Advice for a person who is fostering . . now biomom has come back

[USAmma]

I am asking advice for a family friend. They adopted one child 12 years ago, are a wonderful family full of love, faith, cultural tradition, and warmth. They also have financial resources to ensure that a child in their family would get all that it needed, but they don't spoil their 12 year old and are very down to earth in that way.

Anyway, a few months ago this family was contacted out of the blue and asked if they would like to foster a child who is distantly related to them, with adoption being a very real possibility. The birth mother had basically done drugs for the entire pregnancy, lived in drug houses with this child and had a series of bad boyfriends. CPS got involved and took the child and placed her with the bio mom's mother, who is of poor health and cannot care for the child long-term. The grandmother is who called my family friends because they are in the family (second cousins or something) and had provided such a good home to their first child. Up until this point the bio mom of the child had not even bothered to come to court hearings even though transportation was provided by the state should she choose to come. She had taken no interest in her child all this time.

Our friends took this child in at a moment's notice with open arms, and she was accepted warmly into their circle of friends. The child was enrolled at a nice preschool part time because she had not been socialized well, and she also was gently but firmly taught the rules of the house. Of course no physical discipline was used. The family took this child to a some specialists to get a good evaluation of what this child needs socially and developmentally. The courts decided to go ahead with the adoption proceedings. The bio mom did not show up for the first two hearings and they could not find her.

So, now she's taken a new interest in this child's life. When she feels like it.She has been granted supervised visitations and makes some of them.The child is now in an unstable situation again and confused. The mother is still hanging out with drug users and all that.

I'm sure this situation is not too unusual. I was just wondering if there was anything I can suggest to this family, who love this little girl as their own. The sad part is that several years ago they had tried to actually foster the little girl's bio-mom, because at that time her own family situation was so bad with drug abuse and physical abuse. They were denied adoption and have had to watch the bio mom grow up in a bad state and now they are afraid of seeing history repeat itself with the little girl.

Advice?

[marsupial-mom]

Well, supervised visitations are what they sound like. It's a far cry from "an unstable situation." Foster parents still have custody, there's no plan of transition back home or anything... it's just supervised visitation.

Your friends just need to stick to the plan, document everything, and be supportive of the little girl. If everyone does what they're supposed to do, then things will work out well. But document EVERYTHING just in case.

[waiting2bemommy]

I don't belong here but I saw this from the main page....if the bio mom is still hanging out with these people because she has nowhere else to go, but she genuinely wants to become a good mom, could they take her in?

That might be a wildly inappropriate suggestion but I just thought of it because you say they wanted to foster *her* just a few years ago, which indicates that she is still pretty young and might have a chance at making a turnaround. IF and only IF that is what she really wants. I knew someone who did this with a young, but adult, mom (like 19-20) and although initially the family who took her in had custody of the baby the mom lived there too and got herself together and afaik she and the child live on their own and do ok now.

And please ignore me if that idea totally doesn't apply here. it just popped into my head.

[pumpkingirl71]

Originally Posted by marsupial-mom 

Well, supervised visitations are what they sound like. It's a far cry from "an unstable situation." Foster parents still have custody, there's no plan of transition back home or anything... it's just supervised visitation.

 This : )  Supervised visits are part of a safe relationships birthparents.  Contact with birthparents is a good thing, as long as it is safe.
 

[Polliwog]

The baby is in foster care. What you are describing would be wildly inappropriate in most situations.

Originally Posted by waiting2bemommy 

I don't belong here but I saw this from the main page....if the bio mom is still hanging out with these people because she has nowhere else to go, but she genuinely wants to become a good mom, could they take her in?

That might be a wildly inappropriate suggestion but I just thought of it because you say they wanted to foster *her* just a few years ago, which indicates that she is still pretty young and might have a chance at making a turnaround. IF and only IF that is what she really wants. I knew someone who did this with a young, but adult, mom (like 19-20) and although initially the family who took her in had custody of the baby the mom lived there too and got herself together and afaik she and the child live on their own and do ok now.

And please ignore me if that idea totally doesn't apply here. it just popped into my head.

[queenjane]

I want to also add that it doesnt matter how much they provide for the baby, whether they are "nice, stable, committed" , can offer her a much better life than her bio mom...the court doesnt look at that stuff at all, at least not in my experience. They will only look at whether the mom has done the minimum required of her by the court/agency, and whether they feel she can provide an adequate and safe home for her child.

This may drag on for years, and in the end the child ends up with her bmom. It could drag on for years and in the end the foster parents get to adopt. Or it could end much more quickly either way. There is just no way of knowing and that is the rollercoaster of foster care. All they can really do is love her and prepare to let her go if that time comes, and document anything unusual, like if the child has behavior issues after visits and that sort of thing. They need to be open about their willingness to provide a permanent home, but be careful to not look TOO eager to adopt, which could backfire. I would encourage them to attend all court hearings, if possible. In most places its the legal right of the FP to be present.

