Barnardo's Scotland Adoption Support Service

Barnardo’s Scotland Adoption Support Service

If you live in Scotland and adoption is part of your story, we’re here for you.
We work in partnership with local authorities, please get in touch to learn more or contact your local authority.

Adoptive Families
We support adoptive families at every stage, supporting therapeutic parenting, navigating challenges, and engaging with education. Our team can guide you through life story work, helping parents and children to understand their journey. Support may involve working directly with the child or the whole family, so you feel confident and resourced for the future.
We also run groups for adoptive parents; we have mixed groups and a dedicated dads’ group.

Adult Adoptees
If you’re an adult adoptee, you may want to explore your life story and understand decisions made or relationships you have had. Whether your adoption was recent or many years ago, we can help.
Working with our partners, we can access records to provide summaries, build timelines, and find forgotten or unknown information. We also host an Adult Adoptees Group, a safe space to meet others who share an understanding of adoption’s impact.

Birth Parents
We support birth parents whose children are no longer living with them, whether through historic adoption or those navigating current processes. Every experience is unique, and we’re here to help at any stage, whether that’s early in the permanence process or when plans have been concluded.

Intermediary - Search and Reunion
We support adoptees and birth relatives in their search to find each other and connect; this may be indirect connections or face to face. We work with each person and support them in this process, exploring their expectations and hopes.

Training
We also deliver training on behalf of local authorities to adopters and social workers.