What's in a name?

I got an email from the boys' social worker on Friday, to say that the decision to match us with them has been ratified by the official decision maker.

We are now, four months after first hearing about them, officially cleared to begin introductions with our sons.  We expect that to begin tomorrow.

The boys found out that we will be their parents, and saw the photo albums that we've made for them, on Friday evening.

I find it unbelievable that we only officially get the go ahead 3 days before we meet our kids!  And there are cases where things don't go ahead, either at matching or at ratification.  How is one supposed to prepare emotionally?

This was made somewhat easier for us by an interesting incident that occurred seven years ago.  We opened our home up for prayer for a few weeks, back in June 2004.  One day, Andy had been praying and came downstairs and said with great conviction, "God's just given me two names."  They were boys names.  We had friends at the time who wanted children and very specifically wanted twin boys.  We thought maybe they were going to have twin boys, and that was what they would call them.  So we wrote the names down.

And then our friends had a little girl.  And then another little girl.  We shrugged our shoulders and assumed Andy had been mistaken.

Nearly seven years, we were looking at profiles of children from social services.  There was one profile of two boys.  Something about them touched my heart.  I'd felt for months that God had been dropping hints that we might be getting boys.

We were sat, having coffee, talking about what to do next.  I was suggesting that we should find out more about the boys.  Andy was slightly miffed we'd only been sent 3 profiles, because he was expecting a catalogue full.  And I suddenly realised that the boys we were looking at were called by the names that Andy had been convinced God had told him seven years before.

How mad is that???

We didn't throw caution to the winds at that point, we continued to seek the information we wanted and we thought really carefully about it.  I'm pretty convinced, though, that it's no co-incidence that our boys are called by the names Andy thought God had told him all those years ago.

My first thought was,  "what a story to be able to tell our children!"

To be able to say that God had prepared a family for them, because He knew that they would need one.

It has also been incredibly helpful to me over the weeks running up to matching.  It's just given me the little bit of confidence I needed, that we've made the right decision.  Otherwise I would have been over-thinking the whole thing.  Wondering if we were doing the right thing, if they were the right kids, worrying that we might have got it wrong, that we've not asked all the right questions...

Instead, we've chosen to believe that these are the right kids and that things will go ahead.  Getting a 'yes' from the matching panel was still a huge moment.  And we were still concerned that they might say 'no'.  But that little hint that we were maybe heading in the right direction has made the last few weeks so much easier.

God is good!

Getting Ready

We've spent this week getting the house ready for the arrival of our boys, who we will meet on Monday.  We've been putting draw locks and cupboard locks in pertinent places and we now have stair gates at the top and bottom of the stairs.

We are seeing our house in a new light.  Many ordinary things are suddenly looking potentially hazardous...  Such as the blind cords in the lounge.  

The boys' room is looking great!  There was an evening recently when I suddenly realised that the beds will soon have real people in them!

A bit more about panel...

I was too excited to sit down and write anything coherent about our experience of panel, last time I blogged.

I had been about to take panel in our stride this time round.  A necessary process, but not particularly irksome.  Assuming that we would be matched with the boys at panel, I wasn't really that bothered.  But then we got a slightly panicked phone call from our social worker on Monday "Just to let us know" that the chair of panel was concerned about Andy's smoking and had spoken to the head of children's services about it.

And suddenly it was terrifying....

Having been to panel with our social worker before, we were somewhat pre-warned.  Last time, she was really anxious and spent the time we were waiting to go into panel, doing a very stressy high speed 'what to say in panel' pep talk.

So we took our lap top and a copy of the Pim and Bibble DVD, which we knew she wouldn't have seen, because it went to the boys social worker, James, who works in a different office in a different town.  When we arrived, Chris and James were both already there.  On cue, Chris, immediately began talking about panel and the smoking issue.

"Right," I said, "we've brought distraction techniques!  We thought you'd like to see the DVD.  And we've made introductory books for the children to show you..."

Chris agreed that she wanted to see the DVD.  She thought it was great and requested a copy to show her colleagues on the grounds that they should get to see it as all James' colleagues had seen it.

