Mum's The Word! The Parenting Podcast - Two Dads in London on their Adoption Journey!

Episode Date: November 28, 2022

Rich and Lew from TwoDadsInLondon join us today to chat all things adoption, parenting as a same sex couple and the journey they have been on with their two children so far!You can follow Rich and Lew on instagram @twodadsinlondonAnd their book is titled My Family and Other Families - you can get this from all good book shops! Get in touch with your questions at [e-mail]--- A Create Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I'm sure as parents we all know how messy things can get whether that's around the house during meal times and even when it comes to our little ones themselves when it comes to wiping Alf's messy face and body I want to be sure that what I am using is the best choice for his skin with baby eczema and nappy rash being common conditions using wipes for sensitive skin is a must we've both been loving water wipes. We've actually used them since Alf was born and they gently clean and help protect delicate newborn and premature baby skin. They're made of just two ingredients, so 99.9% water and a drop of fruit extract. That means they are the best wipe choice for sensitive skin. Alf loves them and I even find myself using them.

Well good morning, it's a very happy Monday because I just got the new Elizabeth line for the first time all the way from Essex to Farringdon. So I know this is probably very very boring for most people but it was very exciting for me because normally you have to change at Stratford or Liverpool Street and it means that I'm now guaranteed a seat. I know technically I should be guaranteed a seat anyway because I'm pregnant but sometimes you feel awkward asking so yeah I had a very very enjoyable journey in and I'm very excited about today's chat. I've got two people in the studio with me today. I know that you're going to love the topics that we discuss. And this weekend, I actually went to my first children's birthday party,

and it was with my lovely friend Vicky, who adopted her daughter. She has been on the podcast before a few episodes back and talking about her adoption process and my guests today are also the proud parents of two adopted children they are Rich and Lou who are known as two dads in London and so they are dads to who they refer to as the boy and the girlie and they document their lives as a family of four they're obviously living in the capital and I love that you're both really honest about the highs and lows of parenting and you're such brilliant advocates for those who are considering adoption so welcome. Thank for having us thank you then we were chatting just before we started recording about how we all almost had child care disasters today which i

feel like is the most act thing for a parenting podcast so um alf's been a little bit ill not ill ill but he's just got it's actually his first cold which isn't bad for an almost two year old um but he's just been a little bit under the weather and he has started this thing of getting up at five in the morning which is great especially as the baby inside of me decided to have a party at 3 30 in the morning and I was like a sign of things to come so I'm excited to speak to you guys about being parents to a boy and a girl and how you juggle it all and and you're no doubt staying up late like we do to try and have a bit of a life as well because it's like five o'clock wake up

but midnight going to sleep oh i've been i've been the opposite actually i've had to be like i will sacrifice my social life i was in bed last night at 8 p.m watching um the new series of motherland oh yeah Have you seen it? Yeah. Well, we don't really get to watch too much TV, do we? Because we're just, I think when it comes to sitting on the sofa, we just end up falling asleep. So we've probably seen bits and bobs of every popular TV series out there, but not committed just yet. It's very good if you want to watch Motherland. For anyone that hasn't seen it, it's very good if you want to watch motherland for anyone that hasn't seen it it's really good but i'm not here to talk about the latest netflix series let's start with um both of your adoption journeys did you always know that you wanted to go down the adoption route well yeah we had a conversation quite early because you've been together for nine years nine years yeah well

10 years yeah 10 years yeah feels a lot longer yeah it was quite early on in our relation we're not like the second date where we didn't say do you want children but i just it did come up earlier on and the i never i don't think we ever thought surrogacy was going to be an option not because we have anything against it obviously we have friends who have gone down that road and it's turned out perfectly well for them but we just always i think for us it was about being together doing that same process and knowing that we're going to adopt a child that's in need and knowing how many there are out there that actually need a loving home i think we felt we would then be completely equal both be their parent because through the surrogacy route we would have to it would be one of us initially biologically and I

think we never wanted that kind of break to go oh look that's your one and you know jokes aside but Lewis is ginger and if it came out ginger everyone would be like oh it's definitely yours that kind of you know so we we really wanted to go in that kind of get a give our love to a family or give our love to a child that really needs it. Yeah, I think my personal opinion was that obviously there, like Richard said, there are so many children that are out there and need a loving home. And obviously we can't naturally conceive. So it's kind of like goes with it.

You know, there's many children out there that need loving home. You know, we've got so much love to give. It sort of felt like the right thing to do for us you really take for granted in a heterosexual couple who can conceive I know obviously not every heterosexual couple can how you literally do have to think about these things like one of my best friends is a lesbian and she hasn't met someone yet and she's now being like well do I wait and hope I meet someone but then I need to have the conversations around surrogacy and everything with her or do I go down the adoption route as a solo parent like my friend Vic did because she never met someone and yeah I guess it's nice like at

least you're together that you get to make those decisions but I think everything as well around being a parent seems to have a time limit on it because people don't want to be too old when they're having young children and I think even adoption takes into account that question of how old are you maybe you can't have a younger child because that means when they're 15 you'll be this age so even that whole worry and concern for people is in adoption world as well as you know can I biologically is my body up to it it's that same consideration. How did you find the adoption process and did you find any kind of pushback or discrimination based on the fact that you're a same-sex couple? I think that we did initially

think that we would go into it and there would be barriers for that reason and i think we created the problem ourselves and when we actually you know because we initially went to an open evening that was based around lgbtq plus um adoption people that wanted to adopt and we went to this event and it was an eye-opener and we decided that you know what we would go through the local authority in the end i think we went into it with the normal myths and worries that, oh, God, they're going to be discriminating against us. They won't want to give two dads, you know, a young baby. All of those thoughts and worries were there. But we went to this open event and it was we left there a little bit nervous and scared because everyone was like throwing their details at us. Come on. You know, we've got lots of children.

