Step-parent adoption

I was adopted by my step father. Is that what you are looking at? Or from a parents perspective?

Oh interesting Emiloly I was wondering the same thing from the perspective of a parent whos gone through it. We'll have the okay from Jakes bio dad but have heard even then that the courts aren't keen on step-parent adoptions! Anyone got any experience?

From a childs POV I was adopted by my dad and didn't meet my bio dad til I was 17. I love both my dads and while I have issues with other aspects of the situation I totally don't have any problems with the fact that I was adopted by dad #1. Hes never differentiated between me and my siblings (his full kids) and thats probably influenced things.

I have a friend who did it successfully many many years ago but the laws have changed so not sure of the relevance. She had to make all reasonable attempts to contact the biological father who had no contact since about the time of the birth and had to go through the process of having visits by a social worker etc to check her suitability to adopt, even though she was the mother.

Another friend tried to do this but the father wouldn't waive his rights and started having access once it all came to light. Her new husband ended up being a guardian, which achieved the same results they were looking for.

Do you need the bio father to agree for the step-parent to become guardian?

My dad adopted my older sister when she was around 4-5 at the same time as he and mum got married. She still has contact with her biological father and his family however dad is always and has always been her "Dad". She had her surname changed, but it was changed from my mothers maiden name to our dads surname. I was born when she was about 5 - it was a real shock to me one day when one of my sisters friends was talking about the fact that we had different dads and said "so, you are half-sisters then?". It had never occurred to me and I was around 17 at the time! We both kinda shook our heads and went "Nooooo......." Sorry, a bit off track there but I suppose the whole point of it was that we never felt like half-sisters even though her biological father was never kept a secret from us. Dad is always "Dad" and she is always my full sister. I think her having the same last name as us did help (although she has since married and changed it). Good luck with sorting it out! Really hope it works out for you. Can't help you on the law side of things as that was around 24 years ago.

Thanks for your input guys :) I like how you felt about your sister Delli. I don't really think of the trouble mosters as being Ethan's half sisters, however I do think of is bio dad's other kids as his half siblings. I'd really like the kids to all have the same surname for this fact.

Shellgirl, how do you know so much about the adoption law? I just told DP that we will need to get married haha and he looked at me and laughed. He said a few months ago that he would 'get married for the sake of the children' other than that he doesn't really see much point in us doing it as we are already in a committed relationship.

We are hoping that the bait of him not having to pay child support might swing it in our favour.

It's a bit of a long and drawn out story. He was absive to me, I have a protection order blah blah blah. He WAS trying to get contact, but when it got a bit to hard (I filed for paternity order to get him to pay child support since he is not on DS's Birth cert) he vanishes in to thin air. His lawyer is filing to remove herself as his council as he hasn't replied to her contact at all in the last three months. This guy has give kids to four different woman (that we know of) And only has contact with the baby he has just had. He isn't aloud to see the oldest two (she also has a protection order against him) And he doesn't admit that the third one is his at all, even though if you see photos of her and DS together you can see they are so much alike.

Like I said, it's complicated. Not he will respond to any requests made by us. He certainly didn't respond AT ALL to our guardianship proceedings. I know that courts tend to not want to sever the 'bond' between bio parent and child, but we aren't looking to to replace his bio family, just make his position as DP's Son more secure.

I work in the Family Court area Emiloly, so that's how I have learnt about this stuff .

If he's not responding to the guardianship proceedings then I would say there is a good chance of your DP being appointed a guardian. Especially as he's been involved in Ethan's care for a while.

Good luck for getting this sorted as soon as you can.