How we found a brother for Ben

There are over 4,000 children waiting to be adopted in this country. The Catholic Children's Society helps a small number each year to find a loving home and caring family. Here, David & Hannah * recount how they found a brother for their son, Ben.

How it Began:
We were very excited to be accepted by the Catholic Children’s Society as prospective adopters, as we were keen to help a child and find a brother for Ben!

Having been approved, we naively thought that we would soon be matched with a child! In fact, the matching process took several months -frustrating at the time, but we now appreciate the importance of finding a child whose needs we could meet.

Andrew:
We were thrilled to be considered as adoptive parents for Andrew. We were told Andrew had potential developmental difficulties, but after discussions with a paediatrician and our social worker, we agreed that the risks were slight and that it was something we could deal with as a family.

In July 2004 we brought Andrew home! Ben was thrilled to have the brother he had always wanted. The first few weeks were quite difficult as Andrew felt very insecure and would not let Hannah out of his sight but with a lot of patience and time, the attachment issue resolved itself. In due course we attended a paediactric clinic and were over the moon to be told that Andrew's development was now on a par with children of his own age.

The New Family:
Ben is very proud of his younger brother and enjoys teaching him new things. As a family we now have wonderful holidays and days out together and thoroughly enjoy each other’s company.

The joy that Andrew has given us all has persuaded us to go through the process again and complete our family with the adoption of a sister for Ben and Andrew. We are looking forward to the new challenges of adopting another child and nurturing them in our happy, secure and loving home.

Click here if you would like to find out more about adopting through the Catholic Children's Society.

*names changed to protect confidentiality.