I don't believe this!

[mamarhu]

It will be tomorrow before I can get the full story, but I am SO upset over what happened in court Friday. I couldn't be there (my 90 year old mother had surgery, 200 miles away, & I had to drive her), so I have only heard the story from another foster parent involved with the case. But the 3 amazing things that seem to have transpired are:

1. One sibling (of the 5) has been returned to mom. His lawyer (each child has their own) moved to make the boy a party to the case, because the decision (return to mom vs. adoption of the younger 4) would affect his "sibling rights". Has anyone here ever heard of such a thing?

2. That boy, 11 YO, was caught sending pornographic pics of himself to his "girlfriend" (he is 11 for Pete's sake!!), and she responded in kind. The 4 younger kids are all highly sexual, due to earlier abuse by the brother, each other, and possibly adults in the family. Could they seriously consider returning the little ones to this home?

3. And now they are appealing the change of plan, last September, from concurrent (adoption & reunification) to RU only, based on the "successful" transition of the 11 YO back home.

oops, almost forgot the sort of biggest one - 4. They are also asking for LittleGuy to be removed from my home, apparently because I asked for help in a team meeting last week. Things are rough right now, and I admitted I don't know if my home is the bet possible placement for LittleGuy. So much for honesty, eh? The lawyers jumped on that, using it as a reason to send him back to Mom. And the big brother. Great plan.

Like I said, I won't have the full story until I speak tomorrow AM with the lawyers and the caseworker. But holy cow, I already spent the whole weekend grieving. Not that i would give up, but we thought this case was a slam dunk, due to the degree of extreme neglect & abuse in the family home, and the 3 generations of CPS reports against the birth family. I am really shaken to consider that my babies (9, 7, and 6 & 6) could be returned to the hell that caused all this damage.

I am tempted to write a letter to each of the 3 lawyers (mom's, BigBoy's, and LittleGuy's) who are on that "side", and ask them if they would be able to sleep at ight, if they returned the younger 4. Is that kind of letter considered bad form?

[karne]

I'm so sorry. Your's is one of the strongest voices on this forum, so to to hear you rattled makes me feel anxious for the children. Sending support your way.

[pumpkingirl71]

I hope today brings you better news.

[Polliwog]

That's crazy. But, it's the children's lawyers asking for those changes, not social services. Right? Because, based on everything I've read on this board and our other one, there's no chance on Earth that a judge would go along with that. At least, that's what I believe.

[Sierra]

I am thinking of you and your little ones.

[HeatherAtHome]

I'm so sorry. Hoping that you'll soon hear better news.

[alicia622]

hope you get some answers to what happened and why today.

[tiffani]

I'm so sorry, mamarhu, I hope you get to the bottom of it soon...

[mamarhu]

Well, pshaw.

My original impression was not far off. Except that the judge is going to ORDER visits between the 4 younger siblings and the older one. I am livid. I would take this to mean that even if the little ones clearly express distrust, upset, or whatever, we will be required to maintain visits, twice a month per child. I hope I will be allowed to supervise or at least attend. We have had a truly rotten DHS transporter supervising visits with Mom, and she has become far too involved, taking the mother's side, even defending her i court.

The DHS case worker, supervisor, and atty all are amazed at these developments. No one has ever seen a case like this, fairly open and shut, go quite like this, so suddenly. They said they had never heard of a sibling being made a party to a case, to assert his sibling rights. They also have never heard of the plan (adoption) being appealed even before the TPR trial.

My head is reeling. I think it is not likely that the younger kids will ever be returned to Mom. But this will certainly stretch on for a minimum of 2 more years. They have already been in care almost 3 years. That is nearly 1/2 of the 6 YO twins' lives!!! 1/3 of my 9YO, somewhere in between for my 7YO.

While I am whining, may I go off topic to explain a sliver, just a sliver, of the stress I am under these days? About 3 weeks ago, I was rear-ended, and the ins. co. ended up calling my car totaled. It took forever to get the check, and it turned out to be for considerably less than I had expected. So I knew I would be stepping down from my minivan, and was almost looking forward to getting a car with better fuel consumption (the eternal optimist, no?). Well it turns out that for $3000, you can't really get much of anything.

But I finally found and bought a fairly nice car, contingent on a mechanic's approval. I returned the rental car that the ins co provided, and drove the new (old) car to the mechanic. Who immediately found a serious leak in the rear main seal, and strongly advised against buying it. $1000 or more to fix it. But now I had no car - the rental co wouldn't rent me a car if the ins co wasn't paying for it; I have a debit card but no credit card. So, I could have returned the car, but then where would I be? No car to even go look for a car. In the end, I split the $1000 cost with the dealer, and got it repaired. I know I got took, but I was over a barrel.

