Part 5...

We've just got home from our last preparation course session - it was an evening session - so only 3 hours!

We had a talk from an adoptee. She is 23 now, and was totally honest with us. She said that her mum and dad are her mum and dad - she has met her birth mum, and her birth siblings, but the people who brought her up, are her parents.

She described the problems that she had at school with anger, and not being able to trust. She says she still finds it difficult to trust.

She contacted her birth mum when she was 18. She says that she was too young, but even if she'd been told to wait, she wouldn't have. She seems to have a lot of anger towards her birth mum - that she wasn't able to sort her life out in order to keep her. That even now her mum is lying about why she was taken into care. That she would have nothing to do with her birth mum apart from she wants a relationship with her siblings.

She says that her parents were fantastic. That there is nothing that she wishes they had done differently. That she always knew she was adopted, and that her parents were always totally honest with her (in an age appropriate way). That her parents were there for her, and supported her no matter what. In fact, that was her top tip: be honest and be there!

Hearing her story was really really interesting. She was absolutely positive about adoption - even though there were things that she has done wrong, it's not because of the adoption.

After she finished, we had a chance to run through the 'what next' steps. We have an appointment with a social worker next week, as a follow up to the course. We then sit and wait to be assigned a social worker for our home study.