Panel was running an hour late.   So there was plenty of time to chat before we went in.  We mainly managed to steer the conversation away from panel and smoking.  At one point, two of James' colleagues popped their heads round the door to report that panel was 'in a good mood today'.  James introduced us. "Of course!" his colleague responded, "Pim and Bibble!!"

Panel was fine in the end.  To my surprise, the smoking issue barely came up.  I had both barrels loaded with lots of very passionate, well thought out arguments which I didn't need to use in the end.

Probably just as well.

The social workers went in before us and Chris told us afterwards that she had really laid into them about the fact that this is a good match and there are no perfect parents.  "I told them there are risks and vulnerabilities in every placement and this one is no different.  I told them how much you have to offer and what a good match this is.."  It evidently did the trick.  I got the distinct impression, when it came to it, that the reason they asked about the smoking was because it was on the list of questions they'd decided to ask rather than because they were worried about it.

It's done now!  Hooray!

Preparing for introductions

We have been having great fun, over the last few months, preparing things for the children to get before they meet us.  We did two sets of things in the end.

Firstly, we worked with our brilliant friends Marney and Stephen to produce a little story featuring us and two little monster puppets, called Pim and Bibble.

When thinking about how to introduce ourselves, we were pondering the ways that young children generally approach meeting new people.  We notice that directly introducing oneself to a small child quite often seems to alarm them.  They generally seem to like to observe for a bit.  Check people out first.  That being the case, we wanted to allow space for the kids to watch from the sidelines, as it were.  So we produced a story which just shows us interacting with the puppets.  Giving the kids the chance to see us and our home without all the baggage of knowing that we were going to be their parents.

The other thing we did was two more traditional photo books, with pictures of us and our house, which specifically introduce us as 'Mummy and Daddy'.  We managed to get hold of some talking photo albums, so that we could record messages to go with the pictures.

Because we were doing something slightly different from the norm, my major concern was that we would have put all that effort into creating a carefully staged, 2 part introduction only for social services to take everything to the foster home at once after matching panel and the kids not to see the DVD before the books.
I felt very out of control of the whole thing.

The boys' social worker suggested we bring everything to matching panel.  But I sent the DVD in the post first, with a long explanation as to why we wanted them to see the DVD first and how it really wouldn't matter if it happened before panel, because it doesn't mention us as parents, and if the match wasn't approved, they'd just be the owners of a slightly random kids DVD.

Delighted to say that they agreed!

They said yes!!!!!!

Well, we had matching panel yesterday and despite all the worries, they said yes!!

We will meet the boys and start introductions on the 23rd May.....

Eeek....

Matching Panel

We're off to matching panel this afternoon.  It is 10am and I am still in my dressing gown.  I've done some things, but in the back of my mind, I kind of think that the day hasn't really started, because I'm not dressed yet.  So there's nothing to panic about yet.  Sad, I know!

The last few days have been a real roller coaster emotionally.  I am pleased to say the terror gave way to excitement and I have been barely able to sit still.  

Then we had a phone call from the social worker on Monday night, to say that the chair of the panel has raised concerns with the manager of social services over the fact that Andy smokes.   Two days before panel!  Honestly!  

The issue came up in the approval panel.  We told them that Andy doesn't smoke in the house or around kids.  They seemed OK with that.  They didn't set any limits on the ages of the children we could adopt.  And now suddenly there's an issue.  

Honestly.  This process...  

Terror!

We have matching panel next Wednesday, which we fully expect to be a formality.  I expect it will feel like a very formal formality, when we are sat in that conference room again, with 15 people justifying their existence by asking us questions...

Assuming there are no hitches, we have an introductions planning meeting on the 23rd May and will meet the boys for the first time that day.

And I am currently terrified!!!!  I don't think I've ever been so stressed!  The kind of scared one is just before going on stage to do something major in front of lots of people.

I have been atrributing my stress to all sorts of other things.  Until, having woken up with my heart rate roughly normal, I picked up the letter inviting us to panel and terror struck again.

We have so much to get ready!  No idea what parenthood will be like!  No idea if we will be any good at it.  No clue what we're letting ourselves in for.  

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!