[Smithie]

What queenjane said, and in some states, it would be normal and helpful for the FPs to retain a lawyer who would start communicating with the DA and the social workers. In other states, the bureaucrats might not like it. That would be a question for them to ask a local lawyer who has experience dealing with social services. 

[queenjane]

If they had the child 12 months, or even six months, a lawyer might be reasonable (and im not saying they SHOULDNT talk to a lawyer but they need to be really careful about that!)...but the OP says "a few months ago" they had the child placed with them. They dont really seem to have standing. "A few months" with no contact and then the bmom shows up and so they start visits then isnt crazy unusual...i'd say its pretty normal. When my second FC was placed with me, a little 11.5 month old, her mom didnt see her for almost two months...they couldnt find the mom, the mom had been hiding her kids when her newborn was taken into care (positive drug screen), hiding them with relatives, they found the kids, split them up...it was at least six weeks after M was placed with me that anyone called me about anything, and then it was 'oh mom showed up in court, she wants a visit, can you come tuesday?'...i dunno, i guess i thought if you just cut off contact like that it would be taken more seriously but apparently not. A week after that she was moved to an aunt which i hope was a good thing for her.

I guess what i'm saying is i hope the OPs friends are prepared to be in this for the long haul. This likely will not go quickly. And it sounds like the little girl is school age (pre school age?) therefore has a relationship with her mom and they will try hard for RU. (Here, if its an infant, they try to make a decision by 12 months due to the young age of the child. If you dont make significant progress by that time they will go for termination. But you can see in the case of a mom who posts here, she got the child at one month old and the child was RU over two years later. )

Where i am, if i understand it, FPs do not have standing unless the child has been w/ them for 12 months. The OPs friends might do better trying to talk to the mom IF the mom is receptive to that and if they wont "get in trouble" for it (risk the placement), to see whether the mom really wants to RU or is going through the motions and if she would willingly give up rights to the child. Thats a very delicate situation though and a fine line to walk.

[Tigerchild]

I think it would be best for your friends if they take the POSSIBILITY (NOT guarantee) of adoption to heart, and if they at least try to remember how much they once loved the mom, and to be mindful that they may have prior baggage over the issue (we couldn't "save" mom, so we're going to try even harder to "save" this one) that may be painful but necessary to work through.  They'll need to be really careful about blaming all instability currently on the mom;  look, whether they like it or not, this child IS bonded to her mother (even though it may be in a negative way for all we know).  Even if they're "better" and the child is bonded to them too, they can't just throw away the mother, as easiest as that would be for them.  The child is going to experience grief in stages no matter what.  Nothing will stop that.  Not even if the birthmom were to get hit by a bus and never saw the child again.  Also, being adopted, especially in the context of TPR for an unsafe environment *is* confusing.  Being moved a couple of times *is* confusing.  If the people who adopt you have great financial resources and are nice and loving, it doesn't remove the confusion and pain of earlier, nor will it prevent it in the future as the kiddo gets older and goes through other life stages.  Even the nicest people are not able to prevent that;  even the crappiest adoptive parents sometimes don't have to deal with it.

I'm a little confused though...has TPR already occured (visitation sounds like not)?  I didn't realize that adoption procedings could begin formally prior to TPR.  It is fairly common for the end stages of TPR, when it becomes the real deal, for people to panic and fight or express interest (or other relatives coming out of the woodwork, ect.).  Adoption is a little different.  I think that you really cant count on TPR as part of "adoption procedings". 

[Smithie]

In my state, children are often put under the management of an adoption worker, told that they're going to be adopted, placed with a family that wants to adopt, etc. etc. prior to the completion of TPR. I find this approach troubling, but there it is. The OP's friends may live in a state with a similar method of placing children.

[marsupial-mom]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smithie 

In my state, children are often put under the management of an adoption worker, told that they're going to be adopted, placed with a family that wants to adopt, etc. etc. prior to the completion of TPR. I find this approach troubling, but there it is. The OP's friends may live in a state with a similar method of placing children.

In my state, I think that's called an "at risk placement" meaning it's legally at risk for disruption if the bio parents maintain parental rights.

As of not too long ago, the average adoption from fostercare took something like 4 years from the child's perspective. So it's really important to remember that this is a long process if you're with the child from the beginning. There can be a lot of back and forth, change of plans, problems/issues/needs that interfere, etc. From the child's perspective, it's obviously MUCH better to have ONE (set of) foster parent(s) plus the bio parents and if adoption becomes a reality, the foster parent(s) adopt. But a lot of these kiddos go from foster parent to foster parent to foster parent to adoptive parent. Or foster parent to bio parent to foster parent to bio parent... Some states are better than others on this.
 

