Unexpected Absence - Evil Bureaucrats

[person0]

All, I have been absent for a couple of weeks from the forum due to unexpected stressful, sad and painful events.  I hope to be back in a somewhat more regular capacity, but it may still take me a while.

As some of you know, my wife and I are unable to have children.  After pursuing other options, we determined that becoming a concurrent foster home (meaning foster only for intent to adopt) was the most appropriate route for us to take.  We have been blessed with two beautiful daughters who will be ours for all eternity.  One is already adopted and sealed, the other is just a matter of completing the paperwork.

About 4 months ago, we were blessed to bring in a third child, a precious baby girl.  The child was placed directly into our care from being with actual family who was not in sufficiently good health to care for her.  That family member (great aunt) has remained in contact with us and that whole side of the family came to her birthday party, etc.  The family developed a relationship with us and wanted us to be her adoptive parents.  The state recently decided they have their own plan.  In an unexpected turn of events, state foster workers took her from our home last Wednesday (they notified us a week prior) and placed her in the care of a different family for the sole reason that she would be with her 3 older biological brothers, whom she had never before met.  They ripped a child from a stable loving environment for only that purpose.  My wife and I took every action we could consider to fight against this decision, as we are absolutely certain it was not within the best interest of this child who has a strong attachment to my wife, my daughters, and I.  We were able to convince the child's social worker, and her supervisor, but it was a supervisor above her, who never had any interaction with us, the child, or the child's brothers or new foster family, who made this rash decision.  The child's family and former caretakers are also grief stricken about the decision and are looking into other options to fight against it, as they also feel it is in the best interest of the child to remain with us.

This has brought on a great slew of emotions for our entire family.  We have been devastated by this experience.  It is hard to bear the though of someone raising who we consider to be our child, knowing we may never be able to see her again.  We are strengthened by our faith, and our love for one another.  However, I no longer believe in the foster system workers actual concern for the specific welfare of each child.

There are many different factors at play here, and I know it is difficult to lay them all out for everyone.  Suffice it to say, we are confident that we and the family are right and the decision made was wrong and not based on the child's situation and needs, but merely an arbitrary decision to combine biological siblings.  Federal law requires reasonable efforts (with some exclusions such as in our case) to combine siblings in order to preserve funding.  I believe this decision was made with funding in the mind of the decision maker.

I may be in and out over the coming weeks and months as my family strives to deal with this, but wanted to give an update for anyone who may have wondered about where I went.

[NeuroTypical]

God bless you for what you're doing here, even though it often hurts.  Although you folks got the short end of the stick here, I understand why people make such a case to be made for keeping bio kids together whenever possible.

They're hoping the story turns out like this: http://newsok.com/article/5544655.  

I'm not saying who is right, I'm just in awe at folks like you, who are willing to do your absolute best.  

 

[zil]

So sorry, @person0 that you and your family are having such trials.  I'll pray for all of you.  We've missed you, but family comes first.

[eddified]

My parents went through the same thing, @person0, at least with respect to the part where your heart gets ripped out because the government  decides to take a foster child away. I think your feelings are entirely normal, it shows your are a good parent.

[anatess2]

I feel for you @person0!  I pray that things work out for the best for you and the child. 

We have a similar story in our ward where one family who decided to adopt a child went through a "ripping".  They adopted a 5-year-old boy from Russia and so they met the child at the orphanage, prayed about it, and got a sure confirmation that he should be with them, so they applied for adoption and while the paper work was getting processed, built a relationship with the child.  A few days before the paperwork was supposed to be completed, the orphanage administrators found a biological relative - some uncle or something who didn't know about the child's existence, and so they offered him priority over the child.  This broke their hearts and made them question the answer to their prayers.  The orphanage encouraged them to check out the other children - a 7 year old girl and a 4 year old boy.  It took them a while to make a decision wary of getting hurt again.  But, for some reason, they felt impressed to go ahead and apply for the other boy but felt bad for the other girl so they went ahead and applied for her too.  They were getting ready to go back to the US when the uncle showed up with the first boy and said he can't take care of the child.  They ended up going back to the US with 3 children instead of the 1 they planned on.  They already have 2 biological children so they ended up as a family of 7!   The crazy thing is... all 7 of them have such similar features and similar mannerisms that people are surprised to know they're not all biologically related to each other.  The biological daughter and the adopted daughter, for example, have the same straight fine blonde hair and are both musical.  The biological son and both adopted sons have the same color eyes and have some form of special needs - the bio and one adopted have dyslexia, etc.  It's like the parents just gathered the rest of their "flock" from the other side of the world.