everyone was like throwing their details at us come on you know we've got lots of children and I think we got home and it was like well we didn't realize it was actually like that so that's why we said we want to go more to a normal local authority than some of the other groups that were offering because they were really asking when are you ready for it we'll call you give us your number we'll come in contact with you we'll let know. And we were just really going for a bit of advice that night. So it was a bit. And I think there's also that like cemented our decision of adoption, because the way that they were with us was like they need people to adopt children. And we walked away. We went for dinner, didn't we? And we was like, well, that was that was fun. We went for a little bit of advice and we ended up giving our number

to a load of um people but we didn't actually start the process for like a year later um i think we just sort of wanted to prepare ourselves we didn't know what we had to do so it was just you know learning the you know the step by step what you have to do going through the adoption process and uh i don't think there was any any point where we actually felt that there was any kind of stigma because of it. And I think we live in a world where we constantly feel worried about it because that's just what you naturally see on the news. I mean, at the minute, if you watch anything about football, it's all about LGBTQ people. Can they go to the World Cup? So it constantly makes you more nervous about that and i go to football all the time and i have no issues but we luckily live in england so we built some of

those barriers ourselves once you decided okay adoption it's for us what what was the process and what were the time scales going forward from that so we initially had a home visit where a social worker would come to our house just to ask us just general questions to get a feel of us, you know, and then they had to see your house. And then you have to basically register your interest to adopt and then you get approved for that. And then that was like stage one. And then you get approved. You have to go to the... Basically, the first stage is all paperwork it's a good sort of 12 14 weeks worth of paperwork and sessions and group sessions and meetings where you find out really all about the type of children that you could adopt and some of

the background issues that they may come with and really it was an exercise where we had to sort of pass the paper-based test that said would you be willing to deal with that or would you be able to handle this type of child and how do you think your family would deal with that so stage one was very much textbook and is that where you have to be quite specific of yes i would adopt a child from an alcoholic family but not a drug family etc they're really difficult discussions because you don't really think about that being as something you're going to have to write down and go, actually, we would rule out this type of child because you feel awful. And that creates lots of emotions around God. You wouldn't be able to rule that out if it was a biological child. But it's like you're writing it down. So it really is difficult. The process from when you start to finish, you become such a more honest person because, you know, the decisions you can't just agree because you're worried that they're going to feel bad about you because you you're saying no to something. Because obviously the outcome is you're adopting a looked after child or becoming a parent, which in itself is a massive, obviously the life-changing decision that you can make along

with that you know parenting an adoptive child comes with another sort of layer of of things that you have to deal with so and then the stage two part though is when you get allocated a specific social worker they'll come to your house weekly and they literally learn everything about yeah i think they know us better than nearly anyone else or any of our friends because they literally write it all on loads and loads of paper so you're writing your life out going back to when you as a child talking about what your relationships were like with your aunties your uncles and how do you think that will shape what you do it's it's massive it was um like therapy i suppose go looking back on your childhood how you was at school what do

you what's your opinion on school what do you how would you feel about education you know literally any question you could possibly ask we was asked is it like therapy with the fear of being judged at the end of it because obviously you kind of are like if i tell you this will you still let me adopt i always used to give an answer and then answer again contradicting what i said so i sort of gave two answers to what they were asking but there was also lots of times after sessions where let's be honest you would be in tears and go i can't believe i said that did you see her face did you see her reaction which probably wasn't a reaction because we were nervous about what we'd said or not said you know

let's be honest i was so there's a couple of times where she left us like she hates us there's no way that she's going to let us go through or and then it was just but they have to be like that because they have to make sure that you are absolutely ready because you know sometimes and i don't know how often it does happen, but there are things called adoption breakdowns where you go through and the child, you know, you have a... Just doesn't work out. And it doesn't work out. And that's another traumatic change for that child. So it's a lot of pressure, but... Yeah, and we went for it a second time. It's kind of interesting as well that you have to go through all of these kind of quite sensible loopholes really to bring an adopted child into the world yeah but like for me i kind

of wish i had that do you like but they never taught you how to be a parent no we always say that you went through all the hard work we went to workshops all this stuff and actually went on the day that we drove our son home from the foster carer we was like oh what are we gonna do you know you know he doesn't want to get in the bath he doesn't want to sit down you know all that the normal things that i suppose any parent will struggle with like you kind of feel like you're so prepared for it because you've been through this massive process so it took us 18 months from start to finish for the first time for our son um so you've gone through all of this thinking that you're well prepared and then i'm like how much porridge do i need to put in here like how old was your son when you got him

and also what was the process from being approved to then waiting for a match so we got him at 10 months and for us we were really lucky from being approved it didn't take that long but that is probably the weirdest thing because we got sent an a4 sheet of paper with a little face on it and some some small lines that explained this child who's only 10 months old um and it got sent to us separately because we wasn't in the same place so Lou was at home I was at the office but normally you were kind of prepared you may not accept the first profile or the first child and you don't want to because i suppose you think that you're going to i'm going to love any child that they send send a profile and i was a bit worried that i would do that and i think

and immediately though we were drawn to the profile and the like his little face was lovely and that all of a sudden but our social worker knew us so well that she obviously probably looked you know she'd been working on that for a while it's not about because how it goes is it's not about what we want as a child because we did this we did this process about where you would write down all your ideal things that your child would turn out to be like you would write down like football and i would write or maybe you know good at darts and or something like that and then she was like rip it up rip it up because your child won't turn out like that although he does love chelsea yeah

