We want to throw in the towel

Ruby - huge hugs to you and your husband. This is so very hard.

You are not alone - I too have felt - since 6 weeks into placement with (then 6.5) Zippy that I have made a mistake. Like you, we didn't do IVF but thought that we would prefer to adopt than have birth children - we wanted to give a loving home to a child / children who would otherwise not experience that and were prepared for all that meant.

Zippy is a bright, happy, funny boy who is a pleasure to be around and gets on very well with other children. Other parents love having him round to play / for sleepovers as he is so easy and plays so well with their boy(s). He constantly makes jokes, chats about what he has learnt at school, wants / gives cuddles and generally brightens the day of everyone he comes into contact with. Oh and he's gorgeous too.

You couldn't find a more perfect child for myself and DH but unfortunately I realised about 6 weeks in that I didn't want to be a mum. Nothing more to it really: I grieved, and continue to grieve my / our old life and miss what we had together and what we were able to do with our time - together and apart.

After masses of soul searching and talking to DH (who doesn't feel that he has made a mistake) I decided to stick with it. The primary reason I came to adoption was to provide a loving, caring and stable home for a child. My empathy for Zippy - and other children we read about - was overflowing and I decided that I could not live with myself if we disrupted - plus I would have lost my husband if that had been the case so lose / lose situation followed by masses of guilt.

I do think there is a massive pressure on your self-confidence to mother / father a 6 year old from scratch – 6 year olds are savvy. They notice things. They know if you do stuff differently from birth parents or FCs and they question it. And so you feel like you are being measured against all of the previous parents and that you need to be the best / kindest / safest / most knowledgeable / most fun etc. This was certainly a pressure for me in the early days but once I met other mums at the school gates I realised that you forge your own way and have to ignore what went before!

So here I am 18 months in. Some days I look forward to spending time with him, making jokes together, cooking, Lego, growing seeds etc – we do some fun stuff together and I genuinely think that having him around enhances my life. And other days I have to remind myself that this is a job that I promised to do and I will do it as well as I can today – grumps and forced cuddles and all. Some days now I even think I love him, and others I feel bitter about what having him has taken away from me and mark off the days until DH and I get some time together.

DH and I put in the effort and manage some time together – sometimes he can work from home at the same time as I am home, we accept / ask for sleepovers with family / close friends, friends will babysit if they know we need some space and a night out together and neighbours with children will often have Z for a couple of hours to distract their own kids from winding each other up! These relationships and arrangements did take a few months to build up but make a huge difference to our quality of life together and ability to remember and reaffirm our identities together.

Only you and DH can decide what is best for you and your situation. I would urge you not to rush in to any decision and am glad that you have contacted SS. Whatever you decide there will be continued support here and I am happy to chat without judgement if you want to PM me your number or email. Axxx

How's it going Ruby7?

Our dd came to us at 6 and we adopted her a few years later.She was passive aggressive, controlling,fake,yet at times could be fun,compliant and charming.Quite early on in the placement we were in a social situation where someone commented on how integrated dd was and I felt so guilty because I thought "dd is not being genuine she is manipulating the situation to her advantage".

As time went on there were enough times when I thought I saw the genuine person under all of DDS complex layers and contradictions.It was enough to hook me in and after having birth children I knew there were times they drive you demented but phases come and go.

I believed that with stick ability,parenting dd appropriately, passage of time an authentic bond would develop.I feel now that I bonded as a mother to add but she couldn't/wouldn't bond with me.We tried for 10 years.There were good times that were euphoric because maybe it was all falling in to place.There were bad times and I mean really bad.In the end dd tried to destroy our family and we have had no contact for a couple of years.

I believe our dd had huge trust issues which are completely understandable due to her background.She would sweet talk hubby in the early years and I felt like the other woman!Despite our concerns we were steered towards adoption by our agency as they felt she would settle if she knew she was staying.Literally the day we adopted her the big guns came out.

We did get bits of therapy for dd but in retrospect it was not tailored to her complex needs.She was never diagnosed with RAD but I believe she has it.I also believe she has a personality disorder.

Our family has survived but that has been a miracle. If we had had the right therapy maybe we would not have needed to disrupt? I am glad I tried to mother did for all those years but I wonder if long term fostering would have been less terrifying for her.Maybe we would have got better support if we went that route?

Hubby wishes we had never met dd and if you knew the whole story you would understand.I do believe part of him still loves her though.I know I love here but she is not safe to be around.

Mine and Hubby's relationship has survived and is now stronger than ever but often took a backseat to our parenting roles.

I hope you find a way forward in this.My confidence was so rocked by DDS passive aggression charm vulnerability presentation that I doubted my assessments of her and believed the professionals.Of course their motivation was to find a long term home for dd as they had other children they need to place.

You need as much information as possible about these children.You need a SW who will get you the right therapy if you continue.

Wishing you all the best whatever you decide to do.

