[HappyMomAnna]

Foster to Adopt seems to be a hot issue right now on the Forum. So perhaps this could be a great thread to share experiences and ideas.

If you like you can cut and paste the following questions and answer on your post....

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1) Have you adopted a child/children by Foster to Adopt programs in your state?

2) What State did you Foster to Adopt in?

3) How many children were placed and later reunited with the biological family?

4) How many children were placed and later moved to a biological family member?

5) How old was the child or children that you did adopt when they were placed?

6) From the date of placement how long did it take for the termination of parental rights to happen?

7) From the time Parental rights were terminated how long did it take before the adoption was final?

8) During the time the child was placed did you have to participate in visits with the biological family?

9) Do you feel that the caseworker who handled the child/children was honest with you about the RISKS of placement?

10) For all of the children you fostered do you feel you were fully aware of the risks and or the issues the placement had?

11) Did you have biological or other children in your home when you entered the Foster to Adopt program?

12) Were you asked to Foster children in age groups you originally did not want?

13) Were there any Foster Placements that you felt you could not handle or asked to have removed from your care?

14) Was there ever a placement that after the TPR was started the STATE ordered placed into another family for adoption?

15) On a scale of 1-10 with one being the worst and 10 being the best how would you rate your experience as a Foster to Adopt parent?

16) Of the children you fostered that were reunited with the biological family are you aware of any children that were later returned to the system?

17) What was the most positive part of your experience?

18) What was the most negative aspect of your experience?


19) If you wanted more children would you try Foster to Adopt again?

20) Once you did adopt were you still interested in being a Foster Family Resource for other children?

21) Why did you choose Foster to Adopt?

22) Did your state encourage you to go Foster to Adopt and were you informed of the Straight Adoption program in your state as well?

23) Do you feel you were educated about the process before you started or do you feel you had to learn as you went?

24) Did all of your Foster children have a CASA or GAL?

25) What else can you share about your experience to help others who are trying to decide if this is the path to adoption that will be right for them?

Feel Free to share your adoption stories as well!
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[ArmyWife55]

(((bumping))) id really like to read some of your responses if youd be willing to share.

[Howdy]

My first Legal Risk went to a bio-parent (not the one she was removed from) after 3 1/2 months. She'd been in foster care almost a year before becoming Legal Risk, and had also been in a relative foster placement an entire year earlier in her life. I think the caseworkers were as honest as they could be, and were surprised by the other bioparent getting out of prison, and if it had been even a month later she would have been free for adoption. Everything worked out okay in the end, and I can't blame the system because she certainly looked to be Legal Risk.

The second (current) Legal Risk placement, seemed too risky in my opinion to qualify as Legal Risk, nevertheless I started to get my hopes way up high after a half a year, but just yesterday (6 1/2 months into placement) I got a call from the caseworker that two relative placements are working on being approved, so it is almost totally certain that I'll lose my current child.

I told her last night of the possibility of leaving me for a relative placement, and the little rascal was hopping up and down with happiness! So much for thinking we had a good attachment and that she'd be sad to leave me! ha! But this morning, after first crushing my feelings by writing a letter to her relatives wherein she referred to me as her 'friend', she left me a 'i love u' note in my desk, so I feel a little better.

I feel a little jerked around by having had this placement which did not appear to me to qualify as Legal Risk, but I suspect that there are not enough regular foster parents (currently my county is offering a hundred dollar prize to the foster or adopt parent who convinces the most people to go to an orientation, so I think they might have a bad shortage), and I suppose they might convince themselves that a child qualifies, just because they need to find them a home. I'd probably do the same thing if I had a child to find a home for, and no available foster families, and lots of available Legal Risk families.

I don't really mind having a child short term and I don't mind supporting their transition to a good relative placement (tho I wouldn't want to support the transition back to a horrible home, I'd feel like a traitor to the child to act like disaster was opportunity), but I do regret using up my money and vacation time and consequently not having those resources to expend on my next (hopefully permanent) legal risk placement.

One thing I don't like about doing legal risk, is having to get through the first difficult months over and over. I hope those get easier with experience.

