[hkolln]

It may be costly to get an attorney but man it sure may help you! You have to decide how much your nephew is worth and if you wish to fight or let go. Have you contacted the Governors office for help? If the child has a GAL or CASA now is the time to contact him/her. They may be able to help.

I can also remember the SW when we became involved in our niece's case saying that she couldn't believe how persistant and resiliant we were. We never gave up and she saw that. We'd call her every day or every other day to keep her on her toes and we documented EVERY single phone call and copied every single letter. The SW said most of the time relatives won't get involved because of the hassles and the frustation with the system! I think they hope you will give up and they won't have to do their job.

And don't be afraid to make them mad. You are only showing them how passionate you are to move your nephew to your house. Do it in a positive manner. Hiring an attorney was a scary thing for us because we were afraid CPS would frown upon us. I have to tell you that was the turning point in our entire case! The attorney filed a court motion to move our niece here, the Judge denied it but it showed the SW and the CASA we were VERY serious about raising our niece. I think without that point in the case I don't believe it would have been decided to place her with us. Plus the CASA worker met with us a few days prior to the hearing and after we sat and talked for 2 hrs she said to us "100% you should have your niece in your home" and she was on our side from that day forward and it helped in court and with CPS on making the final placement decision. All in all it took us a good 11 months to finally get our niece home and then another 12 mos before we could call her our daughter. Looking back at it now I can remember how frustrating it was however how rewarding it is now and how so worth it all was to us.