We adopted our son after spotting his gorgeous smile in The Sun – without you we wouldn’t be where we are today
IT was the big brown eyes and mischievous grin that shone out to Tony Coombs.
The building site manager was on his lunchbreak and reading a copy of The Sun when he first saw two-year-old Lamar.
We had featured the toddler in our pages as part of a National Adoption Week campaign in the paper, under the heading, Will You Be Our Mum And Dad?
The Sun was profiling children in need of loving homes — and Tony and his wife Jan, a charity worker, answered that call.
Nearly 13 years on, Tony, 57, reflects on the life-changing moment he spotted Lamar, now 15.
He says: “I rang Jan and said, ‘There’s a lovely little boy in the paper . . . shall we?’
Jan, 51, recalls: “I couldn’t wait to get home to see in the paper what this child looked like.”
It was then love at first sight as she took in his “mischievous” grin, and she says: “I thought to myself, ‘He looks like me’.”
To mark The Sun’s 50th birthday, we are shining a light on readers who, down the years, have gone above and beyond for others in responding to our many campaigns.
To say thanks, we have set up a £1MILLION Sun Readers’ Fund and want YOU to tell us about the small, local charities that have touched your lives and then nominate them for donations of £2,000 to £20,000 from our fund.
Details of how to do so are below.
THANKS A MILLION!
WE have been celebrating our amazing readers who, for 50 years since The Sun launched as a tabloid, have gone out of their way to help others.
In that time they have raised £100MILLION for various charities championed by The Sun’s many campaigns and highlighted a whole raft of crucial issues.
To say thank you and to mark our special anniversary, we have set up a £1million Sun Readers’ Fund and are asking YOU to tell us about the great causes that have touched your lives and to nominate them for a donation of between £2,000 and £20,000.
HOW TO NOMINATE YOUR CHARITY
STEP 1.
You have until December 18 but why not do it now.
Your chosen charity must be registered with either the Charity Commission , the Scottish Charity Regulator or the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland.
You must include the charity’s registration number.
STEP 2.
Fill out your name, address and phone number, then give us the details of the charity you are nominating.
STEP 3.
Tell us which of our six categories is relevant to your charity
STEP 4.
Write up to 400 words explaining what your charity does, why it is close to your heart, how much funding your charity needs and what that funding will do.
Tell us about your connection to the charity. Maybe you, your family or friends have received support. Do you work or volunteer there?
Make sure to tell us what area of the UK or abroad the funds will benefit.
STEP 5.
And finally, the important bit. Tell us how much money you are requesting between £2,000 and £20,000.
Please note there are a limited number of larger grants available.
The Sun Readers’ Fund panel, that decides who gets what and how much, will be looking to donate the majority of the £1million as small grants to help as many good causes as possible.
BY POST
If you don’t have access to the internet, post your nomination to: Sun Readers’ Fund, The Sun, 1, London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF.
‘THESE CHILDREN ARE LOST’
Lamar, who is on the autistic spectrum, had been overlooked by other potential parents until we ran our story as part of the annual adoption drive to find loving “forever families” for children.
Jan says: “We were drawn to Lamar immediately, even though he had challenging behaviour at that point in his life — he had had quite a rough start in life.
“The reality is that a lot of these children are lost, they’re hurting and you have to put in a lot of work to get them to a place of being the best versions of themselves.”
Tony says: “A child like Lamar can get moved from foster carer to foster carer. But you can break that cycle and give a child a home, and do the best you can.
“My thought was, because he has a condition, you can’t just leave him, so that drew us more towards him.”
Tony remembers the moving moment when he officially became Lamar’s dad and says: “One of the great joys was the feeling when we had to change all the paperwork into our surname.
“The judge called Lamar up and sat him on his knees while the judge was signing the form, then he said, ‘You’re now a Coombs’. That was a fulfilling day.” Lamar has flourished in his adoptive family, he is making strong progress with his schoolwork and is very sporty, particularly enjoying running and rugby.
He is also a gifted street dancer, who has won numerous competitions and trophies, and hopes to forge a career in modelling.
Speaking to The Sun, Lamar comes over as a typical teenage boy — obsessed with sport and, of course, social media. He says: “I like hanging out with friends, going bowling and going to theme parks. I now have almost 1,000 followers on Instagram.
“Some of my favourite family memories have been of the holidays we have been on, like to Cuba.”
Jan and Tony reckon Lamar has come on leaps and bounds and they are both hugely proud of the determination he has shown over the years.
Jan says: “He’s doing really well in school, the headteacher has sung his praises.”
Two years before Tony first made that excited call to Jan about Lamar, the couple had adopted another child, Shai, again thanks to a newspaper campaign for National Adoption Week.
But before adopting, they had never planned to start a family. Jan says: “Believe it or not, I never actually wanted to have children. If it wasn’t for National Adoption Week, we may not have even started. That was the start of the road for us.”
As Shai got older, the couple then began to think again about adopting. Janet says: “We would go away on holiday and think, ‘He’s on his own, he’s on the beach with no one to play with — he needs a brother’.
“But adopting Lamar took almost a year to complete because we had to go through loads of meetings and panels.
‘WE SIT AT THE TABLE TO EAT AND TAKE THE MICK’
“Social workers had originally thought Lamar would be better off as an only child, because he is very high-energy and had experienced a few problems with a previous foster carer’s son.
“But we managed to persuade them that he would be able to live with our family. Lamar finally came home with us in the April of 2008, nine months after we had first seen him in The Sun.”
Lamar and Shai have grown close over the years and get on well, but for the occasional tiff.
Jan says: “Most of the time we all sit at the table and eat together, and that’s when we take the mickey out of each other — or on WhatsApp throughout the day.”
Tony adds: “It’s all been joyful. You have the ups and downs, which is normal with children, but on the whole it’s a real joy.”
Looking again at that original Sun story, Jan says: “Seeing the picture of Lamar is amazing because he is still like this. He is still very bright and mischievous.” Tony adds: “If I hadn’t seen him in the newspaper, we wouldn’t be where we are today.
“It’s only when you look back at things like this, you think, ‘Oh my God, I’m so glad we’ve done it’. It reminds you. It grounds you.
“You can take things for granted sometimes when the children are growing up and you go through different stages in their life.
“But looking back at this article again brings back all those memories. It will be nice to give the article to Lamar when he is older — not to say, ‘Look what we have done’ but just as a way of being appreciative of our life together.”
Ever since he was a toddler, Lamar has loved rollercoasters. At first, he got a thrill from just looking at the rides, then as he got older, he has grown braver and the family has travelled to theme parks all over the UK for him.
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Lamar says: “Going to theme parks with my family are some of my favourite memories of growing up. We have been to Thorpe Park, Blackpool, Drayton Manor, Chessington, Six Flags, all of them.
“I remember going to Blackpool — the big red rollercoaster, that’s scary. It makes your tummy feel well weird.”
But while Lamar has always loved the ups and downs of a rollercoaster ride, thanks to Jan and Tony his life could not have been more stable.
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