Another negative is that I'm getting older. I started the process when I was 46 yrs old, got my first placement when I was 47, and now I'm going to be losing my current placement at 48 yrs, and I don't know now, whether I should increase the age range, whether it is right to try for a young child at the same time I'm getting older.

Apparently most of the other Legal Risk families want children in the same age range (3 to 5, or maybe up to 8) because the caseworker yesterday asked if I was perhaps interested in a baby or an older boy.

[txmomof3]

1) Have you adopted a child/children by Foster to Adopt programs in your state? We are in the process of completing an adoption now.

2) What State did you Foster to Adopt in? Texas

3) How many children were placed and later reunited with the biological family?5

4) How many children were placed and later moved to a biological family member? 0

5) How old was the child or children that you did adopt when they were placed? 1,2 & 3

6) From the date of placement how long did it take for the termination of parental rights to happen? TPR was complete when we got them.

7) From the time Parental rights were terminated how long did it take before the adoption was final? Scheduled for 6 months

8) During the time the child was placed did you have to participate in visits with the biological family? No

9) Do you feel that the caseworker who handled the child/children was honest with you about the RISKS of placement? Yes, on all cases

10) For all of the children you fostered do you feel you were fully aware of the risks and or the issues the placement had?
Yes, but sometimes we were given false hope of TPR.

11) Did you have biological or other children in your home when you entered the Foster to Adopt program? No

12) Were you asked to Foster children in age groups you originally did not want? Yes

13) Were there any Foster Placements that you felt you could not handle or asked to have removed from your care? Yes, one 7mo old boy was hurt so severely that we did not feel we could care for him properly.

14) Was there ever a placement that after the TPR was started the STATE ordered placed into another family for adoption? No

15) On a scale of 1-10 with one being the worst and 10 being the best how would you rate your experience as a Foster to Adopt parent? 8

16) Of the children you fostered that were reunited with the biological family are you aware of any children that were later returned to the system? No I am not aware of any of them. I do know that they keep popping out more babies, so I hope they can handle them all

17) What was the most positive part of your experience? I loved all the children we have had, and wouldn't trade a day of it.

18) What was the most negative aspect of your experience? Being uninformed of the progress of the cases and felt like I was being lied to by cw and bio parents.


19) If you wanted more children would you try Foster to Adopt again? Yes.

20) Once you did adopt were you still interested in being a Foster Family Resource for other children? No, only siblings of our adopted group would be considered.

21) Why did you choose Foster to Adopt? Private adoption was too heartbreaking after supporting 2 birth parents that changed their minds when the babies were born, private adoption agencies were too expensive, and we were strongly recruited by a private placement agency for foster to adopt.

22) Did your state encourage you to go Foster to Adopt and were you informed of the Straight Adoption program in your state as well? Yes to both.

23) Do you feel you were educated about the process before you started or do you feel you had to learn as you went? Definately had to learn as we went!!

24) Did all of your Foster children have a CASA or GAL?
Yes, but I only saw one of them.

25) What else can you share about your experience to help others who are trying to decide if this is the path to adoption that will be right for them? Please be prepared for heartache or a long wait, if you don't have either, then consider yourself very lucky. It's all worth it in the end.

[Hunter's Mom]

Can I answer even though I have not completed an adoption?

1) Have you adopted a child/children by Foster to Adopt programs in your state?
Not yet. Our state does not have an official Foster to Adopt program, but if children in foster homes become available, they offer foster families the first choice in whether or not to adopt after family members. We are currently in a placement that all involved at DHR say will go to adoption.

2) What State did you Foster to Adopt in?
Alabama

3) How many children were placed and later reunited with the biological family?
None so far.

4) How many children were placed and later moved to a biological family member?
4

5) How old was the child or children that you did adopt when they were placed?
N/A

6) From the date of placement how long did it take for the termination of parental rights to happen?
N/A

7) From the time Parental rights were terminated how long did it take before the adoption was final?
N/A

8) During the time the child was placed did you have to participate in visits with the biological family?
Yes

9) Do you feel that the caseworker who handled the child/children was honest with you about the RISKS of placement?
Yes and no. We are currently foster only and the cw wants us to complete the adoption portion of our home study so we can adopt K if parental rights are terminated. She is not being honest with the bio family or fair to them at this point.

