The last of the Referees....

Well, the social worker saw the last of our referees this morning.  I chatted to one of them afterwards.  She seemed to think that the conversation went really well.  Which is encouraging.  The social worker asked at the end if she had any questions and she said the one thing she thought I would want to know was 'When?'

Honestly.  I really haven't primed all our referees to nag the social worker about how long this is all taking!!  Our friends obviously feel for us, having walked with us these three years, and it seems that the moment they get the opportunity to talk the social worker, they find a way of slipping it in.

Anyway.  Chris apparently said that she is aiming for us to go to panel in November, be approved by Christmas and begin looking at kids in the New Year.

Meanwhile, Andy and I are just getting our heads round the fact that there just might be an end to this process and we just might end up being parents at the end of it.  We spent the day continuing our work on sorting the house out.  We are still working on moving my office to the box room, to leave another large bedroom free.  We thought it would be a simple task, but it's a very small room that faces into the sun, so when we put my computer in it, I discovered that there was nowhere in the room, where I could actually see the screen, due to the glare from the sunlight.  Even shutting the curtain (which is quite a pale colour) didn't make any difference.  So we had to go out and buy a blind.  Blind is now fitted, but it took much longer than we expected to not get very far.

My computer and desk are now in the new room, which is an oasis of calm and order, because all the 'stuff' is still in the large room!  I quite like it like this....  Who needs paperwork anyway?  It looks like the kind of office you'd see in a show home.  A computer, a desk and just a couple of token items on the shelves.   I have somewhere to work tomorrow, which is the main thing.

Referees

Chris, the social worker, saw our second family referees today.  They have come to visit for a few days from the Isle of Wight.  Andy's sister and brother in law.  And the nieces (Hooray!!).

She saw our friend Linda last week and is seeing our other 'friend' referees on Monday.

We are very fond of our nieces.  Even though we don't see them that often.  They are quite grown up now.  19 and 16.  They were very young when Andy and I met and it has been great to see them growing up.  They still remember the time we had a water pistol fight with them in the car park at a cinema.  Then there was the evening we followed dinner with about an hour of kitchen science experiments.  (You know the sort of thing.  Making a battery from an orange.  Blowing up balloons with bicarb and vinegar).  It's great to see them.  Andy is cooking dinner with one of them just now.  I am escaping for 10 minutes.  Long day at work.  Needing to introvert briefly.

Our brother in law, bless him, quizzed the social worker about timescales etc.  She says that 'if she had her way' we would be going to panel in November and it would be 'completed' by December.  But sshhhh.  Apparently he wasn't meant to tell us that.  So don't snitch.  I'm not sure what 'completed' means.  I think it probably means 'approved'.

Off to be sociable and see what the chefs have produced!

Waiting but not ready.....

This week has given me pause for thought.    We have now been engaged in this 'adoption' process for 3 years.  You might think, that after all that time, we would be the ready potential parents on the planet.

Actually, I think the opposite is true.

I have noticed, this week, that there has been a sort of split personalilty thing going on.

Part of me has been working through the process stuff reasonably efficiently.  In order to cope with the uncertainty of the whole thing, however, I have completely shut my mind and emotions off from the prospect of becoming a parent.  There is a certain amount of warped, emotional logic which thinks (wrongly) that by not thinking about it, I will be more able to cope with the disappointment if we are turned down.

Naively, I thought that we would have no choice but to prepare ourselves, because of the assessment process.  I thought the assessment visits would really help us to think and prepare.  Actually, they've done nothing of the sort.  It has just been about furnishing social services with a whole heap of information.  Useful for them, obviously, but not for us.

So here we are.  Three years after starting this process, and I feel less ready to become a parent now than I did when we started.

This is where pregnancy has the edge over adoption.  When you get pregnant, there is a definite timescale.  Barring miscarriages etc, you will be a parent 9 months later.  There is no getting away from it.  At some point in that 9 months you have to get ready.  With adoption, you just don't know.  We might be parents in 4 months time.  We might never be parents.  We might begin introductions in 10 months time.  Or two years.  Or six months.  It really is anybody's guess.

And that is a lot lot harder to deal with than I ever could have guessed it would be.

The Eye of Sauron

My husband has an eye infection - for the 2nd (or is it 3rd) time in as many months.  He says he thinks it looks like the Eye of Sauron.   I think he has a point.  He was taking photos of it this morning to put on Facebook.  Presumably to garner sympathy for his plight.  The pictures are horrible enough to have our more extreme Christian friends and acquaintances casting things out...

Meanwhile, my emotions are all over the place.  I was very calm and serene this morning.  Logically believing that life will be good, whatever the adoption panel say (if we ever get to meet them, that is...).  That life will be good, whether we have children or not.

Just been to take a parcel round to the neighbours over the road.  Their two daughters (five and three) gave me a private viewing of their latest artworks, a tour of the tree house in the garden and a display of their trampolining skills.  

And I am undone....

Money Money Money.....

Apparently we don't have enough of it. Or might not have enough of it securely enough to satisfy the adoption panel.

They probably have a point.  To an extent.  We don't want to be in a financial pickle whilst taking care of potentially vulnerable children.  But that doesn't make me feel any better about it.

We met with our social worker on Monday to look at our financial assessment.  Her main concern is that Andy is not earning and my income, whilst potentially substantial, is not secure.  It would be better, from their perspective,  if Andy was in a full time, permanent job.

I've been thinking much more about how we make sure we can be around enough to provide children with the support they might need.  My work can be quite flexible.  If Andy could get some part time, flexible work, that would seem perfect.

Apparently income is much more important than outgoings.  I asked her how much money people are usually earning when they adopt.  What would she be looking for?  She said, about what we were earning before Andy was out of work.

Interestingly, at that point, our income was around £16,000 above the average family income before tax, in the UK.  It is now probably just below the average.  But not by much.

So how do all those families on average or below average incomes, with kids, manage?  Can you really not adopt if you're poor?

The plan is for her to put the figures in her paperwork for the panel and just see what they say.  But she evidently wasn't feeling confident at all about the information we were giving her.

Anyway.  It was all rather depressing.

My logical, rational approach was to sit in a corner and eat brie and drink beer.

Apparently we're aiming for panel in November or December.