In another thread, I made my position on lawyers clear: I think that if you really want to protect your rights and if you want to really know what a judge says and means, you need a lawyer. My experience has taught me that you simply cannot trust the case workers to be honest or helpful. You need your own advocate. That said, if you're not interested in adoption and/or not interested in protecting the child and/or you trust the system/caseworkers, then a lawyer might not be very valuable to you. It just depends.

[heatherdeg]

Ditto to every last thing Queenjane said.  And agreeing with marsupial-mom that you cannot--EVER--trust what the worker says.  Not that they're always lying, but they are often making a best guess and truly have no idea.  You just never know.

And I think what many don't realize is that there is a standard that the states work off of called "minimum sufficient level of care".  It is the barebones standards that need to be met by a birth relative to retain custody (and rights to) a child.  They are: physical safety, access to healthcare and access to education.  When you look at what that can translate to, it IS very minimal.  And if the parent can meet that at some point during her allotted case plan time, then she has a chance to get that child back.  Will it be as comfortable, clean, comfortING, mentally stable or just in general "better" by most people's standards?  No.  But it will be enough.

Your friends also need to realize that the state is charged--MANDATED--to make EVERY effort to keep this mother and child together.  EVERY effort.  That's why mom is given transportation to visits, etc.  Because terminating a parents rights is a profound and monumental decision that no judge would make without screaming evidence that it needs to be done.  Giving the mother so much and having her decline it really just makes this easier in the end (assuming she continues this way).  At least the visits are supervised and the child is safe.

The other thing is that many judges like an infant's fate to be settled before they turn 2yo.  So they have that going for them--especially if this child has been in care for a few months already.  It may take until she is 2yo to get them to file TPR, but there's a good shot that would happen.  If the state is really on the ball, they'll start working on that as soon as the child's been in care for 15mo.

Last, in NJ (which has a separate adoptive unit for foster kids whose goal is adoption) there are 6 or 7 levels of legal risk placements.  These are cases where the goal is actually adoption and the legal risk is dictated by where they are in the TPR process.

THAT IS NOT THE SAME as a child placed with a caseplan goal of "reunification" and the worker saying "That's really just a formality".  No it's not.  They need to find out what the caseplan goal is because it sounds like reunification.

Hopefully they can find some comfort in knowing that they are giving this child a foundation for her life--even if she can't stay; and try to maintain some sanity en route.  They need a good support group--online or in person.  But this situation is not even remotely uncommon.

[Smithie]

"From the child's perspective, it's obviously MUCH better to have ONE (set of) foster parent(s) plus the bio parents and if adoption becomes a reality, the foster parent(s) adopt."

I totally agree. That's what makes me willing to foster - DH and I decided that our family's pain at losing placements would be worth it, if we had given a child (or several children) a chance at having only one placement. It's the part where the worker TELLS the child "this is your new mommy and daddy" when TPR hasn't happened yet that makes my hair stand on end. I wouldn't believe it was true if somebody I know IRL wasn't going through it. She's got this kid in her house calling her "mommy" that could be taken from her at any time - he thinks it's over and he's safe now, but it isn't and he's not. What the hell would that do to him, to be taken out of what he thought was his forever home? How could he trust anybody, ever again? 

[queenjane]

Smithie did they tell you in training (or did a worker tell you) that its protocol to tell the child "this is your new mommy and daddy/forever family" or is that just whats happening in one particular case? It could just be a case of a bad social worker and/or a child who really wants to use those terms.

If this is done while the child is still having visitation with their actual (birth) parents that is just weird. I would think that would be really confusing for the child.

[heatherdeg]

I don't think I've ever met a cw that told a kid that.  They've told the FOSTER PARENTS, but never the child.  And I cannot even IMAGINE that being protocol.  Anywhere.

[Smithie]

First I heard about it in training, then I had an IRL friend experience it. I swear. When the case plan is changed to adoption, then regardless of TPR status (or possible kinship adoption status!), then PAPs are selected and the "forever family" bit goes down. My friend's son was removed from a foster placement and brought to her as a "forever family" placement. And she loves him, of course, and probably the TPR will go through and one grandma has already declined placement. But still, WTF. 

Probably when the PAPs are also the current foster parents, the whole thing goes more smoothly, and the kids are not given false information in the same way. That's one of the things my DH and I are hoping for in taking a foster placement - that if/when the case plan changes, the child won't have another transition to make, he'll just stay with us and then months (years?) later when the adoption decree comes down, THEN we can start talking in terms of "forever." 

