Forever FamiliesForever Families is a community group for adoptive families, it is the only one of its kind where by the support offered is for adopters as well as adoptees covering all ages. Our group has the strength of being run by adopters to support adopters. Too many support groups are run by professionals who know lots and no doubt have a wealth of knowledge in the adoption world however the best support comes from those who have lived the life that other adopters are living. No amount of qualifications or knowledge on adoption can prepare a family for living it day in and day out. Therefore we offer something that is invaluable.
All of the children that attend the group have their own history of how they came to be adopted, this brings with it in many cases a whole list of issues. Most of the children in many circles of society can be made either through their own insecurities or through public naivety to feel different than many of their peers. Having this support group allows them an outlet amongst other families where their story doesn't matter but they are the same as everyone else in the room. This is also true for the adopters, many of whom have come to adoption through infertility. The way in which adopters are required to parent their children is different to that of parents with birth children. They have to constantly factor in the child's past and how that impacts on how they deal with any given situation. Many of the parents get a great sense of support from being around other adopters, where they can discuss behaviours and get advice from each other and where their parenting styles wont be judged or where the impact of past events impacting on their child's behaviour isnt belittled as "all children do that". With this in mind it is very safe to say that the children benefit from a strong sense of belonging in interacting with similar peers at the group. The parents benefit from the interaction with other adopters whilst their children are taking part in many activities that are always going on. The children that attend can often be hyper-vigilant or have high level sensory issues as a result of their past. Adopted children often have a much younger social interaction age than their peers and pent up energy. The activities that are put on are designed to let the children interact and release their energy allowing the parents the time to interact and get support from other adopters. Unlike many community groups we don't target a small local demographic, but instead offer the support to anyone who would like to attend and we have many members from various points of the north west attending our support groups, however given that we are based in Tameside the majority of adopters that use this chartiable service are Manchester based adopters. Our group has recently gone from being a community group to becoming a registered charity (charity No : 1162753), however we started meeting (5 families) for coffee to support each other 22 months ago. We have grown over 25 months from 5 families meeting up to having 89 families on our books, consisting of 143 adopters/adults and 104 adoptees/children. We have formalised the group, set up a board and have given all of the members a voice in how they feel the support group is run. We have had their feedback in how they feel the group could continue to grow at the rate it has, what activities the children enjoy most and what additional support they feel adopters could gain. If you are interested in adoption and would like to speak to someone before making that first step to contacting an adoption agency please don't hesitate to contact us via the contact form and someone will be in touch.
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