Adoption - it ain't easy.

Yesterday was an 'information day' we attended to be steamrollered with the reality of stats, waiting times, and massive punches to the head about adoption.

There are 24,000 people in France who have a certificate saying they can adopt children. That's the same amount of children as there are in the entire world who are up for adoption.

There might be millions of children in poverty and in need of loving, caring parents, but they're not up for adoption unless a judge has ruled as such. Quite right too.

Once they're up for adoption, it's a mad scramble by hopeful parents and adoption agencies from loads of countries trying to get their feet in the door first. This leads to countries creating incredible demands for adoptive parents.

• Colombia put up ads, like Job ads, saying they need 15 parents. First come first served if you tick all the boxes. The rest of the applications get shredded. 
• Russia demand that you report back for the next 18 years of the child's life once you've adopted.
• In Bulgaria, you have to define on a 5 page questionnaire the child you're looking for. It's not about what you're like as parents-to-be. It's whether the child up for adoption fits exactly the child you want to look after. 
• Some African countries demand papers signed by priests.

As for adopting babies, we were told that it simply wasn't possible from abroad. You might be able to from Ethiopia, but you'd have to be under 35 years of age in four years time. The whole room of hopeful French parents sitting around me snorted.

You might be able to adopt a baby in France. The huge total 24 babies who were adopted last year did go to parents. But before you get too comfortable, we were reminded that most of the mothers were alcoholics or drug addicts. Drink while you're pregnant and your child can have serious development issues that only show up as they grow up. Age six you might discover they can never read or write. 

A 'celibate' (as they're called in French) next to me who was obviously hoping to adopt was told she'd have no luck in Africa. Most African countries demand five years of marriage at least. I tick that box. Shame then that I was only in the market for caucasian. The only time my neighbour could start scribbling in her book is if she would be comfortable adopting a handicapped child from China.

Some parents worked out a quicker way than working through the Hague Convention of certificates and regulations and went for 'individual adoption' where you run to a country outside of the convention, find an adoptable child, and get your signatures down on some papers fast. Russia fell under that category last year and subsequently found hundreds of its children adopted by French (the third biggest adopting country after Italy and the US). Those doors are closed now, apparently, and all eyes are on Vietnam.

Made me realise that people who say Adoption is a wonderful thing - giving a home to a child in need etc... - aren't quite right. There must be about 50 times the amount of parents than there are children. The only really selfless adoption, and where the parents deserve medals, are when a disabled child is adopted, or a child who's in his or her teens.

Made me realise too that you can't quite weigh up the alternatives of a newborn adopted child verses a newborn child from a surrogate because that's not realistic. The reality is a newborn child from surrogacy that costs you more than a college education in the US, versus a 6 year old from Africa or Asia that would join us in about five years time. Easy to see why surrogacy is now turning up in articles in OK! Magazine, in the Daily Mail, in daily conversations and on many peoples' bank balances.

Onwards and Upwards

Thank you for those who took the step of writing to me. Sorry to my husband who's querying my use of the word 'squidgy'

As promised, I bring you an entire posting on adoption and surrogacy. Get ready for a five minute lesson on why not to worry about your own fertility if you are, and on the weird and wonderful world we live in.

ADOPTION.

Photo to sum it up on the right

(being realistic about the age of the child in this case...): 

Welcome to the wonderful world of the Hague Convention. Before this was brought in, adopting from the US was a cinch. The Millibands did so for their two sons in 2007.
Now you have to apply for a homestudy in the country where you live. The 'Agrement pour Adoption' in my local language. We took a deep breath and have sent off the first of what I expect will be a barrage of documentation. Surprisingly, the French on the phone I've come across so far have been remarkably nice. This is rare, but perhaps they're carefully selected from amongst maternal nice people.