that is it went from there to then going to actually seeing that profile and we were both saying oh my god this is like the perfect child which we felt like we shouldn't have been saying because all the stuff you're hearing in the process is you know you don't just want to go for the first you know option but we were sure that that was it so we you so the profile you get sent is very it's not basic but it has like a bit about the child um and then some some family history a really small and then you have to say if you are interested in pursuing then you get sent more information information yeah which is more of the detailed background around why we did it and this is around november wasn't it and then they was like well

around christmas they don't place children because um emotions are high in that period and everyone's happy and jolly and it's i suppose it's not as um yeah they don't want to make the move in for a child into a new home think that you've moved into this new house that is all about presents and christmas which then they might have a slump after and realize oh it's not really like that so all these things it's not christmas every day what is this it's bullshit and then and then i we we did pursue it didn't we and then we sort of went into christmas didn't we and i was like i think it was like january the second where it's just like the first official date anyone could go back to work i was like email her and say what's happening next and um we and then that long story short you know yeah we we then went through the process of the foster care constantly going to their house learning gradually taking

over and then scary bringing him home yeah so yeah you go there so basically you go into like a stranger's house who was caring for our son since um he was a baby and then the first day you just observe and then gradually you take over everything until the point where we was getting there before he woke up taking over everything and she would just sort of like yeah take him out for the day and uh then on the last day we drove there yeah you just pick up and go it's really quick it's really odd i remember driving home and we weren't going to come back then was we to the house that we'd be going to and i was like oh my god there's a child in the back of our seat you know it's so interesting because um i keep relating it to my friend vicky and even though she went through the adoption process we still had exactly the

same emotions of bringing your child home for the first time and then being like wow yeah this is it how do we do so what what was your experience like now once you had your son home he's he was like i suppose everyone says he was very advanced but like he did he started walking literally before like a few months before his first birthday so it was only like a couple of months of like pulling him and it was so we didn't get like baby um period we basically brought home a whirlwind who was already like cruising on the sofas it was like oh my god we've gone from nothing to that yeah and i think as well because obviously i'm going back to about being two men i did feel when i first bought you know became a

parent i felt so much pressure so much pressure to be the perfect parent hadn't parent before hadn't got any experience, felt an extra added layer of pressure because obviously being two dads. And I know that, you know, some people do think, because we know we've had messages on social media saying, you know, a child needs a mother's love and such. And so I got into a bit of like, well, everything has to be perfect. Everything has to be perfect.

And I didn't really enjoy it, just the little things. and then richard would you know you'd be playing with him and i'd be like oh god i need to make sure this i think it became that you just were so proactive and organized around we must have this many wipes we must have this many of this whereas i was a little bit more well i'm just gonna play and just have fun so it became really easy for me to build that connection and that attachment, which they teach you a lot about. Whereas for you, it came a bit later. And we had to ask our social worker around because we wanted to make sure that feeling was normal,

that actually because you kind of once said, I feel a little bit like I'm a child minder at the minute because this is not my child. I haven't built that. Whereas I luckily was way ahead and had built that my child I haven't built that whereas I luckily was way ahead and had built that but I wasn't so worried about everything else and I think once he had that conversation with the social worker he said look this is actually completely normal because as well the way I describe it is and I know that it happens for a lot of mothers who give birth and they don't feel the instant connection I definitely felt like for a good

couple of weeks that I just bought a tiny stranger at home. And I was like, you live here. Hope you like it. So for me, it was like this toddler who was very like now we know why. Because he is such a character. And he thinks he's like 18 now. Like he's so funny. But like, yeah, I I'm I'm meant to be

this is my child I'm I'm I need to be in love with this boy and I just wasn't at the beginning and I was just then I felt terrible um but then I think I put all my actions into making sure that he had everything prepared like if we went out and we forgot wet wipes it was like the end of the world like I know that everyone says they take everything and their kitchen sink with you i literally you literally did yeah you literally did this and then and i but i but i do think that that although it's an adopted parent thing that is a new parent thing you you what you feel with the pressure you want to be and no one can everyone can give you all the advice but that's what it is is advice it's not i think for you though and for us it made second time around so much more we would we knew what to

expect so some of the worries around we must have this we must have that that was just gone and instead adoption two for our little girl was very much around what do we want but actually what about our son because you have a whole process the second time around which your friend may eventually go through where they have to have whole assessments around well how will it fit for him or how will it fit for the other child and what are you looking for how will it match where things like you can't adopt an older child because your child that's already there would obviously be the lead child and if you brought an older child it would upset the balance of the family so there's so many things we actually asked him we did ask him yeah we said could have a little

brother or sister what would you prefer and he always wanted a sister so yeah so we actually sort of stipulated that second time around we really wanted a little girl. They can't guarantee, but four months into that process, which was very, very fast, they already had a match for us. So what was the kind of timescale between bringing home your son and then bringing home your girl? Oh, two years. You have to wait two years. You can't adopt again for two years.

