III. More About the Children Available for Adoption
Children You Already Know
In some cases you may know of a child who needs or will need adopting. It may be the child of an unmarried relative or friend, or the friend of a friend. It may be an older child who is having a hard time at home whom you have got to know and love. You cannot simply take such a child over unsupervised and expect to adopt her. And if a child just moves in with you (private or informal fostering) you do not have the legal parental responsibility you need to sign documents, consent to medical treatment, choose a school, etc. on the child’s behalf. All adoptions have to go through the social services and the courts. But given the circumstances, as long as those with parental responsibility are willing and the agency is satisfied with you as potential adopters for the child, it may well be possible. When you first contact your local authority agency you should make it clear that you have a particular child in mind.
Such an adoption has advantages in terms of knowing the child’s medical and psychological background, and contact with the birth family may be easier. But it is not an adoption to be recommended unless you are happy with a large degree of openness. If you feel that you will have to cut yourself off from a group of your relatives or friends or move to another part of the country in order to secure some kind of exclusive possession of the child, you should not go ahead with the idea.
Long-term formal fostering is an alternative here, with the advantage of continued financial help and professional advice, but the disadvantage of not giving you any legally enforceable rights to keep the child if the birth mother changes her mind or the social services decide to move the child. Fostering also does not give you legal parental responsibility, and the social services will have continuing supervision and decision-making powers.
What about Private Adoptions?
Private placement of children for adoption has been illegal in the UK for several decades. Adoptions can no longer be arranged by midwives, nursing home matrons, clergymen, doctors or lawyers, but must all be done through the auspices of a local authority social services adoption agency or a registered voluntary adoption society, even in cases of adoption within the family, although agency involvement in adoptions within the extended family is less.
This is to remove the possibility of profiteering from adoption, which is such a notorious feature in some other countries, to protect children from abuse, by professional vetting of prospective adopters, and to protect birth mothers from the temptation to sell their babies or from undue pressure to give their babies up for adoption by those with a financial interest in a placement. In countries where private adoption is practised money inevitably comes into the equation — specifically, how much you can pay — and the child’s welfare becomes secondary to the profit motive and the desires of the rich for children.
I think that the abolition of private adoptions was one of the finest hours in UK adoption history.
So, having sorted out some basic concepts and maybe cleared up some misconceptions about adoption, if you are still interested (and I hope you are), let’s go on to more personal matters. You will need to read the next section slowly and carefully, maybe several times. Stop often and think about what I’ve written in relation to your own situation. There’s no exam at the end, but if you cheat, the consequences will be much worse than writing GCSE maths formulas on your shirt cuffs. Cutting corners here can mean getting yourself and an innocent child into the nightmare of a wrong placement and a disrupted adoption. The repercussions of an adoption gone wrong, even if it doesn’t formally disrupt, are severe, permanent, and can be widespread. Your prospective child may not be able to participate in the decision, but there is no excuse for you to go into it without your eyes wide open and real honesty to the social workers, your partner, yourself, and most of all, the child.
Next: Chapter IV: Is Adoption Right for You?
© Roger Ridley Fenton