9 months later, apparently, after criminal record tests, medical certificates, photos, psychological tests and interviews with social services types (11 hours of interviews in total, apparently), you get your receipt. That lasts 5 years and for one child. With it, you can apply to adopt a child in any country within the Hague Convention. Most end up adopting from Africa/Asia because there's less of a time lag. We'd be going Caucasian and hopefully a baby. "I'm writing because we are interested in adopting a Caucasian newborn" go these remarkably surreal emails I've started sending to find an 'outgoing' adoption agency in the US.

Guess that if you didn't get the dream choice, as you couldn't bear the wait, the process would look a bit like this (right): 

The oddest part of this whole thing is coming across, on practically every adoption site, these dreadful photo listings of children who are up for adoption. I pick one, at random, to show you. It's dreadful to see them all lining up like that. For the older ones who are more adept on computers than me, it must be harrowing to see yourself up there for ages and no-one clicking 'interested'. Soul destroying no doubt. It is no surprise that the vast majority are disturbed and 'difficult' children. The 'ads' make devastating reading.
This is not a light and cheerful pass-time.

SURROGACY.

Delighted to say that I think I've made some good discoveries. The fear of surrogacy is that you part with 4 years salary and then the surrogate mother doesn't get pregnant/miscarries and you're left really sad and also really broke.

• Los Angeles (due to US medical fees) is simple but crushingly expensive at around 100-150K$ (depending on whether you need an egg donor too)
• Ukraine is about 20K$, but there are loads of reports of fake pregnancies or trafficking babies to pass off as genetic ones, and people running off with your cash, so I think I'd also opt for 5-10K$ with a legal firm who manage all the transactions and check your surrogate mother isn't a Nigerian with a fat cigar.
• UK we'd need to find a surrogate mother who liked the look of us. We'd have to move back too. There are no fees that swop hands between you and the mother. This is altuism at its best.
• India again is interesting as, while only costing around 25k$, it did have the downside of having to wait 3 months in India post birth to get UK citizenship for your child. My clever husband was born in the US, though, so we could apply for US citizenship which only takes 3-4 weeks, return home to France and apply for UK citizenship from here. As a Brit, you need to add on 5K for a 'parental order' so that you become the mother. This is tedious, but probably necessary.

Of all this lot, I think this agency is taking my interest the most, and answering my emails quickly and efficiently. According to one of the million online blogs/websites I've read on this all, that's something not to be disregarded. This is about efficiency and professionalism after all. It's a 'process'. They have a UK branch, they find you another surrogate if your 'chosen one' isn't able to get pregnant for no further fees and they have legal advisers for the genetic DNA checks and visa applications. Hell, they even send a chauffeur to pick you up from the airport. I've got about 20 email addresses of other 'intended parents' who've gone home with their tiny packages too. Next step blanket emailing 'Hello, I'm looking to etc....'. Again, very very surreal.


That's all. I hope this is more positive than the last update. Onwards and upwards as I said. Who knows, I might end up with triplets.


[If this was useful, you might find a more recent post about a meeting with a surrogacy agency I had interesting too, and - 'pitfalls of surrogacy. Look before you jump']

Adopting an attitude towards Adoption

Turns I was right to try and join the dots between abortions and baby adoptions.

With abortions in Europe no longer such a taboo [see left], and single mothers are fairly commonplace (In the UK about 1 out of 4 families with dependent children are single-parent families!), it's no wonder that there aren't so many babies up for adoption.

This means that the UK and France (countries I have an interest in given that I straddle [sic] the two) find that adoption campaigners pick on the same subject: social services are slowing down the adoption process because they're dealing with a child who is often a few years old, rather than a newborn. The problem being, of course, that, by the time social/legal services have digested the issue, the child's likely a few years older again and even less easy to adopt for potential parents like me hoping for the 'Traditional Family Dream'. [see right]

America, meanwhile, holy land that it is, does have stronger views on Abortions, and adoption agencies have picked up on that, resulting in the Juno phenomenon.

