Friday 2 December 2011

We've found our boys!

Well, today was the big day, meeting with the boy's social worker and foster carers, as well as the adoption manager, our social worker and the foster carer's social worker - not too intimidating then!

We were really nervous this morning, in fact the first thing our social worker said when she saw me was that she had never seen me look so nervous! We pre prepared a long list of questions, as we feared that our minds would go to mush when we got in there. We needn't have worried, everyone was lovely, and the foster carers were really nice people.

We talked about the boys for about three hours. We found out more about the extent of their early life traumas (which I won't talk about on here!) and we found out lots about how they have been for the foster carers since they came in to care two years ago.

The foster carers said that they have fostered many children over the last 10 years, but that they have never had two such 'normal' and affectionate little boys. The foster carer's social worker said that she felt that they were very special little boys and that she felt very affectionate towards them. There really wasn't a bad word said. They are described as doing well at school/nursery, being best of friends with each other, being caring and affectionate, happy and cheeky, active and fun. They sleep well, eat well (apparently they love a curry so will do well in this house!) and they don't really argue or fight with each other. They are meeting their developmental milestones generally, albeit the youngest is a little bit speech delayed and a bit immature, but that's to be expected given their start in life.

The foster carers had taken a video this weekend which was wonderful to watch. We saw them at play in their playroom, out for a walk, in a playground and eating their dinner. We saw just how gorgeous they are - big cheeky grins and very affectionate to each other.

They seemed happy to have left their birth mother, and don't really talk about her, certainly not with any sort of affectionate memories. There is no plan for any ongoing direct contact with the birth parents or grand parents. They know that they are being adopted and often ask their foster family when they will meet their new parents. The foster carers have told them that the reason it's taking so long is that social services are waiting until they've found really special forever parents - a lot for us to live up to then!

We were expecting to leave the meeting with lots of things to discuss, but in actual fact, there is nothing to discuss, we desperately want to be their daddies and we feel very certain about the decision.

So, all systems go! We have a panel date booked for the 22nd February, which is only 80 days away. There is a huge amount to do between now and then. We have two more assessment visits to fit in, plus lots of matching paperwork to be done. We are spending next Friday in the records office reviewing all of their case and medical records. We are meeting with the medical officer on the 21st December and we will also now arrange to meet the boy's teacher and nursery key worker.

We are also currently living a bit upside down with lots of work going on to extend our home, and in the new year we need to start decorating two boys bedrooms! (We've already started to pick out beds and wallpaper!). So long as there's no change in our panel date, the boys will be with us in March - only 13 months after we started this journey!!

The foster parents have said that even though the boys can't be told about us until after panel date in February, they are going to start working on introducing the boys again to the idea of being adopted and also start looking at different families.

Oh and this morning we signed our deed poll paper to change our own surnames - we are going double barrelled! We want the boys and us to all have the same surname.

This is very weird, but very, very exciting!

Finally, two of our very good friends were approved at panel this morning - well done guys - we are so pleased for you, and we look forward to coffee mornings with the kids next year :-)

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