At Christmas and in the summer we have Letterbox Contact with our son’s birth mother. At Christmas there is an exchange of cards and we send a few photos and a short letter. In the summer we again send some photos and a letter telling his birth mother how he has done at school.
Our son has three older siblings and we have Letterbox Contact with all of them. Sadly our son’s birth mother was unable to care for any of her children. Our son’s eldest sibling lives with the extended family and we write once a year, usually soon after our son’s birthday and send a photo. We have never received anything back but we will continue to write. As this child does see their birth mother we do sometimes get a photo. The other two siblings are adopted together. Again we write to them once a year. For a long time we did not receive anything from them. Our son was overjoyed when last year we eventually received some photos and a letter. We have told him some of the details of the letter but he was far more interested in the photos. He was able to see that one of his siblings is very tall like he is and has the same colour hair. The other child looks very like his birth mother. For some reason these children do not see their birth mother and so we have to be careful about what we say in the letters.
There will be an exchange of photos and information just before contact with our daughter’s birth mother. We will also send cards at Christmas. Although our daughter does have birth siblings, there are no plans for Letter Box Contact at this time as it would not be appropriate.
We have a file where we keep copies of letters sent and received. This will become more and more important as the children get older and begin to take more control of Letter Box Contact. The Agencies that placed our children have a system whereby they receive and send out information so that our home addresses are not used.