Campaign Focus

PATCH (Passionate Adopters Targeting Change with Hope) was established to illuminate the challenges faced by many adopters in crisis, exposing the inadequacies and harmful nature of current systems.

Drawing from lived experiences, we strive to enhance understanding and recognition, advocating for systemic reforms where support is better purposed, and inline with needs of the child and the family. With additional consideration that early life trauma left unhealed leaves a lasting legacy.

The hope is that such changes will benefit adopters, adoptees, and their families ultimately mitigating the blame and shame experience faced by adopters.

Upcoming event

Please join PATCH and Al Coates, and guests for a virtual event focused on safeguarding families in the adoption. We will be considered in current practice, impacts on parents and children and future practice.

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/safeguarding-families-in-adoption-tickets-950064156467?utm-campaign=social&utm-content=attendeeshare&utm-medium=discovery&utm-term=listing&utm-source=cp&aff=ebdsshcopyurl

Most recent articles:

PATCH Word

Ongoing

Member of the Adoption Reference Group for DofE

Parent Panel member for the Family Rights Group

Who we have spoken to….

AUK – Family Futures – Oxford Attach – Ofsted – SWE – Coram – Al Coates – DofE – Adoption England – MP’s far & wide – Newcastle Uni – National Adoption Recruitment Steering Group – Ridley & Hall – Adoption & Fostering Podcast – Social Work News – Betsy-De-Thierry – Wild Ways Therapy – VLM Therapy – PACT – Hertfordshire LA – & others, plus a significant amount of correspondence & information sharing through the Crisis Doc and other PATCH activities

Want to be a part of this –

join the patch group on Facebook, follow on X or link with me on Linkedin

https://www.facebook.com/groups/201352092616700/

@PATCH_Adoptcris

https://www.linkedin.com/in/fiona-wells-patch-9064071a5

Who We Are

Driven by personal journeys and united in our mission, we strive to ensure that every adopter’s voice is heard, and every child’s trauma is addressed with expertise and empathy. Our commitment lies in pushing for meaningful change, challenging systemic failings, and advocating for the entire well-being of children and families within the adoption community.

Explore Who We Are

Voices

These narratives are not just stories; they are heartfelt pleas for understanding, empathy, and systemic change. From personal accounts to professional insights, each voice contributes to a richer, more nuanced dialogue on adoption, fostering, and the urgent need for a more empathetic and informed approach. Listen, reflect, and join us in our mission to transform the landscape of adoption and social care.

Hear Voices

Resources & Links

Here, you’ll find a comprehensive collection of tools, articles, guides, and invaluable insights aimed at supporting adopters, professionals, and anyone touched by the adoption process. Whether you’re seeking knowledge, understanding, or practical advice, our resources are meticulously selected to provide clarity, comfort, and direction.

Discover Resources & Links

Latest Posts

Annabelle Harris

My Life Changing Involvement With Social Care…. Why I chose to take a step to the side? Because my children’s behaviour was too hard to live with, for them and for me? Multiple incidents a day, support network diminishing, [...]

Florence Walker

I am immensely angry and frustrated. Even this afternoon something happened, and I tried to speak to the children’s home manager and again, I am ignored, treated like I am some annoying busybody with snotty bits of kids who have no training, trying to give me half-hearted feedback on my [...]

Jean Smith

My experience has been horrific. Accused of all sorts by professionals with no understanding of attachment issues. The result is a family torn apart, a child back in care and a broken parent. And still, they don’t listen as I try to hang on keeping a relationship with my child. [...]

Sally Miller

Our experience! We adopted 2 children, although they are not biologically related. She always had attachment disorders due to early life trauma (a pull/push strategy) and challenging behaviours, we attended Theraplay, therapeutic life story work and she’d recently started EMDR, we also attended many parenting sessions over the years under [...]

Alice Lea

For the want of appropriate, timely and professional support (that wasn’t a post adoption social worker coming round to craft or bake for an hour!!) our family broke down. We were left to flounder for months after saying we were desperately in need of more help as a result of [...]

Lesley Robert

Our family is in crisis, the system is broken, and we need our story to be heard. We’re calling for systematic change in the way children and families are supported through the adoption process and beyond. Two years ago, our family were the faces of a National Campaign to encourage [...]

Louise Brooker

Adoption breakdown is not failure to love or try to do your best for the child. Adoption breakdown is not abandonment, lack of parenting skills, or neglect. Adoption breakdown is in the sad reality that many hundreds of families up and down the country face each year due to the [...]

Rosemarie Lewis

We were misled from the start, a catalogue of errors in the PAR report, a child with FASD, years of asking for help, years of asking for respite, a refusal from CAMHS to even see the child due frankly to funding. Finally, my health and my partner’s fell apart, respite [...]

Amelia Riley

Here is a potted history of failures (ongoing) for the last 11 years. Diagnosed with ADHD, ODD, AD, MLD, ASD and very challenging to parent. Sister ‘only’ diagnosed with attachment difficulties but clearly very traumatised from early life and equally challenging. Begged for Respite. All professionals (including therapists, schools, doctors) [...]

Sarah-Jane

I, along with other adopters facing a failed or ‘disrupted’ adoption, will never get over the total injustice, disrespect and callous actions by our respective Social Services departments and staff that have continuously rocked our integrity and damaged our wellbeing and very souls forever. Adopters are not responsible for the [...]

Download “Adoption Crisis: The Jarring Reality of Adoption” – written by The Impassioned Voices of the Parents Exposing The Failings