Listening, learning and strengthening support for our adopters

At Adoption Cumbria, we are committed to continually developing and improving the support we offer to adoptive families. A key part of this is listening to the voices and experiences of the people who know it best - our adopters.

We’ve been working closely with our newly established Adopter Forum to explore how our support services can evolve, shaped directly by the insights and feedback of adoptive parents. This collaborative approach is already helping us identify meaningful developments, including enhancements to our support offer and the refresh of our buddying service - an important source of peer support for families.

In this blog, we’re pleased to share a Q&A between our adopter Jo and Vicky Davidson Boyd, Service Manager at Adoption Cumbria, who talks about the work underway and why it’s so important to put adopters at the heart of service development. 

Jo: So Vicky, this proposal for a buddy system has come out of the Adopter Forum that has recently been set up. Can you tell us a little about what the service is hoping for from increased dialogue with adopters? 

What we are really trying to achieve is being more engaged with adoptive parents and hearing directly from adoptive parents about what is important to them, to help inform our service development and improvement. We want to build this into our routine work- being informed by adopters’ views, and also responding to adoptive parents’ ideas about what supports they need, and representative views. By working more closely with adoptive parents around service development we want to do the things that will help.

Jo: The buddy system is part of a wider programme you are looking to develop around peer led support - what most excited you about this? 

What I was excited by is that adoptive parents in the forum all said this would be hugely helpful. We could respond to what adopters feel they need. I am also really passionate about community-based support and the benefits of giving and receiving help, so this idea really excited me. I've been learning recently about a concept called Community Based Assets and I feel this is what a buddying system is.

Jo: So, with that in mind can you tell us about the proposed buddy system? What is it in a nutshell? 

The scheme will be a 1:1 link for new adoptive parents, with a peer buddy, from the point of approval. We are committed to offering a peer buddy to all new adopters as a matter of course, however taking up the offer won’t be mandatory. 

The peer buddy will be offered for the period from approval (with the link ideally made just prior to approval panel) through linking and matching, the child(ren) moving in, and up to adoption order. Following this period it will be up to families to decide if they wish to continue with a friendship, however, it is envisaged that the Regional Adoption Agency (RAA) will need the buddy to be available for new families.  

The buddy role will be to befriend and offer a ‘safe’ place for advice, and someone to talk to, for the new adoptive parent. A buddy will be able to provide a listening ear and a space where there are no stupid questions or wrong feelings or concerns. It is not a formal mentoring role, although this service is being developed across the North West region. 

It is hoped that this scheme will help prospective adopters to feel seen, valued and connected at this vulnerable stage of their journey and to help feed them into a wider community of support going forward. Buddies will not be expected to have all the answers - far more important is that they have lived experience to share. However, buddies will be equipped to offer some guidance and links to services, or other adoptive parents who may have more relevant information. 

Jo: We’ve started to get a feel for the shape of it, but before we dive a little deeper into some of the nuts and bolts could you share with us a little more of the heart and vision behind the scheme? 

Firstly - right at the heart of this scheme is the desire to acknowledge how hard, emotional and at times overwhelming life as newly approved adopters, waiting adopters and new adoptive parents can be. And that is on top of simply being a new parent which is, in itself, a life changing experience. 

The hope is that the offer of a buddy with lived experience to draw alongside new adopters in the early days will help to validate and reassure new parents as they embark on their journey.  

It is our desire as a RAA that adopters feel able to speak up earlier and with greater confidence about anything that they are finding hard and it is hoped that the buddy scheme will be a key part to facilitating this.  

As an adoption service we are aware that there can be a mismatch between what we think we are offering and how that is experienced by adoptive parents on the ground. Our vision for the buddy scheme (and peer-led support more generally) is that there will be a team of adopters who have a clear and up-to-date picture of what is available from the RAA so they can point new adopters to the relevant events and training opportunities and help them feel more confident in accessing these as appropriate for them. In addition, it is also hoped that there can increasingly be more peer input into the support offered and therefore a closer match between what is offered and what is needed.  

The buddy is working with the RAA and is part of a system of support that has been developed for adoptive parents. Peer buddying is a support offer that adoptive parents have proposed, as something valuable for all adopters in their journey of adoptive parenting. Peer buddies are encouraged not to be critical of the RAA, but may encourage an adoptive parent to ask questions, or guide them on who to go to, if they are worried or unhappy.

Perhaps one way of looking at it is to see the peer buddy as a bridge - helping the new adoptive parent to connect with other adopters, with more information about adoption from those with lived experience, and with the service as a whole.

Jo: Can you tell us a bit about how and when the links will be made - what sort of criteria will you use to match people up and when will they first get in touch? 

There will be efforts to match buddies with new adopters on the basis of geography to make it easier to meet face to face occasionally if that is wanted - however we would also consider the advantages of matching families whose circumstances are similar. 

The Adoption Support Service will be allocating two Peer Buddy Coordinators for this scheme and these coordinators will work with the Panel Advisor to know which new adopters are coming to Panel. In the pre-panel preparation period, the coordinators will work with the adopter’s social worker, to identify a suitable Peer Buddy. 

The Peer Buddy will be asked to contact the new adopter within the first week after approval. It is expected that contact is via telephone in the early stages, and that any face-to-face meet ups are by mutual agreement. 

Jo: What sort of commitment would becoming a buddy involve? 

We think we should buddy all new adoptive parents, because adopters have told us this is what will help. Or at least make that offer. We hope to offer this until new adopters have a child matched and living with them, and ideally up to the adoption order. We will need to look at training and we have identified two link people to be co-ordinators of the service, but I think adoptive parents can be trainers too.

Jo: What sort of support and resources would there be? 

Other buddies - so they can pool experience and wisdom and support each other. The adoptive parents considering the buddy scheme have said that it would be useful to have a WhatsApp group so that they can seek advice from each other if needed. We have also identified two scheme co-ordinators who are social workers in the Adoption Support Team, who will be designated as people to run the scheme, allocate families and ensure that everyone has a point of contact, an opportunity for a check-in, and support. The coordinators will check in with buddies in every Peer Buddy arrangement, to check out that the buddying is going well, and offer an opportunity for discussion if there are any issues to resolve.  

Jo: Presumably you’re keen to recruit some buddies - can you tell us a bit about what you are looking for in a buddy?

People who can offer some time and commitment to this role. Experienced adoptive parents, past the adoption order stage. People open to accepting others, even where they may do things differently than you, or be different kinds of people

Able to listen.

Able to encourage and support.

Supportive of the Adoption Service, and able to advise the new adopters, and the service if anything may need a further look.