Finding Lucy: The little girl destined to be mine
There was a child in the world destined to become Margaret Reynolds’ daughter. And Margaret would stop at nothing to find her…
On a warm evening, my friends and I settled into our seats in the restaurant, on holiday in Sicily. My eye was caught by a woman and a small boy. Her son. They chatted contentedly and when the waiter came, the boy was charming and well-mannered. The image stuck in my mind. It was what I wanted – a child of my own, to join my life’s adventures.
I was in my 40s. I’d been married for 10 years, then had a relationship with a woman for 12 years. Now single, a biological child was an impossibility as I’d been through menopause. I visited a fertility clinic when I was 45.
IVF would require a donor egg and donor sperm, but it took a year for the clinic to find a donor mother and by then, I’d made up my mind. I wanted to adopt. There was a child out there who needed me and I wanted to find them.
The path to adoption was strewn with hurdles and took dedication and determination. For me, it took seven years, elongated by an early mistake.
Friends had successfully adopted from China and I thought that might be my best route, as in the UK at the time, adoptive parents could be no more than 45 years older than their prospective child.
China did not accept applications from people who’d ever been in a homosexual relationship but I foolishly thought it was more important I had a loving home to offer. My past relationship status felt irrelevant.
After 18 months of meetings, training, interviews and references, a panel denied my application after finding something referencing my relationship online. The fact I hadn’t declared it was my crime.
I went home and cried. I was devastated but also felt clarity. I couldn’t give up. I started the process again with a different agency. There were more false starts. More rejections. My sixth application, six years later, to an independent adoption agency, was accepted.
I was now, at 50, too old to be matched with a baby. But a child would have experience of life – of pain, rejection, anxiety and loneliness. In order for me to feel happy that I’d become a parent, this child would have already experienced sadness, which left me conflicted. I told myself the consequences of a child’s unfortunate start may play out in challenging ways for years ahead but that was exactly the child who most needed someone to support, accept and love them. I was ready to take a child who’d been through the worst and love them with my best.
In Spring 2008, my social worker showed me a photo of Lucy, then five. She was smiley, with long hair, big eyes and a cute little nose. I pinned the photo on my bedroom door and from that moment, every decision I made and every thought
I had was about Lucy.
From a shortlist of five potential parents, I was chosen as a match. I wasn’t told a huge amount about Lucy’s circumstances, but that August, I met her for the first time at her foster home.
She stood timidly beside her foster mother, wearing
a crown made of gold card. We met there every day for a week, then had our first outing alone. At a restaurant, the waitress remarked: ‘ Your daughter has such good manners!’ It was the first time anyone had presumed Lucy was my daughter. I hoped one day, Lucy would feel like I was her mother.
The day Lucy moved into my home was difficult. She cried as we left the foster home and all the way back to my house. In her bedroom, I’d placed toys and a letter from my goddaughter and her sisters, welcoming Lucy into our family.
But she ran around the house, unable to settle, refusing to eat. Everything felt strange, for us both. I focused on establishing a routine, because Lucy’s life until then had been so chaotic. I wanted her to feel safe and know life would now be consistent.
I didn’t overload her with experiences. We walked to the village pond, picked vegetables and fed my hens. ‘ What interesting thing is going to happen today?’ she started asking when she came down to breakfast.
She had a sense of wonder and an infectiously positive attitude. ‘That’s a nice person,’ she said as we stopped to chat to a friend in the village. After four months, I baked brownies for Lucy’s school Christmas lunch. ‘These are so good, Mum,’ Lucy said. My heart threatened to burst and break at that very moment.
When Lucy was seven, we went on holiday to Venice. As we had lunch, a waiter offered to pull up an extra seat for Lucy’s soft toy, Jaffa. As he put a napkin on Jaffa’s lap, Lucy giggled and I realised I had achieved the vision I’d longed for.
As the years went by, we made ourselves into a family. Lucy was by my side at concerts, literary festivals and operas. Then she grew up and I started to fit my life around hers, which is a new adventure.
Lucy may be 18 but she still has the same attitude she had when she was six, wondering what interesting thing might happen each day.
Now 63, it has been a privilege to be Lucy’s mum. It wasn’t always easy but the hardest part was before Lucy arrived. Once she arrived, everything I’d gone through to find her made perfect sense. She has given me a life filled with purpose, joy and love.
Lucy says,
‘There was snow, the first Winter after I arrived. Mum took me tobogganing and, for the first time, it felt like home. Having suffered so much trauma and disappointment, I never expected anything good to be permanent. Mum gave me somewhere to belong.
It’s natural to be curious and, when I was 14, I wanted to find out about my birth family, which caused a few difficult years. Now, I am happy with who I am and where I came from.
There are challenges in adoption, but you’ll be giving a child a family. There’s no greater gift.’
The Wild Track: Adopting, Mothering, Belonging
by Margaret Reynolds is published by Doubleday.