[Sunday21]

I am so sorry that this happened to you and your family! Bless you for doing this important work. 

[eddified]

8 hours ago, anatess2 said:

I feel for you @person0!  I pray that things work out for the best for you and the child. 

We have a similar story in our ward where one family who decided to adopt a child went through a "ripping".  They adopted a 5-year-old boy from Russia and so they met the child at the orphanage, prayed about it, and got a sure confirmation that he should be with them, so they applied for adoption and while the paper work was getting processed, built a relationship with the child.  A few days before the paperwork was supposed to be completed, the orphanage administrators found a biological relative - some uncle or something who didn't know about the child's existence, and so they offered him priority over the child.  This broke their hearts and made them question the answer to their prayers.  The orphanage encouraged them to check out the other children - a 7 year old girl and a 4 year old boy.  It took them a while to make a decision wary of getting hurt again.  But, for some reason, they felt impressed to go ahead and apply for the other boy but felt bad for the other girl so they went ahead and applied for her too.  They were getting ready to go back to the US when the uncle showed up with the first boy and said he can't take care of the child.  They ended up going back to the US with 3 children instead of the 1 they planned on.  They already have 2 biological children so they ended up as a family of 7!   The crazy thing is... all 7 of them have such similar features and similar mannerisms that people are surprised to know they're not all biologically related to each other.  The biological daughter and the adopted daughter, for example, have the same straight fine blonde hair and are both musical.  The biological son and both adopted sons have the same color eyes and have some form of special needs - the bio and one adopted have dyslexia, etc.  It's like the parents just gathered the rest of their "flock" from the other side of the world.

What a neat story. The Lord works in mysterious ways!!

[JohnsonJones]

This is hard to figure the right path one should follow.

There is a view that a child's biological mother IS THEIR MOTHER.  That mother is the child's blood.  It is there family, their REAL family.  It is their connection to the past.  Family is the strongest thing one should and could have.  That child is that family's right.  NO ONE has the right to take a child from a mother that loves them and cares for them.

We can then extend this out.  A child's family is THEIR family.  Their biological brothers and sisters ARE TRULY there link, IN BLOOD.  What right do we have to deprive them of this right? 

Of course, this conflicts with the idea of which is better, a stable home the child is already in, and one that is LDS on top of that.  Which is more important, that of your biological and blood family, or that of a home that is already stable and loving?  (That does not preclude the other home will not be stable and loving either, it may be with their biological family, it's just hard to say).

Here's another way to put it...I've changed some of the story slightly so that people who know me or those near me won't necessarily identify me or my family in it, and to protect the mother.

I've changed some of the items and not given names so that if anyone does know me, or my family, they won't necessarily connect the dots to which one of these relatives of mine this is.

Many years ago (over 25 years now) one of my nieces was date raped.  The LDS church helped them at that time (they were non-members) but wanted to have the niece give up the child for adoption to an LDS home.  Her Father was extremely opposed to the idea, but her mother was supportive.  The LDS church stated this would give their daughter the best chance at having a normal life after this, and the daughter chose to give the baby up.

That baby was sealed into an LDS family.  It was raised lovingly with a family that was very well off, and very stable.  Then the father died.  The family went into poverty.  However, the daughter is still sealed, and is one of the only LDS relatives I have (though, in truth, is she really a relative anymore?).

Now the crux of the matter.  The daughter's father has NEVER forgiven me for getting LDS services involved.  He points out, if he ever did join the LDS church, how would he get that child back, even if he were sealed in the temple, that little baby has been sealed into another family.  It was his daughter's choice, but he feels he was robbed.  It was his first grand daughter, and he never got to show that child his love or the great things that grand baby came from.  She never got to realize the tremendous heritage that is hers.  He has a great resentment towards the LDS church on this matter, and towards me.  We are wonderful to each other normally, but when this subject comes up, her father becomes morose, and very bitter, and at those times it is best for me to leave before he grows excessively angry about it.

His home actually is very stable, and he was a really good parent.  I cannot fault him.  I do feel the choice WAS HIS daughters and not his, however.  Also, that child is sealed into an LDS family and has the gospel, something that is very iffy if she had stayed in his home.  He would have raised that child as his own, however.

