to Andy who laughed and said that if I'm frustrated by the red tape now, before we've even started the assessment process, just wait until we do. "You're not even on the road of red tape yet." he said. "THAT'S BECAUSE OF ALL THE RED TAPE. I CAN'T GET TO THE ROAD OF RED TAPE BECAUSE OF ALL THE RED TAPE IN THE WAY." I replied calmly.

Why is it that wanting to provide a home for children who need security and love and to be treated like people involves a process that feels so utterly dehumanising? I'm actually looking forward to the assessment process (yes, I know, famous last words) and the training. I think it ought to be good preparation for us. This wandering around in circles is driving me nuts.

"Granma"

Updated my Mum today about our possible new adoption agency. Got a lovely text back signed "From the potential granma". Can't quite explain how good it feels to know that she shares something of my hopefulness and is rooting for us on this journey.

Possibilities?

Andy did some more internet surfing this morning for agencies and passed me a couple of numbers to contact. Barnardoes, who passed me onto Birmingham local authority, and Together Trust. I had a really good conversation with them. She says that their process takes an average of 4-6 months from the initial meeting. "It is a long process," she said apologetically. "You have no idea how reasonable 4-6 months sounds!" I told her.

Talk about a roller coaster. Now I'm feeling cheery and optimistic again.

Agencies and Eyebrows..

The last 24 hours have been a bit of a roller coaster emotionally. After my conversation with Staffordshire yesterday morning, Andy rang Stoke on Trent and Cheshire authorities. He called me at lunchtime, quite excited, because he'd had a really positive conversation with someone from Stoke. The social worker promised to ring him back later in the afternoon.

By the evening, we'd heard back from Cheshire to say that they won't deal with people who don't live in Cheshire and from Stoke who would be interested, but who wouldn't accept us because of Andy's job. He works with drug users, quite a number of whom have children with child protection issues. They felt there would be a conflict of interests.

Great. So Cheshire won't have us because we don't live in Cheshire and Stoke won't have us because Andy works in Stoke. Why does this have to be so difficult? And we haven't even got as far as the assessment yet.

My girly pampering evening was lovely. Everyone enjoyed it and we raised about £70 towards our Africa trip. I managed not to talk about adoption all evening. And I had my eyebrows waxed for the first time. Ouch. I'm not sure the pain was worth it really. Now they've been waxed, the fact that one is slightly higher than the other is more noticeable than usual.

Snow and Social Workers

Barbara was as good as her word. Her boss rang me at 10am this morning. "Barbara said you'd like me to explain about the adoption course and the process." Hmm. Not quite what I was expecting.

"My understanding from our conversation yesterday is that Barbara was going to ask you about 2 things. Firstly, whether the medical that I had done a year ago will still be OK or whether I'll need another one and secondly she said that you would be able to confirm for us if we would get a place on the course in June, if we're able to proceed with the process following the medical assessment," I said, spotting myself slipping into managerial mode.

She can't tell us if we'll get a place in June. They will make the decision about who to offer places to on the course in April. I then asked about how many people were waiting and how many places there are. Apparently, there are places for no more than 9 households on the course, there are currently 11 people waiting, some of whom have been waiting since August (I wonder if we count as waiting since now or since last January - didn't ask her that) and they have another 11 households to visit. She doesn't know when the next course would be after June. There is nothing planned at present. They know that it's frustrating, but they see no point in offering courses to people if they have no social worker to follow things up afterwards. Sensible.

The decision now is whether we stick with Staffordshire, or see what other agencies are out there. Stoke is a possible, as is just about any other authority. And there will also be private agencies. I spoke to Andy, who has done some ringing around. Someone from Stoke should be ringing us back later today. They have 34 children awaiting placement apparently. Whether it will be any quicker with them, remains to be seen. We need to get the medical done first and do a bit of shopping around re the agencies.

In the meantime, I'm enjoying the snow, which makes everything look so beautiful. I'm having a girly pampering night later to raise money for our Africa trip. That will be wonderful!

I really ought to pray about all this. Just not sure what to say. Don't think I want to be patient and tell the Lord I trust His timing etc etc... Hmm. That's a good honest start to a prayer. Now I know exactly what to say!

Delays and frustrations

We had our meeting with Barbara, from the adoption agency, yesterday. We thought she was lovely when we met her a year ago, so I was quite looking forward to seeing her again.

This meeting was much more business like. We'd done lots of talking last time. She wanted an update on Andy's medical situation, and said, as we expected, that they would need an early medical (ie at the beginning of the process, rather than at the end). Which is exactly what we thought she would say. So it has taken us a year to get to exactly where we were 13 months ago.

The next stage, once we've had the medical and it's been looked at by the medical officer on the permanency panel (the panel of people who decide about permanent placements for children, and approve long term foster carers and adopters) is to go on an adoption course. The next course to be run by Staffordshire is in June. "But I have to tell you, there is no guarantee that you would get a place on that course. We have people who have been waiting since October that didn't get on the course we've just run. And even if you did get a place, there may be a delay in appointing a social worker to do the home study" (6 or 8 meetings with a social worker to assess one's suitability as an adopter).
"So if we didn't get on the course in June, when is the next one?"
"I don't know."
"If we did the course in June, how long would it be, would you guess, before we began the home study?"
"We try and allocate people a social worker within 6-8 weeks of a course, but there are delays at the moment."
"So how many places do you have on a course, and how many people are waiting?"
"I don't have that information."

Apparently the lack of social workers is the problem. I felt indescribably frustrated and ended up quizzing Barbara about why they organise the process the way they do and why we couldn't do the home study first, if there were no places on courses. On reflection, of course, if the difficulty is social workers, it's probably reasonably simple to put on extra courses, if you've got the social workers available to do the home study afterwards.

I was really quite stunned at how gutted I felt. June is quite a long way off, but would be a reasonable time scale. We're planning a trip to Africa in the summer for some voluntary work, so adoption course in June and then home study in the autumn would work quite well. But an open ended maybe / maybe not feels horrid. Very horrid. After some discussion, Barbara said that she would speak to her boss tomorrow to find out whether we would get a place on the course in June and ring us back.

Andy was really reasonable and chilled about the whole thing. When she'd gone, just at the point when I was wanting to throw crockery, he gave me a hug and told me how difficult it must be for them and how it wasn't Barbara's fault. He knows what it's like when he has to tell people he doesn't know when they can have their methodone script. So I shouted at him. "Darling, you've just had a disempowering experience" he said, completely unperturbed by my outburst. That so completely summed it up, and I was so stunned by this moment of insight from my husband, that I stopped shouting and we had a cup of tea and a chat.

The other interesting moment was when Barbara asked how many children we were thinking of. "3 or 4" says Andy. Which is what I'd said a few months back, when Andy was suggesting that one would be plenty to be getting on with. I asked him about it afterwards. "yeah well... 3 would be a good number. 4 is more difficult for transport."