Glad to be dads ; When Phil Reay-Smith came out at 18, he assumed that gay would equal childless. But with legal changes allowing same-sex couples to adopt, he and his partner Michael have made a life-changing decision... [Eire Region]

Summary

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Should we hide the booze? When social services told us that they were going to visit, that's the first question my partner Michael and I asked ourselves. Please don't judge us. We knew we were about to open up our lives to intense scrutiny, and we wanted to make a good impression.

Two years after our gay wedding in Toronto, and ten years after meeting each other, we had decided that we wanted to adopt. We knew it would be a long and difficult process and, for that reason, we had delayed the decision many times. But now we were seeking the approval of social services. Seeking someone's approval can drive you to strange behaviour. And so we found ourselves hiding our bottles of spirits and the martini glasses at the back of a kitchen cupboard.

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Extract

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Glad to be dads ; When Phil Reay-Smith came out at 18, he assumed that gay would equal childless. But with legal changes allowing same-sex couples to adopt, he and his partner Michael have made a life-changing decision... [Eire Region]

Living in London, we knew that it had been possible for gay couples in Britain to adopt since 2005. In the UK, it is local councils which oversees adoptions and when we approached ours, officials went to great lengths to point out that we would be treated exactly like any other couple. In contrast, here in Ireland, only married couples are considered in applications for joint adoptions, though th...

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