In today's Guardian a mother of one wrote a letter to the social worker in her adoption process.
The letter, which was submitted anonymously, details the her experience of adopting her daughter, now 2-years-old and movingly describes the joy of finally being given a baby:
"Three years ago, a miracle came to live with us. Two years old, blond-haired, blue-eyed, charming and cheeky, she was naughtier than a bag of monkeys. Looking like an exact mixture of my husband and me, it seemed she was meant to be ours."
Speaking to her appointed social worker through the letter she says:
"You brought us together, and for that we can never repay you."
The adoption process can be a protracted and deeply stressful experience as the letter's author relates:
"The adoption process took two years: a frustrating, invasive, degrading experience, but with the most sublime outcome. Much like pregnancy, I think, we forgot about the pain and started the application for our second child."
The couple were told that the second adoption would be easier as they had already been exhaustively vetted in order to adopt their first child. Unfortunately the process was derailed after comments by one judge. The judge later tried to clarify his intentions in order to get the process moving again. But sadly this wasn't enough to remove the bureaucratic roadblock and 21 months have passed without any resolution.
The letter's author expresses her frustration with the vagaries of the adoption process.
"None of us wants children removed from birth parents unnecessarily....But surely the policy on permanently removing a child from its birth family must be immutable. It cannot change according to the prevailing mood of the judiciary, the government or the media."
The anonymous writer questions whether in today's "adoption climate" their daughter would've even been given to them and details the severely disadvantaged background she was born into.
"The last form the birth mother completed was written by her social worker as she cannot write. It said her aspirations for our daughter were for her to be happy and “to get a job some day”."
"You told us not to give up hope. But we know there are childless couples being approved as adopters every day who are more attractive prospects than us. And even though we are competing with them, we would give up our place in line: everyone deserves to have the unbelievable joy that we have been blessed with in our daughter. But there is no line and no place to give up. There is just a jumbled mess of sad, confused would-be parents with their lives on hold. Just like us."