And then when we, I think it was quite soon. Yeah, straight after virtually because we obviously there could be a sibling which is always something in this there's a number of siblings involved in both our children which sometimes is quite difficult um but we were kind of waiting and hoping there would be a natural born sibling um it didn't happen so we had to have that conversation that said you know we can't wait until forever because it may never happen and plus we wanted them to be at certain ages together so they could really grow up together richard both of us have got like siblings of like the same sort of age and we remember growing up with the sibling you know playing fighting doing the normal thing

that you do with siblings um but yeah we wanted to make sure of that because it was the same social worker we were very lucky to have the same social worker and I think it was only like it was five months five months and then there was a match

because and she was only four months when she actually came home and because we already had done the adoption process once it's not as much you still have to

you don't do the textbook bit again that bit's already kind of done so you go straight into the stage too she was adult was just five months yeah she was four months when we got the profile and then five months when she moved in that was different as well because we never had experience of having a five month so five months to 10 months is a massive difference i remember being in a shot with my mum and i was looking at strollers again buggies and there was a woman in there who had a baby and my mum and i was looking at strollers again buggies and there was a woman in there who had a baby and my mum was like how old's your baby she said four months i

went i just that's how small the baby that that's how small she is i was like oh my god i remember she was tiny and i was like oh my god like we can do she sort of sat there a lot it was just really different experience absolutely but i did feel much more relaxed the second time around because i knew how to do everything obviously everything's going to go wrong and everything is a disaster because that's normal but like like the actual parenting i just thought i had got to a point where i thought do you know what no one is a perfect parent and i and i really show that on social media because i know that you can look through these perfect grid posts and and i'm just like no because when i'm when i've got the ump about something or when something's not going

right or i don't feel great i want to look and find that someone else is going through yeah that same thing especially like when you know our daughter had a hard time settling into like nursery didn't and and i was like i just feel terrible i just don't know what to do and it ended up that she had glue here she was deaf in one ear and 35 hearing one and i went for a whole year of being told basically like she just doesn't listen she doesn't listen and and you know you know what i mean i was like and but then loads of people i said i talked about this and people like oh my you know my child's done this my child's done that and then it and then it turned out that it was something that I had no control of over anyway and I had felt so bad that whole time but yeah so it's fun you know I think this is like the beauty it's one of

the reasons I set up the podcast but also why I love social media for all the criticism it gets because I feel like for the longest time parenting has been sort of like glamorized and seen as like the ultimate happy ever after, which, of course, it's for all intents and purposes. It's amazing. And you have this amazing love. But it's also the most fucking difficult thing you could do. And sometimes when you are honest, it opens you up to people being like, oh, why are you being negative? And if you didn't want them, you shouldn't have had them. But imagine if we treated all walks of life like that like you apply for a job and then suddenly it's really hard or you're tired and everyone's like well you shouldn't have

got a job then you're like yeah but but i wanted a job well i needed a job and i think what's so nice is as you said the more you open up the more you find your tribe but also the more you find that you're sort of helping other people so the bits that you're finding difficult actually sort of become your strength because other people and like you were saying with your daughter you know you found out what was wrong because you were open about what she was going through and um yeah i think it's so important it's my go-to now for any advice obviously i ask parents and friends but if i there's anything that I go right you know I'm having trouble with this to the kids anyone experienced this before and then you don't you don't feel like you're the only one going through it because you get so many and people love it as

well because I think then they realize that they're not the only ones going through I think some people isolate themselves and I think it's easy for new parents to be isolated for a period of time because they don't know the answers they're often scared or nervous to ask because they feel like they look silly asking or they worry that it may make them make them look like they're not yeah yeah like we went out for a firework evening the other week and we went to this restaurant and we and i shared a picture of like richard was there the kids both had their ipads out and i was like but but that's what's keeping them quiet at that time of night i mean they had a great day try and can actually try and enjoy eating.

And I have people like, I know that there's some people, I said, as soon as I posted, I know people go, Oh, your kids shouldn't have iPad. I said,

but it's like half nine at night. They're not going to sit down and be perfect. And let's be realistic. You know, we want to enjoy the meal. Do you know what I mean? So. And you deserve to enjoy the meal.

But also I always think, I'm sure other people in the restaurant would prefer to listen or not listen to children than not have the ipad and listen to chaos i'll tell you what happened we there was another family on that table we came in straight away ipads 10 minutes later the kid had the phone yeah on the other table they probably thought well they've they've got it they won't feel like i'm a terrible parent and i just think like oh my god like it's not an easy job no you know no one's a perfect parent as much as what especially on social media we're all doing our best and i feel like all our tolerances and circumstances are so different

that's why i just think like live and let live like if people genuinely don't let their kids watch screens like hats off to you if they never do then how do they do it yeah but I yeah I just think it's so easy to judge from the outside yeah um you mentioned kind of um you know receiving um I think homophobic sort of um yeah comments on social media and judgment how how do you deal with that because I guess you've almost got it as a sort of like double from the adoption side and then from being a same-sex couple that um people kind of always presume that the child be like oh so what's mum doing or yeah or then for my friend vicky who is a single parent by choice with her adopted child it's like oh where's daddy and then she tells them about the adoption and then they want to know like

oh what happened to her or like what what happened to her real parents and vick's like really like you're a stranger why am i going to tell you like all my daughter's traumas so how do you deal with not fitting into that heteronormative mold in society well richard's very good he's very good at when if say someone sends us a horrible message which is very we always think educate rather than hate back because i i mean generally if i get a dm that says you know your child should have a mum they should not be raised by men and i and i reply and i just go well what about in a situation where um some child has tragically lost a mum figure at a young age and is raised by their dad yeah i think what's this what happens i think you have to have a balance on how you deal with it because it's really easy lots of people just go just block just block just but i think it's easy

to block but you haven't forgot that issue you haven't forgot the comment that's actually just been said and it may affect you because you you may not be issue have an issue of it there but having blocked it and then talk about it later it does bring up different emotions around I wonder if that's what everyone says I wonder if people just say that stuff and we just don't get told so we often reply but in a really positive way and we often reply to say you may not agree with it but we invite you to continue to follow us or watch what we get up to for the next week and then make a decision if you still wish to you know be hateful we will just block you but often we've had responses that then come back and go i've just

