# Age gap between existing child and new placement?



## AoC (Oct 28, 2008)

We're existing adopters approved for a second child.

But I'm getting discouraged by so many of the listings asking for a significant age gap between existing children and the potential new one....  5, 6 years.... even one saying 10 year minimum age gap!  Our Bug is 4, and since there are so few littlies in the system, anything over a 2 year gap pretty much takes us out of the reckoning.  :-/  I've seen many profiles on Adoption Link I would have enquired about, if it weren't for the age gap.

Are SWers being unreasonable?  Or do they really prefer single child placements for their children?

Sighs.


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## crazyspaniel (Sep 12, 2012)

I think they probably prefer single child placements....
Less complications without another child in the mix (not saying I agree with this obviously but I do think its true in a lot of cases)

Our daughters profile said she should be the youngest child in the family by at least 5 yrs.

Hope you find your LO soon


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## Nieta (May 7, 2015)

Our LA has a minimum 2-year age gap but can increase it for individual cases. Having said that, we've been linked with a LO that is 4 years younger than our DS, even though her sw had originally specified a 6 year gap. IMO the problem with Adoption Link and similar sites is that you are a stranger and so they just look at the basic facts like your DC's age and rule you out straight away if something's off. For our in house link our sw was able to talk about us and our DS with the LO's sw despite the smaller age gap and she happily changed her mind (DS is quite mature for his age).

I think it depends on the child's disposition as well as their sw whether or not a single placement is specified for a child. I do get the feeling that some sw's always sway the same way but sincerely hope that's not the case in reality. However complex children certainly often warrant a single placement.


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## Miny Moo (Jan 13, 2011)

I can only go on our situation, we were encouraged to go for as big an age gap as possible and were asked to drop our age range down from 4-6 to 2-6 preferably going for the younger age, our daughter was 5 at placement so we have a 5 year gap, we love our daughter and wouldn't change her for the world but with hind site wish we had listened and gone younger as feel our son might have coped with a much younger child a lot better than he has.


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## Anjelissa (Jan 11, 2007)

Hi AoC,

We had a lot of trouble even getting 'taken on' for our second lo.
Our original LA were only recruiting adopters for large sibling groups at the time, and I ended up ringing quite a few before we were finally accepted.
Many said they wanted our son to be at least school age, some even older (he was about 3 at the time).
All of them wanted at least 2 years age gap, so at the time we would only have been available for under 1's.
None would take into consideration the time it would take to be approved (at the time we were under the old system, so we were talking about anything up to a year).
There were many different restrictions and all had a different criteria, but in the end (after a lot of work) we were taken on, and our little lady moved in aged 14 months when our Son was just over 4 yrs, so we have approximately a 3 year age gap.
In our case they were prioritising families for our dd who had a child already, as they wanted her to have an older sibling if possible, (so it can run in your favour) .

Like everything else, we now look back and are glad we had such a struggle getting accepted for our second child, as if our original LA had taken us on we'd never have crossed paths with our little lady. I have everything crossed for you that it wont be much longer before you are able to say the same 

x x x


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## liveinhope (Jan 8, 2008)

We were told there has to be at least 2 years between the children.  The LO we are linked with is actually 3 years younger than our son


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## Sun Flower (Jul 14, 2008)

we have been told there need to be a 2 year age gap. Our LO is nearly 2.5yrs so we are hoping to be matched with a baby. Our SW seems positive although we know realistically we might be in for a long wait!! 

I can't believe the differences between each LA's criteria


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## AoC (Oct 28, 2008)

Yes, we were told (and approved on the basis) that there needed to be a two year age gap, which I think is reasonable and never had a problem with.  Bug is four, so that's currently anyone under two.  From what I'm seeing in profiles, I'm going to have to keep on explaining to Bug why he doesn't have a little sister or brother yet (because of course he had to be 'prepared' for our second approval) for another three years or so.


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## AoC (Oct 28, 2008)

Sorry guys.    It's not like me to get discouraged, but it didn't last long...  ;-)  Thanks for all your input.

I was getting very sad, then remembered that there's four years between me and my brother, and we were always close.  

We'll survive.    I firmly believe that Bug was meant to be ours, and I can't imagine that number two will be any different.  So when the time is right, the right Pumpkin will come our way.

Positive wishes and love to you all.


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