It appears, that for between $4-10,000 you can adopt a baby in America straight from delivery. Meanwhile, however, Americans appear to be adopting faster from abroad than from their hood. The U.S. Department of State reported 12,753 immigrant visas issued to orphans entering the U.S. in 2009. 
Why? It's a question of waiting time (families are more particular about what they want when adopting from their neighbourhood than if adopting from abroad), fees, legal complications (that differ per country) and many other quagmires of complicated footnotes, secret costs and emotional pitfalls.

And here I sit, feeling like I'm oddly online shopping for a child.

I'm weighing up the costs, delivery, the ability to congest all the terms and conditions before I sign on any dotted lines, different countries/companies' policies and the knowledge that I'll probably never know for sure if I've made the right choice until it's been delivered to my door step and I'm making it part of my every day life.

Pro-life and adoption agencies

Someone isn't doing the maths. One one side you have women who are pregnant, don't want the baby but can't face abortion. On the other you have couples desperate for children who can't have them. Mix the two together and you get explosions of fizzy pop and marshmallows.

Seems that Prolife doesn't much care about what happens once the child is born, though, just that the child is born at all.

I recognise that, if you've made the step to adopt a child that's not your own, some might say it's not that much further a push to consider adopting a child that is 3 or 4 years old and comes with a difficult upbringing. The heartstrings are sensitive after all and they're talking to a primed, overly effusive maternal audience.

However, Adoption UK have this terrible Wall they put up showing how wonderful healthy children have perfect upbringing with love, security, milk, cuddles, education, trust, family, attention, friends etc.... Watch, then as they bring the bricks crashing down one by one in this excrutiatingly painfully slow process with explanations for dummies where they say, eg, 'Love. They may not have had any and might not want yours'. 'cuddles. They won't have had many due to abuse and won't trust yours'. 'FRIENDS. Coz they didn't get cuddles they might not want friends etc...'. I sort of expected them to then write 'HUMAN NATURE. Due to not have all those previous bricks, they might not be normal'.

Anyway. You get my point. It seemed rather over the top, although I know they're just trying to ram the point home. Smashing that dream again I guess.

POP

Kidney has permanent scarring

Feel like I've got a world record. I've been incredibly successful in failing to keep the kidney I was so kindly given happy and welcome in its new home. I rejected it unceremoniously for a few months, and then I got it nice and infected for good measure. I lost 100 creatinine points in so doing, landing at a round, and nasty sounding 200. That's 30% or so of kidney function remaining for those not in the medicinal know. You don't need to have any sort of degree to know it doesn't sound good.

I had an odd, almost out of body experience as I said, numbed and placid before a matronly consultant I've never met before and heard her say, in French, that I was unlikely ever to have children. They can't say for sure as it's such a big thing to say with just one biopsy that is, after all, not representative of the whole kidney given that they only take out such a tiny part, but it's not looking promising. My 'vascular' whatevers apparently aren't doing all that well after the long beating I've given them over the past 6 months. Whoopideedoodar.

I immediately, being female, a planner, and (although struggling a bit more now...) usually optimistic, have started looking at my options. They are:
1. Nothing. hope I'll defy all medical history and pop out a couple of beeming children, to the applause of all my friends of family. 'What a trooper' they cry. 'Only Kate!' etc... Yah right.

2. I go down the SURROGACY route. A friend's sister is in fact Avey in this blog . This is the surrogacy clinic that manages the whole thing. You have to stay in the country for 3 months when you pick up the child because that's how long it takes for the UK Embassy to administer a passport for your confused child.

3. Adoption... I just see words like 'Conseil General' and find myself downloading spreadsheets and ven diagrams and power point presentations like this one

Hard not to notice the big words, '9 MOIS' or 'AGREMENT REFUSE'.

Given my kidney luck, I'll probably be rejected a nice two years into the process.

And let's not forget the wonderful confusion of us being two Brits living in France.

Am I resident in the UK? Can I apply for Surrogacy UK? If I adopt a kid in France, is my kid then also British or would my own child then be of a different nationality from me?

Obviously, if anyone is in the same position as me (highly unlikely I now realise) or thinks they can help, I'd love some advice.

Feeling more than a little bit lost.