Public Forums

https://www.glamourmagazine.co.uk/article/failed-adoption

The flip side

That author is quote mining. This clearly is a highly emotive topic, but noone's is helped if arguments become dishonest and unfair.

Some people generalise their own experiences and seem to feel they can then judge someone else's situation, a situation they know hardly anything about.

And you never hear about other families with have to place children into specialist care/foster care

I have a friend with a very complex not adopted son, ASD, ADHD, epilepsy, learning disabilities. He became very aggresive, in his teens, too big for my friend to pick up after he had a fit, which were frequent. He started pulling a knife on her when he was upset about something. She has a spectacularly unhelpful husband. Son went into foster care at 15.

Its not just adopters

There’s not enough talk about disability or special needs including emotional needs in general - and so many schools still need educating

Sarah Naish on Facebook ….. “Society in the UK is rightly outraged, disgusted and devastated about the recent news of poor little Arthur who was tortured to death by his father and step mother. Briefly, the veil of abuse has been lifted and society sees what we (as therapeutic parents), deal with day in and day out. We KNOW this abuse happens to children, we know it happens to thousands of them. We hear in the news about the children like poor little Arthur who died. We do not hear about the survivors. Those children are the ones that we look after. They are left with the hallmarks of traumatic abuse for the rest of their lives. At what point do we stop blaming individual social workers and start admitting that the system is broken? Parents who have NO capacity to parent are allowed time and time again to practice on their vulnerable children. Children who have been removed from abusers are forced to have contact with them and are re-traumatised every time they go. I have been fighting this for over 25 years since realising how badly the system had failed my own adopted children and led to the deaths of two of their siblings. How much longer do we have to keep fighting for the rights to basic safety and care of our children? RIP little Arthur. Bless your heart. ”

There seems to be a total disconnect between the tragic death of little Arthur and those who survive and who we parent. But we can’t just take each instance in isolation. I know that not all children suffer to the extent that Arthur did but equally regardless of their age when they come to us they will have suffered trauma, in all likelihood will also have underlying genetic and/or other issues. They’re not a blank page. I think Sarah Naish says it far better than I can.

The headline of the original article wasn’t great, the lack of anonymity troubled me but this is the reality of adoption. Our children are the ones who have survived but not unscathed. There has to be a safe place to tell it as it is in a way that doesn’t appear to demonise the adoptive parents or the children. Parenting children with additional needs - any additional needs - is bloody hard work.

@lilythepink, I would respectfully argue that it is a helpful comparison as it is yet another example of a female being shut down/cancelled when trying to speak about personal and current issues that matter.

Those of us in the feminist community have been hounded out of jobs and issued with death threats for making the case that humans are chromosomally unable to change their sex. Eleanor Bradford has been shut down or ‘cancelled’ for being honest about her adoption story; people haven’t liked the language that she has used (or even the subeditors who write the headlines) so her content has been dismissed and she has been cancelled. Very few people have actually listened to her; they’re too busy being offended. We’re stuck in a society that cannot see the wood for the trees.

You mention in a later post that you’re not a fan of ‘cancel culture’ but you have tried to shut me down for having a difference of opinion. That does not make for a healthy discussion of equals.

I just wanted to add that I’d dearly love for Eleanor to have the freedom to post here to let us know her personal thoughts, as there is so much supposition and conjecture. Eleanor????

I was hoping she would