{"id":1137,"date":"2025-03-17T15:08:16","date_gmt":"2025-03-17T16:08:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/?p=1137"},"modified":"2025-03-18T23:11:51","modified_gmt":"2025-03-18T23:11:51","slug":"i-adopted-my-son-at-3-he-couldnt-bear-to-be-touched","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/2025\/03\/17\/i-adopted-my-son-at-3-he-couldnt-bear-to-be-touched\/","title":{"rendered":"I adopted my son at 3 \u2013 he couldn\u2019t bear to be touched"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n\t\t\"Mother\t<\/div>
Trauma doesn\u2019t disappear when a child is placed into a loving home (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When I first met my youngest son, he had a flat head and was a \u2018floppy baby\u2019 who couldn\u2019t sit up at a year old.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He looked vacant, expressionless, and it took months for him to smile.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He\u2019d spent his first eight months lying alone in a cot, rarely picked up, rocked, or comforted.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He was eerily quiet; he had stopped crying long ago because, in his world, cries went unanswered. He had adapted to neglect, <\/a>wired for survival rather than connection.\u00a0<\/p>\n

My eldest son was different, but no less harmed. Adopted at three years <\/a>old, he was wary, hyper-alert, and unable to tolerate even gentle touch.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If I moved too quickly, he would flinch and withdraw, physically bracing for the violence he\u2019d previously known. In those early months, during a moment of panic, he put his tiny hands around my neck.<\/a><\/p>\n

Trauma doesn\u2019t disappear when a child is placed into a loving home<\/a>. It is embedded physically in their brain, shaping every response and interaction.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Tackling this is a long, hard process, and that\u2019s precisely why the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) was created.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It provides specialist trauma therapy, attachment-focused interventions, <\/a>therapeutic parenting support, and play therapy, vital services that help traumatised children rebuild their emotional foundations.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And from my experience, that is crucial work.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n
\n\t\t\"\"\t<\/div>
Things are hard enough for adoptive parents like me (Picture: Lisa Mainwaring)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The ASGSF doesn\u2019t give money directly to adopters; rather, it funds these critical interventions through local authorities who commission specialist therapy for children most severely impacted by developmental trauma.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s precisely what has allowed my children to move from fear to safety, to finally trust adults, and start engaging meaningfully with the world around them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Yet today, the government is threatening to remove this lifeline.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The ASGSF is only being funded through the end of March, with no update on whether it will be continued or replaced by targeted support.<\/p>\n

That has left parents dealing with abandonment from the government, while dealing with their own children\u2019s difficult development.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For children who\u2019ve experienced abandonment, shame is so entrenched they don\u2019t even realise they\u2019re acting from it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Birthdays and holidays are often ruined because joy itself feels threatening to children.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As an adoptive parent, you quickly become an accidental trauma expert. You devour every book, attend every webinar, and absorb every piece of neuroscience you can, because understanding trauma becomes essential; not just for your child, but for your entire family\u2019s survival.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But we can\u2019t do this alone, and that\u2019s why lifelines like the ASGSF are so crucial.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n
\n\t\t\"Baby's\t<\/div>
When I first met my son he couldn\u2019t sit up (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ten years ago, when David Cameron was prime minister, he passionately encouraged families to step forward to adopt.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His government launched high-profile adoption campaigns, promising families ongoing support, and rightly describing the long wait for children as a \u2018tragedy\u2019.<\/p>\n

A decade on, with a new government, those promises ring hollow. Adopters feel abandoned, and the devastating consequences are looming if the ASGSF funding isn\u2019t sorted.\u00a0<\/p>\n

My children won\u2019t magically stop needing therapy if their support disappears, they won\u2019t suddenly forget their trauma.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Without continued support, their hard-earned progress will stall or regress. Families like mine are already emotionally exhausted from the relentless push-pull of trauma behaviours.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Without professional help, the strain quickly becomes overwhelming, leading families to breaking point, adoption breakdown and even children returning to an already overstretched care system.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Schools and professionals frequently misunderstand trauma, mistaking certain behaviours for deliberate disruption. Traumatised children regularly face exclusion, compounding their struggles.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n
\n\t\t\"Mother,\t<\/div>
We need an immediate commitment, not just short-term but long-term (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Recent research by Newcastle University exposed another hidden crisis: adoption poverty. Adopters are routinely forced out of careers they loved, overwhelmed by advocacy and navigating a fragmented, dysfunctional system.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This week, the government is launching plans that will urge everyone to work, yet policy-makers seem oblivious to the reality that adoptive parents frequently cannot hold down careers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Instead, we spend our lives advocating for our children\u2019s basic rights, caught in endless meetings, battles for Education Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) and relentless form-filling, all within a fractured, inadequate system.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Policymakers need to consider the butterfly effect, the unintended chain reactions their decisions set off. Cutting the ASGSF in a few weeks isn\u2019t just a budget decision, it would trigger devastating societal consequences.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Adoption numbers could dwindle, leaving children stuck longer in an overwhelmed care system.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Untreated childhood trauma could also lead directly to higher mental health needs, lower educational outcomes, unemployment, and increased criminal justice involvement later.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n
Comment now<\/title><span class=\"metro-comment-cta__text\">Will your child be affected if this funding is cut? <\/span><\/span><a class=\"metro-comment-cta__button\" href=\"#metro-comments-container\">Comment Now<\/a><\/div>\n<\/section>\n<p>I was chatting to Zach Gomm, a specialist in therapeutic parenting and developmental trauma support, about the devastating impact of cutting the ASGSF.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He told me that many teens forced to end therapy now may never return, and for some families, those weekly sessions were the only thing holding them together.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Removing this support is a short-sighted financial decision that will inevitably become society\u2019s moral and economic debt.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>We need an immediate commitment, not just short-term but long-term, to ensure every adopted child receives essential therapeutic support.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>These children didn\u2019t choose their early trauma, but we, as a society, can choose to help them heal or abandon them, and that\u2019s why I\u2019m urging people to contact their MP to tell them the Adoption Support Fund must continue.<\/p>\n<p>Because love alone, sadly, isn\u2019t enough.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><strong>Do you have a story you\u2019d like to share? Get in touch by emailing <a href=\"mailto:jess.austin@metro.co.uk\">jess.austin@metro.co.uk<\/a>.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><strong>Share your views in the comments below.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Trauma doesn\u2019t disappear when a child is placed into a loving home (Picture: Getty Images) When I first met my youngest son, he had a flat head and was a \u2018floppy baby\u2019 who couldn\u2019t sit up at a year old.\u00a0 He looked vacant, expressionless, and it took months for him to smile.\u00a0 He\u2019d spent his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1139,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1137"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1144,"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137\/revisions\/1144"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/softnary.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}