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Diageos Luci Morelli felt supported starting a family through adoption

Diageo's Luci Morelli felt supported starting a family through adoption

 April 18, 2023

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Diageo is a very people-focused company, and actively supports both the professional and personal lives of its employees.

For those wanting to start a family, Diageo offers a progressive family leave policy that helps employees focus on the joy of raising children, while continuing to thrive at work. Diageo's commitment to diversity sees it celebrate all types of families, which has earned the company recognition as an adoption-friendly workplace.

This support was very much felt and appreciated by Luci Morelli, a Diageo Project Manager for Innovation Commercialization, based in Illinois, US. Working at Diageo enabled Luci to manage her commitments while creating a beautiful family through adoption. 

"No matter how meticulously we plan our lives, as Alanis Morissette once said: "Life has a funny way of sneaking up on you." I had a game plan: get a good job, a great husband, travel the world, then have kids but the struggle didn't begin until the very end of the game. After several painful and unsuccessful IVF sessions, I realized that the only way for me to have a family was through adoption," says Luci.

Making the decision to adopt 

"I'm from Brazil, where the social divide, mixed with drug abuse, results in many children being placed in foster care. Stats show that after the age of three, a child's chances of adoption decrease exponentially. It’s also known that, when people file for adoption, most of them want a baby. Furthermore, when children are removed from their biological families in Brazil, they almost always have siblings. All of this is to say that, as much as I wanted a baby, I couldn't ignore the reality of the situation in foster care. It took months to consider, but we finally decided to file for two siblings, regardless of race, and up to eight years old," comments Luci.

Changing her life forever

"When the social assistant called us and said there were two sisters that were a perfect match for us, we could not breathe. After days of sleepless nights two never-ending conversations, we decided to go for it. We spent Christmas in Brazil to meet Dandara who was six, and Amanda who was four and a half. After the visit, we couldn’t stop envisioning our lives together, the four of us. We said yes to the adoption and the girls arrived in our lives on March 31, 2020. The day my life had changed forever," explains Luci. 

Supporting working mothers

"When moving back to the US, I took time off work to help the girls and I promised them that I would only work for a company that supported working mothers, Diageo is this company. I love knowing that if my children ever needed me, I can be there. This year, our family celebrated its third anniversary and I know that we’ll always be a patchwork family - full of love, laughter, tears and tantrums. And, like any biological family, we are entitled to the status of a real family simply because we are. No two families are alike, but what holds a family together is love, commitment, and care," adds Luci.


Work for a fully-supportive employer

Women's work is highly valued at Diageo, and they thrive with the support and opportunities provided through the company.

As one of the world's leading alcohol beverages companies, Diageo offers a wide range of career opportunities for talented women.

Learn more, and apply now for a brillant job at Diageo.

 

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