10) For all of the children you fostered do you feel you were fully aware of the risks and or the issues the placement had?
Yes.

11) Did you have biological or other children in your home when you entered the Foster to Adopt program?
Yes.

12) Were you asked to Foster children in age groups you originally did not want?
Yes

13) Were there any Foster Placements that you felt you could not handle or asked to have removed from your care?
No

14) Was there ever a placement that after the TPR was started the STATE ordered placed into another family for adoption?
No

15) On a scale of 1-10 with one being the worst and 10 being the best how would you rate your experience as a Foster to Adopt parent?
so far, 9, but we have not completed an adoption yet.

16) Of the children you fostered that were reunited with the biological family are you aware of any children that were later returned to the system?
None have

17) What was the most positive part of your experience?
Being able to help families and children who needed our assistance.

18) What was the most negative aspect of your experience?
CW who do not know what they are doing and jeopardizing the well-being of the kids by not giving a clear case plan to the parents.

19) If you wanted more children would you try Foster to Adopt again?
Yes.

20) Once you did adopt were you still interested in being a Foster Family Resource for other children?
We will.

21) Why did you choose Foster to Adopt?
It chose us, really. We talked about adoption, but kept coming back to foster care. When we pursued adoption, roadblocks went up everywhere. When we pursued fostering, everything went really smoothly. We feel it is a God thing. We put our faith in Him and will adopt in His time, not our own.

22) Did your state encourage you to go Foster to Adopt and were you informed of the Straight Adoption program in your state as well?
yes and yes

23) Do you feel you were educated about the process before you started or do you feel you had to learn as you went?
We educated ourselves before beginning. We took a list of over 100 questions to our first visit with our cw. And she answered them all. I did tons of research and called people in the area that had done it before we committed to anything.

24) Did all of your Foster children have a CASA or GAL?
No

25) What else can you share about your experience to help others who are trying to decide if this is the path to adoption that will be right for them?
You will have to send more home than you will be able to adopt. The idea in foster to adopt is to find families for children, not children for families. You have to have a tremendous amount of faith and patience to do this. There will be days when you want to run screaming to the fertility doctor or the surragate mother or sperm donor or whatever your specific situation is, but if you stick it out and are faithful, God's will will be done in your life.

Thanks!
Christy

[mom to 3]

1) Have you adopted a child/children by Foster to Adopt programs in your state?
Adopted after fostering. Fostered first then case plan changed to became foster with a view.

2) What State did you Foster to Adopt in? Canada, Ontario

3) How many children were placed and later reunited with the biological family? 1 and his sibling at different foster home. They were reunitied with us

4) How many children were placed and later moved to a biological family member? 0

5) How old was the child or children that you did adopt when they were placed? 4 days, when he and his brother were reapprehended and cam to us, brother was 5 1/2 yrs

6) From the date of placement how long did it take for the termination of parental rights to happen? just over 3 years

7) From the time Parental rights were terminated how long did it take before the adoption was final? 11 mths

8) During the time the child was placed did you have to participate in visits with the biological family? at the beginning, then she disappeared, then reappeared to fight TPR.

9) Do you feel that the caseworker who handled the child/children was honest with you about the RISKS of placement? It didn't begin as FVA, but she was NOT honest about how it was progressing

10) For all of the children you fostered do you feel you were fully aware of the risks and or the issues the placement had? No

11) Did you have biological or other children in your home when you entered the Foster to Adopt program? Yes, older son

12) Were you asked to Foster children in age groups you originally did not want? Yes

13) Were there any Foster Placements that you felt you could not handle or asked to have removed from your care? No

14) Was there ever a placement that after the TPR was started the STATE ordered placed into another family for adoption? No

15) On a scale of 1-10 with one being the worst and 10 being the best how would you rate your experience as a Foster to Adopt parent? 2 when it was going on, but since it's had a happy ending, probably a 9. It did cost us over $5000 in lawyers fees trying to get right to be recognized as parties in the case. DS#3 returned from unsupervised access with unexplained bruises and we tried everything we legally could to halt reintegration with ** and her new husband.