never seen a gay family that's the kind of reply you get i just didn't know or i've never met a gay person these are some of the comments we get and it's like well now you have I think lots of people jump to the obvious stereotypes and think that we're all going to be this type of person and it's like no no just follow us that's why we're trying to do this so you can see that actually it's just another normal family like all the other different families that are out there but sometimes it it does it does bother you you worry about how far you go about questioning them or or making a statement about it because you don't want to go too far and become an account or we don't we've never wanted to be an account

that constantly just flies the rainbow flag all day long because i find that annoying you know if somebody every day at the high street kept trying to give me the same leaflet, you know, and I eventually go, look, you've tried that three days in a row, mate. I don't want the leaflet. I think it's the same with us and the way that we come across. I think if we don't constantly show it in your face

that, by the way, we're a rainbow family, you must know that. And people just watch along and eventually just like us. And then their afterthought is, oh yeah yeah, they are a two-dad family. I didn't really think about it. That's kind of how we want it to come across. And we've had lots of, most of our followers are women.

And we've had lots of them say, oh, my husband started following you. They kind of message you. It's like they've achieved something because their plumber of a husband who just don't talk about anything to do with gay guys is now following you because he really loves this thing that you always do. And we really like feel good about that because it's a small, tiny change, but it's made a difference rather than just block and ignore, which I think sometimes the easier way out. which I think sometimes the easier way out I think sometimes it depends on the day doesn't it if you're upset then you look at one message it can upset you for the rest of the day you know but in terms of like um stuff online we don't really but what about in the real world because you must say when one of you are at the park and they're like oh is your mummy how do you sort of we had we had

one at the I had it once at the gym i was signing up for swimming for the kids and it was just me and obviously the two kids were with me i was signing up and this this lady was really really lovely and i said all right it's arson i what's the days what's the times i said it won't be me bringing them and she said to them oh it's mummy going to be bringing you and you know our son was quite obvious went no daddy's going to be bringing you? And, you know, our son was quite obvious, went, no, daddy's going to be bringing me. And I really felt sorry for her because she didn't mean it in a bad way. And she really got like anxious and what,

and she's like, I'm so sorry. I said, don't worry. No, don't worry about it. The normal thing that people are just expecting is it's mum and dad. So I don't have an issue, but she really got into like a panic and she asked somebody else to kind of carry on the transaction as such because she was so.

And then she came back and said, I'm so sorry. I said, look, just don't worry. But I think sometimes you get people get more nervous about it than we do because they're so worried about what your reaction might be. Well, I suppose it's like that thing that when your intention is good, you feel so stupid for making assumptions. It's like that sort of like classic thing of like, you know, I would say to a school friend, oh, is your mum coming to watch the netball? My mum died. And you're like, oh, God. Oh, no. And then you feel awful because you're like, but I didn't mean it. So, yeah, it's a well-intentioned error, isn't it?

like in well-intentioned error isn't it i'm sure as parents we all know how messy things can get whether that's around the house during meal times and even when it comes to our little ones themselves when it comes to wiping alf's messy face and body i want to be sure that what i am using is the best choice for his skin with baby eczema and nappy rash being common conditions, using wipes for sensitive skin is a must. We've both been loving water wipes. We've actually used them since Alf was born and they gently clean and help protect delicate newborn and premature baby skin. They're made of just two ingredients, so 99.9% water and a drop of fruit extract. That means they are the best wipe choice for sensitive skin alf loves them and i even find myself using them

our son's quite matter of fact though isn't he he probably pulls up more people than we do he doesn't get embarrassed like he's in a you know he was in a football team and you know i would come and watch and you could see the little kids that look if to say i'm not sure what's going on but i don't really understand and then obviously they would just tell them and kids i always say this kids don't care adults care kids don't care so but they both know as well they're adopted and we constantly make sure they know that they're adopted because that's part of the story it's part of how it works now I think you know 20 odd years ago it was really different um open a letter on your 18th birthday and you're like your life is turned upside down and I think they want to get away from that but that that's where we probably have the most challenges or that's where we might get the most upset about

things because we know what their past really is we we don't tell the world what that is because that's for them but we also know what their future entails and i think that's a really difficult thing because we were watching a show on tv the other day and our son was watching it was i'm a celebrity and this lady sue on there she was adopted and she you know she's 59 now she gave the the kind of miracle lovely happy ending story of she said you know i i met my birth mum at drama school and he couldn't help it and he just looked to us he was really happy he said oh i'm gonna go to drama school one day because he really just thought that that was where he would meet meet her so we didn't say no or explain we just said okay mate you know if but that really

got me for a couple of days. I really kept going over my head thinking, God, one day he's going to have to read this letter about his own background. And he's probably not going to have that happy ever after. And it's, we have to deal with some things that other parents, we don't have to do. Because we know it's coming. With your children, you want to protect them.

You don't want them to get upset. You don't want them to feel anything. we know it's coming you know with with your children you want to protect them you don't want them to get upset you don't want to feel anything but we we cannot do anything to stop the day that they know yeah there is their story and that's upsetting because we just know it's going to happen but all we can do you know like we it's been there as much as possible but it still breaks your heart because we know it's it it's going to come or they realize well like he's now he knows what adoption was when he's little but actually the emotional side of adoption now you can see it sort of coming how old is he now seven but he's he's a lot older than what he is

so he so now like he's linking the emotional side that he did have a family why don't i see that family and of course we can't really go into to he has a little book like a child-friendly version of why has pictures of his birth parents in there has his story but it doesn't give him like the nitty-gritty details that and and we we actually meet annually with two siblings that they're both also adopted into other completely different families um so we meet annually with them so he sees these people and has a like a relationship with them which is really lovely but there's going to come a day when he gets this letter called the later life letter that basically is a harder version of the facts of this is actually what happened and that's for us to decide

