POLLY Kerridge felt a warm glow as she watched her children exploring their new home.
It had taken years of preparation, meetings and parenting classes and at last she was able to call these two children son and daughter.
Aware of their difficult start in life, Polly* was sure she would be able to give the brother and sister the life they deserved.
Never for one moment did she imagine that four months later she and husband Andrew* would be saying goodbye to their adopted children for good.
“The idea of giving them back never even entered my mind and the reality was horrific,” Polly tells Fabulous.
The couple of 12 years never wanted children of their own and instead longed to provide a loving, safe home to youngsters in need.
“I had no interest in carrying a baby and I felt like I had the right experience to support a child who had experienced trauma,” Polly says.
“I had been through trauma myself during my teens and I had come out the other side, and I wanted to help another child to do the same.”
The couple began looking into adoption in 2017 and say they were under no illusion that they would be getting a “perfect” child.
Polly, now 43, says: “We certainly didn’t go into the experience blind.
“I used to get frustrated when I’d meet couples looking for a ‘perfect’ child. It was unrealistic.”
Both Polly and Andrew were informed of the type of behaviour and conditions they might expect from an adopted child.
But she says it was a far cry from the reality of what was really needed.
“We had training in dealing with trauma and the impact of foetal alcohol syndrome,” Polly explains.
“The way this was discussed made it sound like these were extremely unlikely scenarios.”
In November 2023 the couple’s dream came true when they were matched with Billy*, five, and his sister Ava*, four.
“Our social worker implied they were the ‘Holy Grail’ of children to adopt,” Polly says.
“We took every parenting course available to us and readied ourselves for the kind of children we thought we were welcoming into our lives.
“We knew there had been alcohol abuse and domestic violence but we were not prepared for the level of trauma that turned up on our doorstep.”
Polly and Andrew welcomed their two children into their home April 2024 believing that this was the start of their new family.
However, she says it was a matter of days before she realised that Billy’s needs were far greater than she had been led to believe.
“It was very push and pull, sometimes he’d want us with him, other times he wouldn’t want anything to do with us,” she says.
“He seemed to need control over the household and would try to manipulate us and his sister.
“I believe this was the only way he felt safe.”
Worried about their son integrating, Polly says she made the first call to their social worker, asking whether they could be referred for a trauma assessment with Billy.
However, they were told this wasn’t possible until Billy had been with the couple for six months.
He looked me dead in the eye lifted my top up and tried to bite me
Polly Kerridge
With no other option, Polly continued to parent her two children to the best of her ability but it was just few weeks in that Billy began to lash out.
“I was a little taken aback but I didn’t think loads of it because I was aware that he was experiencing constant change,” she says.
“But it escalated into regular biting, kicking and punching, and throwing things around the lounge.”
Polly says his behaviour was becoming increasingly threatening.
“A couple of months in Billy had begun threatening to kill us,” she says.
“One evening Billy tried to pull his sister out of her high chair, so I took her upstairs to safety.
“When I came back downstairs he was holding a knife.
“I’ll never forget what my social worker said when I mentioned it: ‘It’s only a butter knife’.”
HOW MANY ADOPTIONS BREAKDOWN?
There is no UK-wide data, but most sources put the figure at between 3% and 9%.
That’s still hundreds of families, and obviously each one is agonising for everyone involved.
The terms adoption ‘break down’ and adoption ‘disruption’ are disliked by families whose children are no longer living with them, because they often continue to parent their children at a distance, with regular ongoing contact between them.
Source: Adoption UK
Polly says that the stress of parenting quickly put a strain on both herself and Andrew.
“Within a couple of months I had lost a stone-and-a-half,” she says.
“My mum said I just looked desperate, and that’s exactly how I felt.
“I was sending daily emails to our social worker but continually the help we asked for never arrived.”
As the couple waited for therapy, they tried their best to carry on until one incident saw Polly hit breaking point.
“We were on our way home and Billy threw his scooter on the floor,” she remembers.
“He told me to pick it up and I just said ‘no’, there had to be some boundaries.
“He responded by urinating on our carpet in the living room.
“On one occasion after a disagreement over a toy he looked me dead in the eye lifted my top up to try and bite me.
“I was constantly on edge waiting to be attacked or to need to get his sister out of harm’s way.”
I was frightened of my son
Polly Kerridge
Polly sent a desperate email to Regional Director of Social Services explaining they could not continue as they were.
But rather than receiving the support they hoped for they were met with a heartbreaking decision to put the children back into care.
“I was frightened by my son at that point,” Polly says.
“We had a strong bond with our daughter but the decision was made to keep the siblings together.
“I wish we could have stayed parents to our daughter and we could have had a relationship with our son.
“Now we have no contact with either of them.”
A week after Polly sent the email, her two children left her home forever.
“I will never be able to describe the utter shame and heartbreak I felt in that moment,” she says.
“Our daughter told me she loved me as we said our goodbyes, I think she knew she wasn’t coming back.
“The thought of giving these children back when we welcomed them into our lives was unimaginable, it still feels so unreal.”
In the weeks that followed, Polly and Andrew struggled to readjust to their old lives.
“The gravity of it was so huge to process,” she says.
“I don’t even want to live in the same area anymore.
“I was embedded in the community, I made friends at my son’s school, the parks, the cafes, everything is tainted with memories of them.”
It has been six months since Polly last saw her children and she says the disruption has had a lasting impact.
“I’m now of an age where I wouldn’t consider having children of my own,” she says.
“The experience we had means I wouldn’t adopt again, I’m not even sure we’d be allowed to.”
Polly has since discovered that there are thousands of families experiencing the same thing.
How does adoption work?
In the UK, there is lengthy process involved with adopting a child and it can take up to six months for the paperwork to be finalised.
To even be considered, you have to meet the following criteria:
- You must be over 21
- You must be a legal resident of the UK for at least 12 months.
- No criminal convictions – especially any related to the endangerment of children. This applies to everyone your household.
You will also have to go through an inital background check and assesment, which will consider whether you are the right fit for adoption.
Potenital parents will also have undergo training and a process to match them with the right child.
She worked with the campaign group PATCH (Passionate Adopters Targeting Change with Hope) which was created to ensure children and families gain access to the right services and the right interventions following adoption.
“It was enormously comforting to know that we weren’t alone in our situation,” Polly says.
“But equally it was enormously worrying that so many families are being let down by this system.
“Andrew and I wanted to take on a child who could benefit from our help and love now that child is back in care.
“I’m not here to shame Billy. He did nothing wrong. He’s a child and he was just as let down by the system as I was.
“I believe everything happens for a reason and this happened to me so I could use my tenacity to make a change in the system.”
Fiona Wells, founder of PATCH comments: “The true scale of the adoption crisis is being overlooked, whether by denial or neglect.
“Hundreds of adopters share their struggles with PATCH, revealing a system that removes children due to trauma yet fails to provide the support needed for recovery.
“At the core of this failure is a critical oversight: a child’s history is ignored until trauma manifests in crisis yet then this crisis is blamed on parents for not managing complex trauma symptoms.
“PATCH is amplifying the voices of adopters failed by the system. Too many care plans, regardless of permanence, overlook the critical need for recovery, repair, and acknowledgment of trauma, adversity, loss, and harm.”
*Names have been changed. Polly received no payment for this article.