16) Of the children you fostered that were reunited with the biological family are you aware of any children that were later returned to the system? Yes, my 2 .

17) What was the most positive part of your experience? they came back and we have a solid foundation due to early contact.

18) What was the most negative aspect of your experience? The incompetency of the children's worker who didn't build enough of a case, didn't do what was necessary to make sure the ** knew the consequences of her actions, so judge gave ** the benefit of the doubt, didn't follow through with checking on the kids and making sure ** was complying with conditions and basically blew the case. She was on holidays when two other workers reapprehended the boys.

19) If you wanted more children would you try Foster to Adopt again? Yes with a different attitude and much more hands on with the case.

20) Once you did adopt were you still interested in being a Foster Family Resource for other children? Not an option as we had to undo the harm the worker and mother had caused. It has taken 3 years to get there.

21) Why did you choose Foster to Adopt? We started as foster and we were committed to the boy and we also wanted to have his brother with us. When it looked like the plan was changing, we knew by then that the ** could not parent and that they needed someone to be committed to them.

22) Did your state encourage you to go Foster to Adopt and were you informed of the Straight Adoption program in your state as well? We were not encouraged to FVA or adopt as we were in our 40's. FVA was being touted as not used very much, only in certain 100% certain cases. Now 5 years later, most of the cases go FVA and they are trying to convince straight adoptive families to go FVA. This may be too much change too quickly as the agency lawyers are not always consulted but are the best judge of whether the case has enough to win in court. Not all judges are on track for faster case plans and decisions about adoption also.

23) Do you feel you were educated about the process before you started or do you feel you had to learn as you went? self educated by other foster parents and through support groups.

24) Did all of your Foster children have a CASA or GAL? ?

25) What else can you share about your experience to help others who are trying to decide if this is the path to adoption that will be right for them? Ask if they will be considered for straight adoption if they become foster with a view family. I have had many discussions about this with other foster and FVA families. It is for sure, the best way for the children, other than a straight adoption which isn't always possible at first. It can be hardest on the families. Living with the uncertainty can taint the beginning years that first time parents especially want to cherish. I think it may be easier to handle if the child isn't a first baby, especially after infertility problems.

[mj77]

1) Have you adopted a child/children by Foster to Adopt programs in your state? yes

2) What State did you Foster to Adopt in? Oregon

3) How many children were placed and later reunited with the biological family? 1 this far

4) How many children were placed and later moved to a biological family member? none this far and hopefully not.

5) How old was the child or children that you did adopt when they were placed? 13 1/2 mo.

6) From the date of placement how long did it take for the termination of parental rights to happen? he was legally free.

7) From the time Parental rights were terminated how long did it take before the adoption was final? 1 year 9 mo. I think

8) During the time the child was placed did you have to participate in visits with the biological family? no

9) Do you feel that the caseworker who handled the child/children was honest with you about the RISKS of placement? yeson first /no on second

10) For all of the children you fostered do you feel you were fully aware of the risks and or the issues the placement had? no, but I don't think his cw did either.

11) Did you have biological or other children in your home when you entered the Foster to Adopt program? no

12) Were you asked to Foster children in age groups you originally did not want? yes

13) Were there any Foster Placements that you felt you could not handle or asked to have removed from your care? no

14) Was there ever a placement that after the TPR was started the STATE ordered placed into another family for adoption? no

15) On a scale of 1-10 with one being the worst and 10 being the best how would you rate your experience as a Foster to Adopt parent? 7.5

16) Of the children you fostered that were reunited with the biological family are you aware of any children that were later returned to the system? no

17) What was the most positive part of your experience? our children

18) What was the most negative aspect of your experience? the waiting


19) If you wanted more children would you try Foster to Adopt again? no, just straight adoption from the foster system.

20) Once you did adopt were you still interested in being a Foster Family Resource for other children? yes

21) Why did you choose Foster to Adopt? didn't pursue but there was a specific baby that looked like he'd go to adoption.

22) Did your state encourage you to go Foster to Adopt and were you informed of the Straight Adoption program in your state as well? Our state discouraged foster to adopt.

