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Valerie was mum to a five-year-old daughter and adult stepson when she and her husband decided to grow their family through adoption. Their adopted son joined their family in 2021 with the support of South East Wales National Adoption Service. This is their story…

I gave birth to my daughter when I was 44. Being a little bit older than typical first-time-mums, we felt it might be a bit risky having another pregnancy. We both work in social care, so we know the outcomes for looked after children, and we just felt like we had more room, and love, in our lives for another child. 

We started the adoption process at the beginning of 2020, we went through it all online because of Covid, the training, the panels, before we were matched with a little boy who is now our son.

The experience of going into a foster carer’s home and meeting your son is a very unusual and unique experience. I can remember being in bed the night before thinking “I’m going to meet my son tomorrow.” It’s a very strange experience, but it was very exciting. 

Our daughter was so excited to have a little brother. It is funny to look back, I think she almost expected a little toy, someone she could bring home and play with. We talked about adoption with her a lot, but perhaps not much about having a toddler in the house. She’d set up tea parties, and he would just pull it apart. But I think he bonded with her first. They had that relationship of two children playing together. He used to laugh his head off at her, it was wonderful to see their relationship develop.

Our son is incredibly lucky to have such a big circle around him. As part of his adoption, contact with birth family was continued. Formally, it should take place twice a year, but he loves his big sisters, and we all get on so well that we see them every couple of months. We recently started contact with his birth mother. We had support from our social worker to act as a kind of mediator and adviser for best practice with facilitating this. I remember thinking when we were going through the training that contact with birth families might be a bit scary or a bit of a worry, but it has been plain sailing. We all agreed it was within his best interest to have that relationship there.

He knows he is adopted. He understands that he has sisters that live with someone else, that his older brother is grown up and lives on his own and his birth mum is a part of his life too. He understands that families don’t all have to live together. To him, it is just a normal part of his life and we are here to support him through that. The training was so helpful with ensuring we had the rights tools to navigate something like this.

To anyone thinking about adoption, I would say just go for it. Do the training, read as much as you can, but also enjoy it. There is never a bad time to introduce adoption and excitement and love and family and all that joy into your life.