So then I took Mom up to the hospital 200 miles away, only to find she has a serious infection, so they cannot do the surgery. The trip was OK for the Dumplings and me, but really hard on Mom. In fact, I don't think it was a coincidence that she had a minor stroke this morning at 5 AM. She called me (this is getting fairly routine, it was # 5 since Thanksgiving), so I went right over to her house. Stayed with her all morning, missing my 10 AM recertification inspection. opps.

Anyway, I left out all the little stressful details, like the little kids' behavior, 2 therapy appts I spaced while out of town, the fact that we forgot to put out the trash, the bills I have yet to pay, my brother with whom I have not spoken in 8 years is coming to town to say goodbye to Mom, my sister also planning to come up, I am still trying to find a job - over a year with no luck.

OK, I am done ranting - I feel a little less overwhelmed just for saying it. Thanks for listening, and for the suport above and the last few years.

[Sierra]

Oh my goodness, hun, hang in there!

[Thandiwe]

((hugs))

Foster care cases, I'm finding, can truly rattle you to your soul. Add in life, and it's a lot! I can relate. It's not just our case, or the long drive associated with our case, it's life compounded by all of it. It takes a lot out of you to emotional find your life on hold while working through a case and in the meantime your own life marches on and makes new and unexpected demands.

I'm sorry you're going through a really rough patch. Getting through each day and forcing myself to only look at what is right in front of me helps. If I look at too much, I get discouraged, angry, bitter, and sad. But in this exact moment, I can make it through, keep my sanity, and be happy for my kid's sake.

And learn to laugh about the small (and sometimes not so small) stuff. Like finding myself locked in a single stall bathroom in a hotel resort with a screaming toddler for 45 minutes and two other little ones because we couldn't sit in the restaurant while she freaked. Only to have my toddler color. On the walls and countertop. Which are newly tiled, really beautiful, stone. With crayon. And it wouldn't come off. I was crying at that moment, but when I slunk into the hallway and raced with the kids back to the room, I laughed. One of those moments...

[tiffani]

I have nothing but hugs for you, mamarhu. wish I had more to give... hang in there and don't forget to breathe!!

[khaoskat]

Originally Posted by mamarhu

I

1. One sibling (of the 5) has been returned to mom. His lawyer (each child has their own) moved to make the boy a party to the case, because the decision (return to mom vs. adoption of the younger 4) would affect his "sibling rights". Has anyone here ever heard of such a thing?


I am tempted to write a letter to each of the 3 lawyers (mom's, BigBoy's, and LittleGuy's) who are on that "side", and ask them if they would be able to sleep at ight, if they returned the younger 4. Is that kind of letter considered bad form?

In regard to your first question, the answer is Yes.

When an adoption occurs, parental rights are terminated and the child(ren) when adopted are then considered the biological child(ren) of the adoptive parent. A new birth certificate is issued, removing the biological parents names and information and replacing it with the adoptive parents information.

So, by allowing one child to return home and terminating the other three children, you do affect the rights of the older sibling with regards to his siblings. They are technically no longer his siblings. He has no rights to see them ever again or communicate with them ever again. He has no rights to inherit from them either. He is cut out of their lives totally and completely

As for sending the letter, I would strongly advise against it. Even though you feel it is totally wrong, as an attorney they have a legal duty and obligation to do what their client wants. I have represented Sex Offenders who have failed to registered, and I have had to take the matter to trial, knowing full well that we were going to win the trial and my client would get off totally free and clear of the charges against him/her.

When you are an attorney you have to separate your morality and conscious from your job. You took at oath of office, just like a doctor, and you have rules and regulations regarding your profession that you are required to follow. Unfortunately, when you are an attorney you don't get to pick and choose the cases you get assigned by the Court, and if you did, you would be bankrupt.

Wanted to add about the sibling being add as a party to a case. In Ohio, when you are terminating parental rights, the children are automatically a party to the case. They have a right to be heard on their wishes and have the Court appoint an attorney for the child if their wishes differ from what everyone else wants (ie CPS, Guardian Ad Litem, etc).

What you need to do is consider talking to the Court and asking for an attorney to be appointed for the children in your custody. That they have a differing view from what the sibling wants, and since the older sibling is now a party to the case, these children have the right to be heard and become a part of the case. That these children want to be heard and do not want contact with the older sibling and/or parents. If the Court is going to appoint an attorney for one child, they need to do it for all of them.

[Polliwog]

Rhu has said that each of the children already has his/her own lawyer. I've NEVER heard of a child being made a party to a case. My son's siblings were too young, but my soon-to-be adopted daughter's are older. They were never mentioned in court, ever. They live with their father though, if that makes a difference.

[Whistler]

Oh my goodness... I wish I could do something to help lighten your load, Rhu! All I can do is send thoughts and prayers your way and encourage you to keep fighting for those little ones, as I know you will.

It stinks that asking for help resulted in this. What do they prefer? Total Burnout? Arg.

Keep plugging away. And treat yourself to some chocolate.