When one comes to biological family vs. foster family, it can become a very complex and difficult thing to answer.  Back in the day, I may have said, keep the child with a stable family, but after these events, I think that I favor having that child be as close to their biological family as possible, as long as that biological family is also in a stable and loving environment.

It's a hard choice, and a hard decision, and it is not easy on those who do foster care or are the biological survivors.

It is one reason why I have chosen NOT to do foster care in our home, and if we ever chose or choose to adopt, it would have been a straight up adoption if possible, without doing foster care first.

 

[person0]

There is now an exciting update to my story!!!

Over the past two weeks we have been working with KY CPS, the current foster family, and our and the baby's social workers.  The foster family was unable to handle all of the children together, and a joint decision was made that it would be better to separate the two older children and the two younger children.  As a result, as of this morning we now have 'our' baby back, and also her 3 year old brother.

The most vindicating part is that while we were in the meeting to decide whether or not to separate the children, every single person was on board with the decision.  The meeting facilitator verbally acknowledged multiple times that it was the wrong decision in the first place to have removed the baby from our care.  Regardless of this 'slap in the face', the CPS manager who originally made the decision to remove the child from our home, continued to offer the only dissenting opinions and options, such as removing all the children and placing them in a new home to try again with a new family.  No one liked any of those options.

Our and the child's social workers now will attempt to push for a legal sibling separation.  The children's goal is now changed to adoption, and so if all goes our way, we will be able to keep these two little ones forever!  

SIDE NOTE:  Not related to this story, we will be officially adopting our second daughter on Tuesday, and will be sealed to her on Saturday the 21st!  We are overjoyed for this miracle as well!

Edited October 7, 2017 by person0

[Just_A_Guy]

@person0, I’m sorry I missed this earlier.  Have the bio parents’ rights already been terminated?

It’s easy for CPS to fall into acting as though they run the case (I don’t mean this pejoratively); but never forget that it’s the *judge* running the show.  CPS has to follow their own policies as long as they have legal custody, and as a foster parent you want to stay on their side whenever you can.  And it sounds like things resolved for the best.  But if something like that happens again, you can ask the judge to remove the child from CPS custody and grant temporary custody of the child directly to you on the basis of the relationship that has formed (the longer, the better).

Edited October 7, 2017 by Just_A_Guy

[person0]

1 minute ago, Just_A_Guy said:

@person0, I’m sorry I missed this earlier.  Have the bio parents’ rights already been terminated?

It’s easy for CPS to fall into acting as though they run the case (I don’t mean this pejoratively); but never forget that it’s the *judge* running the show.  CPS has to follow their own policies as long as they have legal custody, and as a foster parent you want to stay on their side whenever you can.  And it sounds like things resolved for the best.  But if something like that happens again, you can ask the judge to remove the child from CPS custody and place the child directly with you on the basis of the relationship that has formed (the longer, the better).

In this case, the judge is the least helpful party of all, and is highly unlikely to consider removing the children from the care of the Cabinet.  This particular judge has a reputation for rarely terminating rights and removing children, regardless of the federal guidelines, or problems of the parents.  The two children we have are the 5th and 6th born addicted that the father and mother have given birth to, while abusing.  Only the first two children have had termination and permanency with their paternal grandparents.  The mother is currently pregnant with #7 who will also be born addicted and we will be taking her into our home around November/December.

CPS is currently filing for termination, but has not made the official request yet.  We also have a good relationship with the maternal great aunt.  She is in continuous contact with the mother and will soon begin encouraging her to voluntarily terminate rights if the judge doesn't immediately go for it.  The mother of our 2nd daughter voluntarily terminated her rights, so it does happen from time to time.  We are not necessarily expecting this to work out given the number of parties involved, and the fact that we and the other foster family have almost no say.  Yet we sincerely hope it will.

Many the pieces have fallen in place to lead us to believe this child's return to our home is brought about by the hand of the Lord.  Between when she left us and returned, we said yes 5 times to various sibling groups of 3 (which would have put us at our maximum permitted # of children - and preventing us from taking this child back and her brother).  Each time something happened to cause us to not get that sibling group, such as an obscure family member coming out of nowhere and stepping forward only two hours before we were to pick them up, and other things.  Also, now there are more parties involved (Judge not included) who are on the side of separation, so while its still somewhat of a long-shot, there is reasonable hope to be had.