[heatherdeg]

Originally Posted by Smithie 

First I heard about it in training, then I had an IRL friend experience it. I swear. When the case plan is changed to adoption, then regardless of TPR status (or possible kinship adoption status!), then PAPs are selected and the "forever family" bit goes down. My friend's son was removed from a foster placement and brought to her as a "forever family" placement. And she loves him, of course, and probably the TPR will go through and one grandma has already declined placement. But still, WTF. 

Probably when the PAPs are also the current foster parents, the whole thing goes more smoothly, and the kids are not given false information in the same way. That's one of the things my DH and I are hoping for in taking a foster placement - that if/when the case plan changes, the child won't have another transition to make, he'll just stay with us and then months (years?) later when the adoption decree comes down, THEN we can start talking in terms of "forever." 

Smithie, if I'm remembering right, you have that one friend in town there that got the call not long ago (within the last year), right?  Because one case doesn't so much make this a precedent as much as it makes for one horrible cw.  What you're seeing is not the norm.  I promise that if it were, we'd see way more screaming about it on the national fp board because it's downright cruel to all involved.

[marsupial-mom]

Originally Posted by Smithie 

It's the part where the worker TELLS the child "this is your new mommy and daddy" when TPR hasn't happened yet that makes my hair stand on end. I wouldn't believe it was true if somebody I know IRL wasn't going through it. She's got this kid in her house calling her "mommy" that could be taken from her at any time - he thinks it's over and he's safe now, but it isn't and he's not. What the hell would that do to him, to be taken out of what he thought was his forever home? How could he trust anybody, ever again? 

Did the worker say "forever" or "adoption"? Because just saying "mommy" and "daddy" doesn't mean forever and it's not really all that confusing to children. Young children don't have a concept of forever anyway, so they just know they had this mommy and then this mommy and then that mommy. The transitions are stressful because each mommy does things differently and some abrupt transitions might be particularly traumatic, but kids don't get confused by having multiple mommies. They get confused about abrupt changes in primary caregivers, regardless of if it's supposed to be a foster mom or adoptive mom or birthmom or whatever. An older child, however, would understand and be confused by terms like adoption and forever family, so that's no good. I can tell you that caseworkers sometimes do tell children that. I know a 14 year old boy who has been told he will be adopted (if he approves) by a woman that I am pretty sure will not actually be allowed to adopt him. She simply can't meet all the requirements unless they bend the rules for her, which maybe they will. But either way, it's still not accurate to tell the kid he's "going to be adopted" when it's not certain.

[butterflyblue]

I would say that the situation the OP described is not unusual - I have friends with children adopted from foster care who went through nearly the same thing, and one who is going through it right now, and may be for another year or so.  In Texas, where I live, foster parents have no legal standing until one year, though that varies by state, and in my case, we were granted standing by a judge at around eight months.  But my case/my children's case was quite out of the norm.

I think many caseworkers tell foster parents what they think will happen at the time - so in my friends' case, they were told that the case was definitely moving to adoption and that they would be able to adopt.  But in foster care, things turn on a dime, and caseworkers aren't the ones who make all the decisions.  We were told, for example, that the kids were reunifying in two weeks, and then instead TPR happened.  We were told we would be adopting, and had filed the petition to adopt, been transferred to the adoption caseworker, and she had told the kids we were going to be their forever family now, and then two weeks before the adoption was to be final, we were told that a bio relative who had surfaced would be adopting.  We fought it and won, but it was by the grace of God, and definitely not what CPS wanted. 

So take everything, everything that CPS tells you with a grain of salt.  I never had anyone deliberately lie to me, but I know that caseworkers only told me what they knew (and there were other things going on/being decided without them) or what they thought I needed to know.  And talk to a lawyer, because they will know the law and also what is likely to happen in your state/area.

[marsupial-mom]

Originally Posted by butterflyblue 

 We were told, for example, that the kids were reunifying in two weeks, and then instead TPR happened.  We were told we would be adopting, and had filed the petition to adopt, been transferred to the adoption caseworker, and she had told the kids we were going to be their forever family now, and then two weeks before the adoption was to be final, we were told that a bio relative who had surfaced would be adopting.  We fought it and won, but it was by the grace of God, and definitely not what CPS wanted. 

Wow on the first one. That's a big mistake! I understand that judges aren't always preditable, but caseworkers should have known that TPR was likely since someone had to file for it!

Good for you on the second one. Kids need stability and permanency. If someone shows up late in the game, they're late. Sorry. Maybe they should get visitation or something, but it's not fair to kids to drag out adoptions while CPS goes hunting for relatives who obviously aren't involved in the first place.