Meli and Satya's story

Sisters Meli (3) and Satya (2) are full of life. They happily spend their days painting, singing, and running around the local park. Their lovely smiles light up the room and they have a beautiful relationship with one another. A year ago things were quite different.

The girls were living apart from each other in separate foster placements while their social worker searched for their forever family. Typically, sibling groups and children of ethnic minorities wait the longest for adoption, and at that time there were no prospective adopters who shared the girl’s cultural heritage anywhere in the UK.

Thankfully, Meli and Satya’s social worker found James and Zoe. It was a perfect match.

James and Zoe share how they came to adoption:

“We heard Krish speak at Momentum and both felt God speak to us about adoption. We both went on to read the Home for Good book while we were on holiday, which affirmed our thinking – and broke our hearts. To realise children waited so long for adoption, especially siblings and children of ethnic minorities, particularly challenged us.

As we talked and prayed together, we believed that God was calling us to adopt, and He spoke specifically to us about how this was not the plan B for how we would grow our family, but was always His plan A for us and our future children.

We contacted the Home for Good enquiry line as soon as we were home and were put in touch with Adoption Matters, one of the partner agencies for Home for Good’s pathway to adoption. Our assessment was draining at times but we knew it was important, and it was a great learning experience about ourselves too. The preparation groups were very helpful and gave us a lot of ‘tools’ for adoption, plus we met another couple who had come to adoption through Home for Good and have since become good friends with them.

Being matched with our beautiful girls was incredible, but a bit of a whirlwind – we saw the girls’ profile only a month after our approval at panel, and then started introductions three months later! Because Meli and Satya were living in separate foster placements the introductions were lengthy and quite complicated, and it was such a relief to welcome our girls into our home and begin working out our own family routines that suited them both.

Having a different ethnicity to us does present an extra layer of challenges for us all, and we pray that God will give us the wisdom to support the girls well as they navigate this along their journey. We are grateful for an extensive support network through our church that cares for us prayerfully and practically, and also includes many people from different cultures and we believe this will really help the girls to be around people who share their skin colour.

Meli and Satya have been through so much and these experiences are sometimes evident in their behaviour, but generally they amaze us with how resilient they are. They are little heroes!

We’ve had so many highlights that it’s hard to pick any out, and actually, we just have so much joy in the everyday moments of being family. Every now and then, the girls will tell us how much they like their home and their mummy and daddy – entirely unprompted! It is incredible.

If you are able to foster or adopt, go for it. It will turn your world upside down and inside out in so many ways but these children need us. To be loved and chosen and called – just as we have been.

Get good counsel to make the right decisions and stay connected with your family, friends and church because community is vital in every season of the journey. Do all that you can to educate those in your support network about the adoption process.

Throughout the whole experience, fight to keep God at the centre of everything – and it will feel like a fight at times – but make him your priority each day because that’s where the strength will come from that you NEED!”

*All names have been changed in this story

If you have been inspired by Meli and Satya's story, please consider giving a gift to Home for Good to enable us to do more to find loving homes for vulnerable children.