when he is ready for that that we know that's going to be really traumatic for him because as much as we've given him you know everything and you try and be the best parents they have fun all the time um we know there's going to be do you get support and help with that from social workers or adoption agencies any support that you need there's an adoption after adoption sort of support team that you can go to at any point but i guess it's the sometimes well i think we go over the top we try and give them so many experiences we try and always have fun and i think well we know what they've got coming so it's a little bit like well why can't they go there why can't we just have that laugh because you know in a couple of weeks they might find this out and that's really really difficult

so it's uh as an adoptive parent you've always got this other thing that's kind of going. And at any point, we could get a phone call from a social worker that says, there's another child. And immediately you're offered that child, because you have one of the other children. So we've had two occasions where we've had to say no to a new child. One, because we were already in the process for our little girl. And to us, our decision was made and that little girl was going to be ours. So we couldn't change that. And then once for the other child, straight after she'd moved in, said, oh, there's another.

And it was like, we've literally just had a baby moving. We can't. So there's another. And it was like, we've literally just had a baby moving. We can't. So there's all these other things going on around. And then you feel guilty about saying no. Saying no. Because then you feel like you should say yes, but then you've got to, you know, we feel right as a four, well, five of our dog.

We feel right as we've made that decision, haven't we? Yeah, we've made that decision that it's all equal as well because they're not biological siblings our kids but if we was to take one or the other it would then be imbalanced and it would be like it might not be but when they're 15 and they're teenagers and probably giving it back a bit well you adopt you took her one or not my one or vice so we just we just want them to know that we did it all everything we did we thought about for both of them sort of thing but it's yeah it's challenging because you might watch something on tv that triggers that what would be your advice to people considering adoption because

obviously there are so many sort of extra factors to consider that you're mentioning now i mean you you'll know if you're ready to be a parent to adoptive child if you get through the process you know lots of people dropped out when we went through it and i think you've just got to understand that yes you know we we do have amazing times as a family i wouldn't change the world i actually always say that we were all meant to be together we was meant to be a family and um that can happen but obviously um you've got to go in realistic and you you know i always say that yes on social media it looks amazing and i always say but our children are naughty our children do this our children do that i always try and feel like i have to change that balance but i always say but every adoption process is different so we can only give you

advice but you won't end up you won't go through the adoption process and end up with what we have as a family because me and Richard are the ones that have created this through our choices and decisions but what but if anyone is considering adoption 100% go for it because you you will get the best outcome ever for your for your own personal life you will have a love that you've never known from these kids and they will be wanting to give it back to you because you know they've had a tough start some of them and i think the benefits you get from seeing them achieve something is i wouldn't say it's more than any other type of parent because it definitely isn't but for you you think ah he couldn't do that

and actually he's achieved that due to what we've helped him do and now he's this really confident funny kid and you just think wow and he doesn't look like us biologically because he can't he shouldn't act like us biologically because he can't but everyone says he looks like you and he probably acts like me and it's like the biggest compliment you can get because we know that they're not but when you get that by a stranger it just makes you think oh i must have had such a nice impact that yeah that he actually acts like us or she will act like us he got my good looks exactly to be fair alpha's got my personality and i'm quite tommy's much more of an outgoing people person than i am but i'm much more like you have to really get to know me because i'm quite shy and quite an introvert and i'm quite grumpy and so when alpha's like no more no more and tommy's

like i've got so many good qualities Why can't you just get my personality? What can people do, like, for example, me, is there anything that I could do to make the world more welcoming for same-sex couples or for children? Because, for example, if Alf were to start school, I'd hate to think, I don't think he ever would do this, but that he might be, like, I don't know, pick on your child, for example, for being like, oh, you've got no mummy like what can you what can we do as a sort of

heterosexual i think like like i like maybe just touch on like the fact that i say children don't care so children probably don't care that that think of it as like how you don't have this because obviously if you've educated your child from a young age that everyone you know every family is non-traditional i suppose is the word um then they they won't need to question it because it would just be their reality like you know when i i remember that the mums loved that i was a two dad family um and the school you mean and i don't know i think it's really hard because i don't think there's one thing that you could do because it's just common sense isn't it really and what you how you are not projecting your own prejudices onto your children basically and i think that's even for us it's difficult

because look we grew up in what would be classed as normal mum and dad household so to us and through our growing up life that was normal i mean me, I try to make that my normal, even though I knew that would never be the case. But I think it is about trying not to let that just because your family set up is this particular way. That's not everyone's family set up. Everyone's family set up is completely different because some people are brought up by their grandparents. And that, again, for some people, they might not have any grandparents because they may have been older and no longer be with us so it's really just trying to be open and and kids kids just know how to work this stuff out we're really corny as we say we just say all you need is love just love makes a family it's so true but yeah it is well another thing i'd love to touch on and you did kind of briefly mention that you've got a dog.

Yeah. I had a dog. I have a dog, but he lives currently with my parents just because the dynamic just wasn't working with him. He was eight years old when Alf came into the world and there was a lot of snapping. And I feel like I made a decision that there's only so many times, even though Snoop's a toy poodle, like how much harm could he do?

