There was an amazing programme on BB2 this evening, about a very disturbed child called Maisie. Maisie had grown up with a horrific amount of violence in her life, and had 2 failed adoption attempts, her last attempt at finding a future family was with David and Sue, an amazing couple who had already adopted 8 'damaged' children.
Maisie had some very severe temper issues, and was quite hateful towards her new mum. They had to fight for funding to get her theraputic counselling with Family Futures. Family Futures specialise in difficult to place children and claim a 95% success rate. Funding for their care was £50k a year and yet the family struggled to get this approved, despite the fact that they told Social Services that if they didn't get the funding, they couldn't proceed with the adoption, and Maisie would have to go to a secure care facility in order to cope with her outbursts, at the cost of £295,000 a year! Madness!
We were worried the programme might put us off, but far from it. It was inspiring seeing what the parents were able to do, and how much they turned around the life of a very damaged little girl. We also reminded ourselves that to be the subject of a documentary, she was a fairly extreme example, and we hope that our experience won't be quite so challenging, but it is definitely good to keep our feet on the ground and not get too carried away with a romanticised view of what our own family will look like.
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