Supporting friends through the adoption process

When a friend tells you they're adopting, you become part of their support network whether you realise it or not. The things you say in the early conversations, the practical help you offer during the assessment, the way you treat the children when they arrive — all of it matters more than people often think.

This is a short guide for people who want to support a friend going through adoption and aren't sure how. Some of it is what to say, some of it is what not to say, and some of it is the more practical stuff your friend probably won't ask for directly.

Match their tone

When someone tells you they're considering adoption, the first response sets the tone for every conversation that follows. If your friend is excited, be excited with them. If they're nervous, take the nerves seriously.

What you don't need to do is ask for the details. Adopters get asked a lot of personal questions during the assessment — about their childhood, their relationships, their finances, their fertility history. Most of it stays between them and their social worker. If your friend wants to share something with you, they will. If they don't, that's not a slight on the friendship; it's a boundary they're entitled to.

Listen more than you advise

You don't need to have an opinion on whether your friend should be adopting. They've already made that decision. They're working with professionals who understand the process. What they need from you is someone who will listen when the assessment is dragging on, or when they've had a bad meeting, or when they're waiting on news.

Educate yourself a bit if you can — read what they send you, ask what they're working through. The UK government's adoption guidance is a reasonable starting point. The more context you have, the less your friend has to explain.

Offer practical help

This is where friends genuinely make a difference, and most of it is invisible to the agency.

The single most useful thing you can do, if you have children of your own, is let your friend look after them. Properly look after them — overnight, all day, on your own, with no parents nearby to step in. Childcare experience is something adoption agencies look for during the assessment, and it's not the same as cuddling a baby for an hour at a birthday party. Your friend needs to know what it feels like to be the only adult responsible for a child who's tired, hungry, upset, or all three. You're giving them that experience.

Beyond that, the practical help that adopters tell us they appreciated:

• Offering to be a personal reference — Jigsaw, like every UK adoption agency, asks for references from people who know the adopters well.

• Childcare cover during assessment meetings, panel preparation, or training sessions.

• Help getting the house ready — a fresh coat of paint in what will become the children's room, help moving furniture, an afternoon of childproofing.

• Being available during the long quiet stretches. Adoption involves a lot of waiting. A text saying "thinking of you" lands well during week six of nothing happening.

What not to say

A few things to avoid, however well-intentioned:

"It's just like having your own." Adopted children are their own children — that's the whole point of adoption. The sentence implies adoption is a slightly lesser version of birth parenthood, which it isn't. It's a different route to the same destination.

A related habit worth dropping: contrasting "adopted children" with "your own children". Adopted children are their own children, emotionally and legally. If your friend has both adopted and birth children, the right phrase is just "their children" — not "their adopted one and their own one". The distinction sounds small but it lands on adopted children, sometimes for years.

"Have you tried [fertility option X]?" If your friend is adopting, they've made that decision. They don't need you to suggest IVF, surrogacy, or that they "just relax". Some adopters come to adoption after fertility loss; others choose it first. Either way, the door is closed on alternatives.

Questions about the children's history. When children are placed, friends and family are sometimes curious about birth parents, why the children were taken into care, what's "wrong with them". This information is private to the family, and in most cases the adopters themselves are still piecing it together. Ask about the children, not their past.

Questions about cost. Adoption is free in the UK. The associated costs (medicals, background checks, court fees) are small. If you're curious, you can read about what adoption actually costs. You don't need to ask your friend.

After the children come home

Support doesn't stop when the children arrive — in some ways it's needed more than ever. The settling-in period is intense. Children are adjusting to a new family, a new home, sometimes a new school, and the adopters are learning to parent children who may have spent years elsewhere.

What helps:

• Treating the children as full family members from the first day. They're not "the adopted kids" — they're your friend's children.

• Patience with the bonding process. Attachment takes time, and it doesn't always look the way people expect.

• Practical help in the early weeks. Meals dropped at the door, walks with the dog so your friend can have an hour to themselves, school-run cover if you can manage it.

• Celebrating milestones. First day at a new school, the legal adoption order, the first birthday in the new family — these matter.

Adoption creates families that look and feel like any other family. The route is just different. If you're supporting someone on that route, the steady presence of friends is one of the things that makes it work.