But it was more that his his personality changed like he became really stressed at the beginning because obviously like i call snoop my firstborn like he is literally he got me through like so he just went through so much with me in my life and at the beginning it was like happy families and introducing him to alf was like one of the happiest moments ever and then when alf kind of got to four or five months the dynamic just shifted and i think snoop was like why is he still here and why did he start pulling me and he he had honestly like hyperventilate with stress and it just really changed him um now my parents have retired they live in the lake district with my gran they have like he is a one-man dog but um i actually got a question uh from a lady called debbie who said um hey ash i hope you're well i've been listening to your podcast for a while now

i particularly like the episode on getting back to yourself it resonated with me so much i was wondering if you could talk about how you introduced elf and snoop for the first time you hear lots of scary stories i'm pregnant at the moment but my dog is my first baby did you find it difficult with the arrival of your little one i'd love to hear more and any tips you have i look forward to hearing from you debbie so i thought you guys could talk about your story well we actually when our son came to live with us we had a yorkshire terrier um called nutter and unfortunately he's no longer with us um when he was six years old and he was a massive part of our son he was like his best friend um and that really um affected him actually so their relationship was amazing but obviously um they grew up together but i think that first meeting

and and a few of the first meetings we were really nervous because our dog wasn't really as much of a snappy dog but there were certain people he would like and strangers he just didn't and we were worried that that would be the case but i think because it was in our house he seemed to be it was like okay for him and it just sort of they blended really well and he chased him around do you remember the social worker during the initial process came around and she was like you do realize that if it doesn't work out you will have to get rid of your dog well yeah she didn't quite say she did she did rehome the dog and we were like what we can't do that that's how a child like so that that did that was something that came up wasn't it but

obviously it's a thing that but now now but i mean it went really well and luckily they just got on but i can see that lots of people that have got dogs and i think especially if you have a bigger dog you would probably be really worried especially when you see things in the news they only have five seconds away and something awful can happen so i think we always had a small dog we've now got a cockapoo who is absolutely crazy but we we introduced her at the sort of start of lockdown when loads of people got dogs we said oh well let's get them a dog and we've because i think we've had her since she was a tiny baby since sort of 12 months 12 weeks she's just it was their first so like they've just grown up with her and i think to be fair she's more like a human than most dogs it's a bit scary she just lays like a human does but yeah i

mean i think it is the first few introductions have got to be you've got to remember that the dog lived there first and dogs are very territorial and if they don't like it you need to probably try and work on it or like you make a sensible decision well do you know what we made a real effort like you kind of touched on with that we made sure snoop was still very loved and wanted you know you when you watch lady and the tramp it broke your heart didn't you and they're rocking and lady tries to calm and they're like shoot shoot and i was like that could never be. And so Snoop actually interacted really well. Obviously, it was like supervised visits.

I know that there's actually loads of good information. I swear part of my course I did with Emiliana from the Mindful Birth Company had a section about introducing dogs. But I'm sure there'd be stuff on YouTube. My sister has a whippet and he started biting people during her pregnancy to the point that they got banned by the royal mail they had to go collect their own i mean it's funny but it's not funny and at the time it was like so traumatic because rudy like most dog owners was their first love as well and and they were worried that a he might seriously bite someone or that they'd have to rehome him or in the worst case scenario if he did something that he would get put down and now like him and my nephew Jasper are

best friends like they really persevered with it but it was a really highly emotional time for them but he just settled and I think like for us we probably could have not tried harder with Snoop it also coincided with Alf waking up every hour of the night and because Snoop was in my bed it was almost like one thing too much that was sending me over the edge when I was kind of experiencing quite severe postnatal depression and now if I'm perfectly honest I would love Snoop back and I feel like it would all be fine but he's changed my parents and my gran's life my gran's got terminal cancer

yeah it's like how like sometimes my dad's like yeah Ashley I just want you to know if Snoop's your dog if you want him back obviously he's yours

oh it ripped my heart out man I don't know how we'd cope but obviously he's your dog and in my head I'm like I can never take my dog back I can't do that yeah but also I can't I can't compete with being,

they live in the latest state and they walk him out. But I guess what I'd say is just like, don't rush anything and like follow your gut and remember that it's new and scary for your dog as well. But you shouldn't feel bad for having made that decision because sometimes as a parent, these things happen and you've got to go with that gut feeling sometimes you haven't got 10 weeks to work it out because in that 10 weeks you you may have had much

worse of a breakdown so and i feel like as well this is advice for like parenting in general i'd say is like people judge you for whatever you do and i still get some like quite nasty messages about how I gave up my dog but I know that I did what was best for not just me and not just Alf but also mainly it was for Snoop and people would also judge if I'd have allowed that snapping to continue and let's say he bit Alf then everybody would jump down my throat because I didn't do something so i think most i'd say 99 of cases are probably it's probably like great so um but there definitely will be information on the internet i've got to have more damage probably like wow that is the last time i ask ashley anything and parenting is all about sacrifices isn't it you sacrifice sleep social life anything so obviously you know your child

has to come first yeah even in situations as heartbreaking as that before i let you go i did say we'd talk about your book um and very gracefully you never even mentioned it to me i just saw it i saw it on instagram and i was like we need to talk about your book so um congratulations but tell us about it because it's international now it is it was a crazy thing I when we first started Instagram we had sort of like these things that we wanted to do and it came from us buying children's picture books for our children and having to buy separate separate ones about um two dads or this and we we don't we just thought you know what we could create um a book and you know two years later you can buy it in new york and like all around the world i think it comes back to that thing that you said what can people do as parents to help their kids understand

no i'm not gonna say buy the book the answer is buy our book that is sort of the reason for that type of book because we could have easily written a book about two dads or a book that's badged with rainbows all over it which would have done okay but there would be lots of parents that probably wouldn't have picked that up because it doesn't match their family and the idea was to create a book where actually all children through reading that story would be able to see themselves and see their friends and other families that they completely used to in the school playground. So that actually everyone is included and it's just a,

but it is, it is like a, an adventure at a fun fair. So the narrative of the book isn't describing every family. It's literally a boy called Liam. He goes to the fun fair and he loses his ticket, but on the way he's friends help him find it it and each of the friends has a different family dynamic but it's it's it's just there in the book we just felt like we didn't want to have we didn't want to explain it because we feel like

