Quote:
|
Isn't it so interesting that foreign countries let you adopt before you've even held the child in your arms, yet in the U.S. you must be supervised for a year or longer before an adoption (through foster care anyway) can be final?
|
There a few reasons for this. Not all fost/adopt are legally free for adoption. Some fost/adopt are close to TPR (termination of parental rights). Some are placed in a fost/adopt home becouse there is a higher chance of the child going for adoption then ru (reunification) with family. That was the case with our fs. His tpr is in two days. He was placed with us at 4 months old as fost/adopt and is now 10 months old. Some are going through appeal process (bparents are fighting the tpr). Most appeal dont go through, but it takes awhile and many times the kids are moved to a fost/adopt home while the appeal process. My ds took 2 year of appeal process it took a total of 3 1/2 year to adopt him. Unless tpr occured there could be visits with bparents and family member. Unless you ask specifically for legally free children (most are older kids) the children can be ru with bfamily. Younger children are usually, not always, placed in a fost/adopt home before tpr occure.
Other reason is like other said they want to make sure that this is a good fit. Im so glad for that. Children from foster care are not like other kids. Even at very young age many have lots of problems. My fd is 19 months old and she already has behavior, anger and aggression problems. Many kids can go through a 3 month honeymoon period. You will never see the true child until 3 months down. Sometimes sw will not tell you the full truth on a child or keep things so you will take a child. I had a girl that was placed with me from another foster home. According to sw the other foster mom had er and needed child moved asap. What she forgot to tell me was that the er was this child sexually acted out on her younger child. She also forgot to tell me she sexually acted out on her younger sib and was seperated from him to keep him safe. When she sexually acted out on our much younger fs, we called the sw and she said she "forgot" to tell me that part. The child was moved the next day due to safty reasons. Some children do better in a home and not so good in another home. So a child doing wonderful at one foster home, might not do well in another home and vise versa. This time frames gives everyone a chance to live as a family and make sure that this is a good match for everyone, especially for the child.