So last night was the date of what was supposed to be our first open evening but because i've been so keen to crack on with everything, i found another one to go to last week.
We arrived later than we anticipated due to traffic but when we arrived everyone was very friendly and welcoming, they made sure that we had our information packs and had signed in so that they knew who we are and then they sorted us with a drink and a biscuit (bonus!).
Once we sat down, we watched a quick presentation about the agency and generally about fostering and adoption. After that there was a quick introduction to the agencies team and to some members of the adoption team of one of the local authorities near us (we are right on the cusp of one LA and in another so we have options there too) who work in partnership with the agency to try and provide the best possible support.
Once the official bit were talked through, we had a chat with an adopter who has recently gone through the process which again was great.
Lots of information was given to us and every question we could think of was answered. It was great to see the LA and VA working together even though it was only an information night. They were all incredibly relaxed and it was honestly brilliant.
When we left, we were so excited about everything and talked everything through for a good couple of hours. It was inspiring!
Fast forward a week and off we went to another agency for another evening.
Straight away, it just didn't feel the same. We had a talk from a couple of social workers and talked with some new parents which again was very informative and we learnt some new things about the process.
We got another information pack and spoke to some other people at the end. One of the social workers asked us some questions but didn't seem to be too interested in our answers, she even mentioned that she was hoping to still be able to watch her soaps when she got home. Weird thing to say so far as we're concerned.
Anyway, when we left i asked my wife which agency she was feeling best about. She was reluctant to say at first until i said that i didn't know why necessarily but it was definitely the first and she agreed and said that it was because she didn't know why that she was worried about saying something.
We spent much of the evening discussing it again and asking twitter what they thought and decided that our gut instinct is the best tool we have so to go with it.
Now for one more open evening with the LA who's boundaries we live within during fostering and adoption week and we'll be going for stage one!!
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