Video description: A white deaf man sits on a black leather sofa. His background is a brick wall which is a mixture of red, brown and cream. He wears a khaki polo shirt with a three-quarter zip. He signs in British Sign Language.
William’s story
My name is William and my partner is Kate, she is mixed race. We met at a deaf residential school and have been together since we were in our late teens. We’re now in our late twenties and work full time.
I work as an architect for a local firm and Kate works for a deaf charity organisation. We’ve been trying to have a family for six years so we went to see a GP for advice. They referred us to a fertility hospital. We found out that I was infertile, and we wouldn’t be able to conceive a biological child.
So, we decided to adopt a baby, but the entire process has been a struggle because of social service’s lack of support for our case.
It’s been especially challenging because there have been issues with social services providing interpreters and they don’t seem to understand how deaf people like us can be parents.
There have been so many issues with social services providing us with interpreters, including miscommunications between the interpreter booking agency and social services, which meant that no interpreters turned up! When the interpreters did show up, they weren’t qualified! Social services also could not provide us with our choice of interpreters. So, we decided to pay for our preferred interpreters out of our own pocket instead.
