We were lucky enough to speak to the wonderful Fernando, an adoptive parent based between America and Brazil. He kindly shared him and his wife, Lela’s fascinating story of adopting their son Kauê. Their story is both heart-warming and complicated (as all adoption stories seem to be in one way or another). Before we begin, it must be noted that their adoption took place in Brazil, and the Brazilian adoption system is, of course, different in many ways to the UK adoption system. With this being said, every adoption has more or less the same premise at the core – loving adopters wanting to complete or add to their families and this is what we’ll be focusing on with Fernando’s story.
In Brazil, there is a long waiting list to adopt a child. And by long we mean long. The wait for adopting a baby can be up to 15 years. The wait for children above 2 years old is faster, but you may still be looking at up to 6 years. Fernando commented that one of the reasons for this is that adoption is one of the only legal processes to add to your family for those struggling with fertility in Brazil. Methods like surrogacy are actually sadly illegal.
In Brazil, the adoption process follows a complex screening process with psychologists, social workers and intense parental interviews. To even qualify as an adoptive parent you have to go through a six-month training programme. During this programme, social workers and adoption experts provide you with the ups, the downs and everything in-between. This is in an attempt to manage expectations, provide a ‘reality shock’ (as Fernando commented) and to prepare you for all eventualities of adopting a child. Initially, Fernando approached the training with scepticism, as in his mind, he just wanted to be a dad, was that not enough? Quickly this view dissipated, and this training became him and Lela’s entire priority for the duration. They were taught to deal with challenging moments, testing moments and potential mental health struggles that their future adoptive child or children may struggle with. He reflects on the training as impressive and incredibly representative of some of the challenges he and his family ended up facing when embarking on the adoption process. It's only after this training, you then qualify to be added to the waiting list. For Fernando and Lela, it took four and a half years of waiting for a call.
When the call finally came, they were informed that a young boy of 6, Kauê, was waiting for them.
In an ideal world, Fernando and Lela wanted a big family and they were more than open to the idea of adopting birth siblings. When they first heard the news that this little boy was in foster care with two of his siblings who all required adoption, they were over the moon. Sadly, this elation was quickly thwarted as the judge had already made the unanimous decision to separate the three siblings due to their previous failed adoption. The judge explained that as the previous adoption had failed, and the children were of course getting older, the system believed they had a higher chance of all being adopted singularly, rather than all together. The judge believed in this sentiment so much that he refused even the possibility of multi-sibling adoption for Kauê and his siblings.
“We were refused even the notion of adopting all three of the siblings, despite it being something we desperately wanted.”
After already a four and a half year wait, Fernando and Lela made the difficult decision that it’s better to adopt one child at the expense of them losing their siblings, than no child at all.
And so the process began. Taking place during the Covid 19 pandemic, the couple were not allowed to have any physical contact with Kauê other than just via pictures and video calls. Despite this, Fernando reflects on their bond already being precious, and truly feeling as though Kauê was already their son during those calls. After months of back and forth, they finally were allowed to see him in person and Fernando recalls the magic of meeting him for the first time. After a month of living together and settling into family life, it was time to sit in front of the judge, and for Kauê to make the decision that would frame the rest of his life. He was asked questions like:
‘Do you want X and X to be your parents?’
‘Are you enjoying the relationship?’
‘Do you understand that these will be your new parents?’
These are big questions for any six-year-old. Yet nothing was to prepare him for the next question…
‘Do you understand that if you choose this family, you will never see your siblings again?’
This decision was asked of a six-year-old boy.
The answer was a testament to the power of their familial bond, and how comfortable and loving the home that Fernando and Lela welcome Kauê into is. Kauê decided he wanted to go home with his new parents. We won’t go into too much detail of the process, but still it took another year until formal legalities were able to confirm Kauê as their legal son. The final step is an adoption hearing in which the judge and social workers analysed the previous year, and heard from Kauê himself. At just seven years old at this point, Kauê was asked the following:
‘Who is your mother?’
‘Who is your father?’
‘Are you happy?’
As you would expect, Kauê’s answers were overwhelmingly positive, and now finally their official family life could begin.
When questioned about the process of the adoption system in Brazil, Fernando was actually quite positive. He believes that the process is actually well structured and well written, yet unfortunately where it fails is the lack of societal infrastructure designed and implemented to follow that law. We questioned him on his main frustrations as an adoptive parent, and he revealed his first (self-proclaimed) selfish frustration is the time scale and rigidity. He commented that he felt the decisions were taken out of their hands at certain points, and decisions about what they wanted were made for them. Specifically Fernando and Lela’s challenges were rooted in systemic societal problems, as opposed to actual issues with the settling in of Kauê.
The second, and more painful frustration, was the lack of ability to adopt Kauê’s siblings.
When Fernando and Lela were asked ‘what is your perfect match?’. They struggled to answer. They wanted multiple children, and they didn’t care what age. They didn’t want to limit their options as they were just desperate for a family. When this was brought up and discussed, it was made clear to them from the judge, that in every instance they try their very best to keep biological siblings together – with a view that the siblings should live together.
Except, in reality the absolute opposite happened.
They felt they were not even given a chance. There was no ability for them to connect, meet or converse with Kauê’s siblings, who were just two and nine years old at the time. The system failed them in this regard with the reasoning behind the decision being due to the previous adoption having failed. The judge believed that the three together, would be too intense for a single family to cope. With the nine ten-year-old being on the edge of the ‘adoption perfect match list’, the system worried that if it failed again, none would have a chance at adoption.
We asked Fernando if Kauê asks about his siblings.
“After two years of being a family, Kauê still talks about them. In the beginning it was a lot. We were very open and always encouraged good discussion. In the beginning he was really feeling the pain of being away from them. The social workers explained to him that it was a better chance for him to have a family this way. They explained if you love your brother, if you love your sister, it’s better you let them go instead of staying in foster care and having no life in the future. He doesn’t talk about them anymore. When people ask him if he has siblings, he says no but he says that he had them when he was in foster care. He sometimes asks now for a brother because he wants to play with someone. Overall, he has handled the grief of losing his siblings very well.’
It’s obvious just from talking to Fernando for an hour, that his love for his son shows no bounds. Despite Kauê feeling the gap left by his siblings, more prominently at the beginning, we would argue that the benefits of him being adopted into this loving home have more than outweighed the benefits of keeping the siblings together. However, it’s impossible to know how the three siblings, if adopted together, would have interacted in this new familial bond. We have no doubt that given the opportunity, the children and parents would have all benefited greatly from being kept together, and the system failed them hugely by removing even the possibility. With this being said, only positivity has come from this adoptive story and with Kauê’s social, personal and educational development skyrocketing, it’s obvious just how incredible both Fernando and Lela are as people, and what wonderful parents they are too.
“We are now living a dream”
Fernando & Lela.
Lela actually documents their lives on her Instagram page, where she shares details of their family, cooking and home life - check it out and follow along as Fernando, Lela and Kauê navigate life together.
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