Last week a number of my friends received visits from Social Services. Having begun with a few throat clearing questions, the social worker asked them whether they thought I was a child-abuser.
For those of you recoiling in horror, I should explain that P and I have applied for approval to adopt. The process in the UK is, as you would no doubt expect, bureaucratic and deflating. Social workers (for whom, as a profession, I have the utmost admiration) assume, correctly, that the great majority of prospective adoptive parents have already struggled through the mire of IVF. They also assume, again correctly, that those wannabe parents will be in the grip of at least some degree of desperation. This affects social workers’ behaviour in two ways. The first is that they believe you need careful handling and I describe our experiences below. The second, I will deal with in my next entry.
Social workers go on courses so as better to fathom the mind of those who have been through failed IVF. The perceived need for such courses arises from an apparent assumption that our minds will be as devastated and as difficult to pick through as an earthquake-hit hillside fortress. With the courses comes jargon:
Social worker: “Do you feel you have fully grieved for your dream baby?”
Moobs: “Do I feel I have whatnow?”
SW: “Grieved. For your dream baby”
M: “What dream baby?”
SW (looking sympathetic): “The child you dreamed you and P would have together”
M: “The only time we ever imagined what our own child would be like we concluded that it would be permanently grumpy and have an enormous monobrow. If you have one of those in stock we’re good.”
Since the social worker is taught that you will be damaged you cannot simply reassure them that you aren’t. That would be a sign that you were “in denial”. Nor, of course, can you sob uncontrollably into their lap. That would be a sign that you have not begun your recovery. You have to strike a delicate balance in which you persuade them that you have been very upset and are still upset but are somewhat less upset than you were.
It is also assumed that you will be naive about what adoption involves – that your dream child will have rubbed pixie dust in your eyes before evaporating away leaving a big pile of medical bills. From the outset, therefore, they are at pains to tell you just how harrowing and grinding an adoption can be. In our case, as natural pessimists, we had very little untrammelled optimism to dispel. Even if we had seen ourselves plucking an apple-cheeked babe from a social services mulberry bush and walking off towards the sunset, P’s many months browsing the Adoption UK website had put paid to that. Many of the entries might best be summarised thus: “Deary me, we seem to have adopted Satan”, followed by a slew of comments saying “Hang in there” and “Have you tried pressing a communion wafer onto their forehead?”
After four days of training during which social workers endlessly retiterate that anyone thinking that adoption will be anything other than hellish is not in their right mind, they then say “of course if you have any doubt at all about whether this is the right thing for you to be doing, you shouldn’t do it”.
I had no idea you guys were still going for it – good for you. I can only imagine how teeth-grindingly frustrating the process must be for you. Social Workers are’t used to dealing with intelligent, articulate people – there aren’t too many around in the social care world, either on the professional or the clientele side!
oh THAT kind of scrutiny. i thought, perhaps, you were being quizzed about washing machine parties. sounds like you’ve got the measure of social workers. it’s mind games, my dear, mind games. but i’d back you any day of the week. xx
YES!! I’m so very very excited for you. Bless you for opening your lives to another soul. and what a lucky lucky child it will be.
The only time we ever imagined what our own child would be like we concluded that it would be permanently grumpy and have an enormous monobrow. If you have one of those in stock we’re good.
Brilliant!
Oh, Moobs this is awesome
You’ll be wonderful parents for any little fire-starter.
My sympathies are with you and may i suggest maybe mixing a little laxative in with the next social worker’s tea?
“Deary me, we seem to have adopted Satan”, followed by a slew of comments saying “Hang in there” and “Have you tried pressing a communion wafer onto their forehead?”
I laughed so heartily and unexpectedly that I nearly split my macaroni pants 😉
LOVE YOU A MILLION BILLION SQUILLION (and I normally only ever say that to my kids)
x
How can you joke at a time like this?
Aah – so that’s how ….
Probably best not to mention your imaginary internet friends though, ay?
You’ll be pleased to know that the Cambridge contingent of the Moobs clan haven’t yet received a call from the antisocial workers.
We know a little of how astonishingly tough adopting can be from when we looked ourselves – it sounds like what’s toughest to receive from the social workers is not the little’un, but the belittling.
In your shoes, I don’t quite know how I’d speak to them. Of course, once I’d taken them off, having comfortable feet would make it all the easier… I say again, you’ll be pleased to know that we haven’t had a call…
It’s evident that Joseph Heller would have been proud of the catch-22 that if you’re sane enough to want to adopt a child you’re possibly not insane enough to put yourself through the hell of the process. J8 are all desperately hoping that you’re the perfect level of insanity and it all goes swimmingly.
Oh dear. Platitudes aplenty. Just what you needed. Sorry.
Practise your ‘brave smile’ (for the social worker) and you’ll be fine. And yeah, maybe don’t mention how you invite loads of random people you met on the internet over to your house for wild parties.
Oh I do hope it goes well for you. We had the SW visits when our friends adopted and found them surprisingly ok but I think that particular sw had a good deal of common sense….Not always the case. Just have your answer to the question “How will you deal with it if your child turns out not to be capable of the levels of achievement you would like / you would have expected your “dreamchild” (yuck) to be capable of?” Terribly politically incorrect question I always think but it always comes up when anyone with a modicum of intelligence and/or money and/or an education wants to adopt…. Keeping everything crossed for you….
Pch. You’re making it all up. If American sitcoms have taught me anything it’s that you can wander into an adoption office and be home with your newborn in time for tea. And be very careful you don’t accidentally adopt twins by mistake. It happens.
Claudia bounced me your way.
We just had this exact same interview with our adoption specialist in the States. We apparently didn’t strike the right balance.
Good luck.
They also probably read from your dossier that you’re a lawyer. So they think you’ll be lying.
I think you’ll be fine!
Sorry I’ve been away for a while – so nice to see your new layout. xx
TT – Oh, I hope you don’t mean the interview went badly.
DS- Welcome home!
On the one hand, I am sure it must be insanely frustrating to go through this level of scrutiny.
On the other, fair Moobs, good Lord I laughed out loud at the thought of your permanently grumpy, monobrow-having child.
Oh but you are good.
I would have interpreted the social worker’s question as: “Have you grieved for your dream, baby?”
The correct answer to this is, of course: “Far out.”
fantastic stuff. i’m sort of laughing…crying…hysterical. i’m loving this dream baby.