Questions for the open evening

Its the open evening this week, so Spike and I are starting to think of questions..

(Some of these stem from watching 15000 kids and counting on channel 4)

We are brand new to this, so please excuse our ignorance if you ever read this and think WTF you cant ask that! Or, wow, did you not know that?!

1 – Can you specify you don’t want a baby fish? Or that you only want a girl fish between say 2/3-6? Is it terrible to say you are not a fan of babies??

2 – Can you only adopt a little fish in your area? i.e. What happens if you adopt, you’re walking down the street and you walk past someone who knows the little fish? Do you adopt from all over the UK?

3 – Will working full time and being self employed go against us if we decide to adopt? Does one of you have to give up work?

4 – Will they want to speak to flick and wave?

5 – What happens if your financial past hasn’t always been so rosy?

6 – Can you pull out at any time during the process before matching?

7 – How long does it normally take if you do decide to go ahead?

8 – If you’re not telling people you are going through the process other than really close friends, how do you do references can you use the people close to you?

9 – Does having pets go against you, we’ve 3 dogs huge, medium and tiny?

10 – Do they tell you if you’ve got a fish who has been taken from the birth family or given up by the birth family?

11 – Is it okay for a little fish to always know they’ve been adopted if you dislike the idea of secrets.

12- Is it wrong to say that you want a little fish that looks like it could come from you?

13- Are you suppost to tell people you are looking into adoption, or can you tell people when you know its something you really want to go through?

Will add them as we think of them, Spike has said he won’t go any steps further unless he’s 100% sure, and I feel exactly the same!

 

Saying it out loud.

Saying it out loud.

I’ve only told one person I know that myself and Spike are thinking about adoption, just in general conversation I mentioned we was looking into it. The response was “people who don’t have kids don’t realise how much hard work kids are, it’s easier when you have them from birth you can adapt to them living with you?”

I kept my mouth shut, smiled and decided I was never going to tell anyone else we was considering adopting a little fish, until we get further down the process (or should I say IF we get further down the process)

Open evening.

Open evening.

After passing the first call, myself and Spike have been invited to attend an open evening, 2 hours long where we can meet people who have adopted, social workers and gather information.

Being at such an early stage, I feel kind of silly writing a blog, but even if after our first open evening we decide not to progress further or they decide we are not suitable then atleast we tried!

The first call

The first call.

Feeling pretty informed we picked up the phone and contacted our local family placement department, they asked;

1 – Names, date of birth – Bubble/Spike mid thirties

2 – employed/self employed – Spike has own business, I work full time.

3 – Any little fish? – Yes 2, flick & wave, do not live with us.

4 – How many bedroom house – 3. Flick & Wave share a room – 1 room spare

5 – Ever tried IVF (randomly they went straight to this point) – No. Why? Just never have, not an option we’d like to persue.

6 – Address to send more information to.

The beginning

The beginning

Its early days, like real early days. We are looking into adopting a little fish into our family, having our own fish has never happened, and although in the early days we tried, went to see some doctors, we never took it to the point of IVF or having any operations. I’ve got PCOS which does not prevent you from having a little fish, but makes life difficult. On the contraceptive pill PCOS is easy to control, without it its hard work, and blooming draining to say the least. So back onto the contraceptive pill I went.

I’ve always considered adoption, I know (thanks to the little fish) that I can love with all my heart a child who I did not produce, I also know that I am not concerened if I never fall pregnant, but that we can give a child a really good stable home.

But, I am not single, for Spike this is all new territory, having always said a flat no to adoption and me never pushing the issue, one night he told me to get more information.

So I did.

We’ve looked at the following websites

http://www.adoptnorthwest.co.uk/

http://www.adoptionuk.org/

https://www.bemyparent.org.uk/

We also looked at a lot of information online, and I’ve been reading blogs to get an honest account of the process, the pros and cons.

Spike works long hours so I’ve done a lot of research online, here are some of the blogs I’ve caught up on and found really valuable

http://dear-daughter-our-adoption.blogspot.co.uk/

http://www.theboysbehaviour.co.uk/

http://adoptandkeepcalm.wordpress.com/

http://thepuffindiaries.com/

http://www.sallydonovan.net/

Bubbles & Spike.

Us

We are 2 people in love, who fell in love, bought a home, got married and continue to live happily ever after. We have disagreements, fall outs and everything in between. But the thing that keeps us real is we are best friends, we laugh, we trust eachother and every day we are grateful to have found eachother in the big fishpond.

I am the wife, he is the husband, he has two little fish from previous relationships who I would gladly jump in front of a moving train for. The little fish live in a different pond to us, and different ponds to eachother, but they are still our family. We have three dogs which keep us busy also.

We think (at this point it’s all investigation) we’d like to extend our family to have another little fish live with us, and so our journey begins.

For the purpose of anonymity we will be known as bubbles and spike. The little fish will be known as flick and wave. The dogs are huge, medium and tiny.