The baby girl we brought home stayed with us for six months and then she was placed with her maternal grandmother. She has the sweetest smile in the world and we miss her sweet face. We were hoping it would become an adoption case but it wasn't meant to be.
We took in a two year old girl for a few hours. Yes, a few hours. We had a newborn boy for 3 days. We also brought home a pair of siblings and they stayed here for 5 days. That's what we opened our license for and we love doing what we do.
Right now we have a two and a half year old girl who has been with us for a little over a month. She had a hard time adjusting but has really been getting more comfortable with us lately. She and Kennedy play a lot and share well for the most part. We aren't sure how long she'll be here but we are just trying to make sure she gets the love and care she needs until a permanent placement is decided upon. Last week we brought home a two week old little girl. She was born six weeks early and only weighs 4 and a half pounds. She's already eating more than when we brought her home.
Alright, on to our boy. On our last post, I told you that the judge had delayed reunification with bio mom for ten weeks. He did so because her court ordered therapist had recommended ten more weekly sessions because there were some major issues and she thought bio mom "wasn't ready to be a full time parent." So we went back to court ten weeks later and were told that bio mom hadn't even completed five of the ten sessions. So CPS did what any organization that protects kids would do. They decided to reunify anyway. As I'm sure you can imagine, we were heartbroken. We still are. Court was on a Thursday but they were nice enough to give us until Saturday evening to give him back. So I took the next couple days off and we spent that time as a family, having as much fun as possible, even through the tears.
That Saturday we had a going away party at Chuck E. Cheese. Family and friends came out to have a good final memory with our little buddy. When I say final memory, it's just in reference to him being with us on a day to day basis. We were sure bio mom would let us visit because she said she would. And she did. At first.
We were getting to visit with him pretty regularly but then it started to be every couple weeks. He was actually spending about five days and nights a week with his bio dad's cousin. Bio mom was getting her welfare check and that's all that mattered. He was able to be at Kennedy's birthday party in late August, which was awesome. Then we didn't see him for a couple weeks.
In mid September we arranged for him to come visit on a Friday and stay until Saturday evening. When he arrived at our house he had scrapes across his nose, bruises up and down his legs, his ear was red and looked swollen, he had a rash on his belly, and he had diaper rash so bad it was crusty and blistered. Ash put diaper cream on it and it immediately started getting better. These are all signs of neglect and/or abuse. As foster parents, we are mandated reporters so we called CPS to have them come out and take a look at the poor kid.
To be honest, even if we weren't mandated reporters, we would have called. Anyone with a conscience and a heart would have called. A couple bruises or scrapes are normal for a kid but this was excessive. CPS said there wasn't enough to take him but that they'd go talk to bio mom. Later that evening we got a text from bio dad's cousin stating that bio mom wanted buddy back immediately because we called CPS on her. We took him back with the thought that we'd probably never see him again.
We continued to try to get visits with him but bio mom just kept saying no. She said "I don't need nobody calling CPS on me." She also told us it was our fault that we'd never see him again. If you're not doing anything wrong, why would you worry about CPS?
When it became clear we wouldn't be getting any more visitation, Ash contacted a family law attorney to see if we had any options. Turns out we did. Since there was still a family court case for bio mom, we could file a joinder to become a part of the case and request visitation. All of the information we found and were given told us we had to file the joinder first. If that's approved we can file for court ordered visitation. So that's what we did.
We filed the paperwork for the joinder on the grounds that buddy has an established bond with his sister, us, and our families. When we filed that paperwork they gave us a court date. It was today.
So we went to court today. It was presided over by a commissioner. Ash and I were there to represent ourselves. Bio mom was there with her program counselor, bio dad's cousin and bio dad's cousin's fiancé. We said our piece, bio mom objected to us being made part of the case. Her argument was that Buddy is doing good with her and that it's confusing to him because he calls us mom and dad and she's his mom. The commissioner sternly reminded her that it's his right to have a relationship with us and his sister. She asked her if there was any reason not to allow the joinder. Bio mom reiterated that he's good and it's confusing. She was told that that's not enough and asked again if there were any reasons not to allow it. She sighed and quietly said no. A defeated no. The commissioner granted our request!!! We won round one!!! The next step is to file a request for visitation. Which we will be doing this week! The only down side to today is that the commissioner told us we could have filed for both at the same time. So it'll take a little longer to get it done but it doesn't matter. We will not stop fighting to have this precious boy in his sister's life and in ours!
There you go. You're all caught up. Feel free to share, comment, post or tweet. If this can help other foster parents in similar situations, we're all for it! Until next time, be ever evolving.