N

((Hugs)) for you all

You sound like you have made up your mind - and if that is your final decision, then yes its about damage limitation and allowing the kids to move on as quickly and painlessly as possible. 

I am also drawn to share a little of our story.... We thought we wanted the same thing a few weeks in - DH had gone back to work and I was having a really tough time is the school holidays - I even called SW and asked them to remove the kids..... we paused and thought and we decided to keep going a little longer (tbh it was mostly about the embarrassment of telling others we'd given up so soon).  I can't say it was all easy, it wasn't, and again a few months in, after coming home early from a disastrous holiday, we made the same call - although again after talking it through at length with our SW, we stuck with it.  I'm now glad we did....its not been easy and has changed our lives in ways we never expected but the gift of seeing our kids grow and blossom is precious. 

Before you go ahead, just ask yourselves one question - what will you regret more in 20 years time - keeping going or not? I hope that whatever you final choice, you can find deep peace.

Bop

Prior to being with us, our two children were placed with a couple, that placement only lasted 4 weeks, and they also had to make the heart rending decision to hand the children back. They went back into foster care.
Six months later they were with us and have been now for 18 months, and despite the ups and downs they are perfect for us and we love them very much.

My message is that we are so grateful that the first couple were brave enough to disrupt, brave enough to know they were not the right parents for the children, I cannot imagine what damage would have been done to everyone had they stayed.

Sending thoughts and prayers to you.

I think your honesty with yourselves will get you through this. But spend lots of time envisaging the future. What will you feel like in ten/twenty years time? My eldest is also from a disruption and he couldn't be more attached. It took a long time though. I wish you all the best in whatever you decide. Esty.

This is all so moving and so personal so impossible really to advise other than to say make space to really reflect - which it looks like you are. Thinking of you all with compassion and empathy.

Feeling like scum of the earth. Hoping me and DH will get through this. Fc says she will have them back which might be a small mercy? SW went to see zig in school without telling us so I think she knows something is going on....still don't know if we have made the right choice. DH is much more sure than I i think he is the kind of person that once he make a decision thats it. He does not agree he is stressed or at least if he is he can still make the right choice..... It feels right but we will always have the what ifs I guess. NatuLly all the SW are sad and angry with us. We have said its us not the kids. For what it's worth I think hey need a together or apart assessment I think they are electric together and can't see that any amount of therapy or cool clam parenting will change that and zag may well have a better chance on his own and I think zig need to be on her own too. Should we mention this or will they think what do we know after a very short time.....I never thought I would be the person to do something so awful .....

Hi, Ruby -

Sending you hugs.

You've made a very difficult decision: that doesn't make you a bad person!

You are saying that "it's us, not the kids". I wonder if that's really true. You can get all sorts of "vibes" from traumatised kids and it could well be those that you were picking up and that's what you can't cope with. Particularly with a six year old. If they haven't bought into being adopted, there's a whole load of stuff that you could be picking up on, as well as the trauma.

You're saying that you think they might be better apart: that suggests that there is a lot going on with the kids. I think that social services - the whole system, in fact - isn't very good at deciding whether kids should be placed together or apart.

I'm not surprised that SS are dumping a whole pile of guilt on you. If they didn't put it on you, they'd have to put it on themselves, wouldn't they? "Where did we go wrong with assessment/matching/preparation/support?" Much easier to blame you. But you don't have to accept it, and you don't have to add your own condemnation.

Look after yourselves!

Love,

Corkwing

I thought you had two rather than three, but even then taking two at once is effectively taking on fully active, mobile twins and any parents of twins will tell you how hard that is when they are just babies, let alone all the baggage Zig and Zag will have with them. They will also be terrified by yet another disruption in their short lives and whether it really will last "forever" or whether you will just be another set of adults passing through their lives which will add another turn of the screw to their behaviour and hence on yourselves as a couple. They are testing you out as adults, they are testing where the joins are between you and DH, they are testing for your trustworthiness and for your ability to love them no matter what as parents and that exam (as far as I can see) lasts a lifetime..

You have turned your whole lives upside down and no matter how prepared you thought you were, it is still like being hit by a tsunami, theory has become reality and you find all the theories don't work in our imperfect lives though they can help and inform how we act as parents: They don't yet like you, they don't yet love you, they don't yet trust you, they don't yet want to be with you, they don't yet recognise the damage that has been done to them, they are certainly not yet grateful and almost certainly don't really understand what adoption means and all that can hurt and challenge our understanding of why we're doing this to ourselves in the first place. You are bound to be stressed and in ways you have never experienced before which makes it harder to recognise for what it is. Took us over 6 months just to get a bedtime routine embedded that worked and took less than 3 hours :-)

Whatever you decide as a couple, disruption at whatever stage isn't your fault and don't let SW make it yours, as noted above it simply lets them off the hook over their decision making processes. For the sake of your little two your insights deserve attention whatever happens next .

All the best whatever road you travel.

How are you getting on Ruby7? Been thinking of you.

me too Axx