23) Do you feel you were educated about the process before you started or do you feel you had to learn as you went? I felt educated about the process

24) Did all of your Foster children have a CASA or GAL? neither did

25) What else can you share about your experience to help others who are trying to decide if this is the path to adoption that will be right for them? I didn't desire a newborn baby so this was the best situation for us in going through the state which was completely free plus they have an adoption subsidy to help with medical expenses and other things.

[tlc4kidz]

1) Have you adopted a child/children by Foster to Adopt programs in your state? In the process.....have filed the petition with court.

2) What State did you Foster to Adopt in? Missouri

3) How many children were placed and later reunited with the biological family? 1

4) How many children were placed and later moved to a biological family member? non that I know of....1 went to another state.

5) How old was the child or children that you did adopt when they were placed? newborn

6) From the date of placement how long did it take for the termination of parental rights to happen? still hasn't happened 16 months later

7) From the time Parental rights were terminated how long did it take before the adoption was final? N/A

8) During the time the child was placed did you have to participate in visits with the biological family? Only once....either caseworker or parent aide does visits

9) Do you feel that the caseworker who handled the child/children was honest with you about the RISKS of placement? absolutely, and still is

10) For all of the children you fostered do you feel you were fully aware of the risks and or the issues the placement had? yes

11) Did you have biological or other children in your home when you entered the Foster to Adopt program? 2 bio-sons

12) Were you asked to Foster children in age groups you originally did not want? no

13) Were there any Foster Placements that you felt you could not handle or asked to have removed from your care? no, they have all been under the age of 1

14) Was there ever a placement that after the TPR was started the STATE ordered placed into another family for adoption? no

15) On a scale of 1-10 with one being the worst and 10 being the best how would you rate your experience as a Foster to Adopt parent? 8

16) Of the children you fostered that were reunited with the biological family are you aware of any children that were later returned to the system? not aware if they were

17) What was the most positive part of your experience? getting to advocate for the kids....for the 2 that were adopted into other families being a part of the selection process and keeping a relationship with them has been very satisfying.

18) What was the most negative aspect of your experience? the stress and the ups and downs with not knowing if they would be returned or not


19) If you wanted more children would you try Foster to Adopt again? absolutely

20) Once you did adopt were you still interested in being a Foster Family Resource for other children? we won't be for some time...having 4 will keep us busy, but a LONG way down the road I would like to again

21) Why did you choose Foster to Adopt? It chose us...we originally had no intent to adopt, but fell in love with our current placement and can't imagine life without her

22) Did your state encourage you to go Foster to Adopt and were you informed of the Straight Adoption program in your state as well? yes, that was all explained in class, but we weren't swayed either way

23) Do you feel you were educated about the process before you started or do you feel you had to learn as you went? I felt educated because of my profession and having dealt with foster care in the past. We also have friends who have and are fostering

24) Did all of your Foster children have a CASA or GAL? yes...only 1 had a CASA

25) What else can you share about your experience to help others who are trying to decide if this is the path to adoption that will be right for them? Not to go into it with a heart set on adoption, but a heart to help a child for however long God has them there. Do not be afraid to say no to adoption if either you do not feel 100% committed to the child or you are feeling unsure. There is a perfect family out there for each child and it is just as satisfying to be a part of the selection process. Everyone told us when and if you have a placement you are meant to adopt you will know....I was skeptical about that but it is so true. Why do people foster 100 or more children and only adopt 1 or 2? I have to believe it's all part of God's plan. It's so awesome to see in hidsight but can be difficult when you're in the middle of it!

Feel Free to share your adoption stories as well!

Several years ago a friend begged us to try to adopt a girl she was working with who was legally free. She said she "just knew" she was supposed to be a part of our family. We were not able to adopt because of her age and the age of our boys...it was determined she needed to be in a home with no sibs of opposite sex near same age. About 6 months into the placement of our current fd (the one we are trying to adopt) we realized she is the other girls bio-sib. Call it fate or God or whatever, but I can't believe it was an accident...and I feel so blessed to know I'm not always the one in control of our own destiny