it doesn't need explaining when reading to your children because when they're three to five often you are going to be reading to them because that's normal and i think it lets the parent get asked the questions at the time when their children wants to ask the questions or if they don't ask anything they don't have to explain anything i think it lets you kind of build on that through just a normal adventure story where they might sometimes like our kids would go why why's that one got two dads and that one hasn't and then it gives the parent the opportunity to go well actually this is sometimes what there is and this is also something which it lets them really sort of educate them but through a fun story rather than a book that says okay we

have to read this book because all families have these types of parents which then is feels like teacher sounds like a great christmas present but but then it has actually done like so well and it's i remember when it went on to pre-sales and we were like oh my god like this is gonna happen and he actually went to like number one and pre-sales we was like oh my god and now we get messages from people we got a message last week from someone saying i went to my local library and it was there and it was in auckland in new sealand it was like what this is crazy i do like i'm not like to in our own home or whatever but like i just we did see like there there was nothing out there like this like i think it gives parents the lead to discuss or or what they want to if they're child rather

than having to feel like you have to say this thing and you know what it's really interesting and really obvious but it's so good to like read books about whether it's like i don't know different types of people because do you know the book so i can't remember what they're called but they're like little heroes or something and you've got like elton john david attenborough all of those kind of hero books i was for some reason like i bought out a couple of the boy books about boy heroes and i was like oh i'd love to get like the dolly part one of the and then i was like why don't i like it's not like because he's a boy he can't learn about iconic women like surely if anything he should learn

even more so about iconic women but it was almost like built into my head that i had to like look out for only what was sort of like relatable to him. He definitely needs to know who the Spice Girls are. No, but I think that is, even when we go, if we went to a bookshop, we would have to search for the specific book. And then you kind of think, oh, this book is only specific to us. And I'm sure there's lots of other scenarios because, you know, we've got a child with

hearing aids, we've got a person in a wheelchair, but it's not a specific book about children with hearing aids or a person in a wheelchair. That's just normal life. We see all of them people every single day. So what we did was just include all of those different people and just have them there. That's not the narrative. We don't say this person is in a wheelchair. They just are because in kids' minds, they just are anyway. It's actually really nice.

I know that this current culture war seems to have an issue with any kind of woke agenda, but even there's like a plus size, like a new Disney protagonist. And it's like, that's amazing for like body image because her weight and her size isn't the point of the disney film but it's like for children to grow up and see that as normal and and then um i don't know like you like you said you see in films or tv shows all the time now whether it's same-sex couples or whatever it might be but it's not it's not the point it's not they're not like the protagonist they're almost just there and it's so nice to think that they're going to grow up in a

world that's they don't have to fight so hard to be themselves. Children no one is going to change unless people just accept that the world is different and why does it affect you? I know that sounds so easy for me to sit here and say that but it only affects you if you let it affect you do you know what i mean so why why couldn't we find a book yeah and i think that what is the name of your book by the way because we i will make sure we link it in the blurb but it's called my family and other families finding the power in our differences and we didn't rehearse yeah we did rehearse that sorry um but no and for us as well as a two-dad family we could have just made ourselves the heroes in the book but actually we we didn't do

that because that's not the point of the book the point is everyone and we have always said that we feel single parents and single mums in particular sometimes get a really hard time um you never really see these lovely messages written about and we always see all this difficult stuff about why they're making it hard and we thought no no no if they're doing what we do and there's two of us they they're far more champions than we let on and we made sure in our book we won't give away the story but there might be there is definitely a single mum family and they may be one of the really important characters as part of the story that is the biggest thing that i becoming a parent i was like hang on a minute people were critical of single moms like i'm

sorry what like they do this on their own but like why is the criticism not on the person that's absent as opposed to the person that stayed and raised the children richard goes away and i have the kids i always make a point of going you you need a medal. Single parents need a medal. And they love that recognition. Yeah, because they just don't get enough of it. And I think sometimes you just, it needs to be said more by people who aren't single parents.

You know, we can shout about being two dads, obviously, because that's what we are. But no one gives a stage to single mums to shout about how well they're actually doing. They just talk about how difficult they're actually doing they just talk about how difficult it is whereas we thought let's you know take that opportunity yeah so to answer your question it's an amazing book honestly i feel like we've like chatted and chatted and chatted from every no it's great um thank you all of you for listening to mum's the word parenting

podcast um if you do want to get in touch, we love to hear from you. I say we, and it's just me, the royal we. You can get in touch on WhatsApp. So either a message or a voice message, which is free. The number is 075-999-27537. Or of course, as Debbie did, you can email at askmumsthewordpod at gmail.com.

Or another really simple way to leave a comment is that you can leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. I feel like after the answer to Debbie's question, I was going to be like, I am not messaging in. Thank you for that rubbish advice. But yeah, Richly, thank you guys so much as well. And if you want to find them there, Two Dads in London on Instagram,

and I'll put all the information. And I'll be back with another episode, same time, same place next week. I'm sure as parents, we all know how messy things can get, whether that's around the house, during mealtimes, and even when it comes to our little ones themselves.

When it comes to wiping Alf's messy face and body, I want to be sure that what I am using is the best choice for his skin. With baby eczema and nappy rash being common conditions, using wipes for sensitive skin is a must. We've both been loving water wipes. We've actually used them since Alf was born and they gently clean and help protect delicate newborn and premature baby skin. They're made of just two ingredients, so 99.9% water and a drop of fruit extract. That means they are the best wipe choice for sensitive skin. Alf loves them and I even find myself using them.