[Mummy_Big_Bird]

Hello everyone!

I have been lurking around the forum for a while, and finally registered.

I have a question for those out there who take in babies. I was wondering how long it took you to get your licence, after you finished training, and how much longer it took to get a placement?

When I was in training, the instructors kept indicating how desparate they are to have foster homes for infants, and the need for foster parents. I finished class just over two months ago, and my home study was compleated a month ago. I keep checking in with my SW every week or two, and my paperwork still hasn't made it to the head office! I always get a story of how backed up the office is. But in training, they said everything had to be compleated in 45 days from the end of class. Don't get me wrong, my SW seems to be a very nice person, and seems to be great to w...ork with, but it seems like the process is just taking much longer then it should. When the home study was finished, she said that at that point, I would be put on the waiting list, and I have been given the impression that if they got a baby in, I would be the first call.

Its not that I am desparate to have a baby. I just am so anxious to get involved and start helping children out. I'm not very good at waiting. I think that it is good that there is not a child out there who needs me, but then wonder if there is a child out there who needs me, but the system is not w...orking to help them.

Has anyone else had to wait so long for the licence? I feel like I should speak up about it, but I don't want to get myself "black listed" right off!

[L-A-J-C-R-C]

Hi,

I understand how anxious you are, however, a month really isn't that long of a wait, especially for a baby.

In KY they use to have a year after you completed your classes to get your homestudy done and filed. I believe it's now changed to 4 months.

We're not patient people either so I totally understand how you are feeling. Maybe you'll get lucky like we did and they will need a placement for a child and rush your paperwork through.

Best of luck. I hope your foster care experience is as wonderful as ours has been.

Michelle

[claschober]

Hello,

We have finally completed our process after a long year of waiting only to wait some more for a placement. I too am not a patient person, but know when the child that is right for our family comes along we will be ready. Here is a bit of a timeframe of what my dh and I have gone through:

02/04 - orientation
06/04 - completed PRIDE training and all of our paperwork
10/04 - received Foster License
02/05 - sw finally finished up our Homestudy

Best of luck to you!

Cindy

[Katrinad]

Hi there, we were cleared before christmas and are just waiting too. However, for me life is so busy at present, I'm glad nothing much is happening. My second son started school last week and it's taking all my energy to get him motivated in the mornings and then get used to only having one at home. I'm in lala land most of the time. Not that I don't think about it, it's cropping up in my dreams!! I'm just glad that people must be trying hard and getting it right, otherwise we'd all be flat out busy with children who have been abused or neglected. Where about's are you? You're either english, australian or kiwi is my guess. Oh please be a kiwi like me!! No one ever visits the "down under" board.

[BethanyB]

I am a fost/adopt parent and will hopefully be adopting my seven month old in the very near future. I did not go through the state to be licenced for foster care/fost-adopt. I went through a private agency hired by the state. My classes lasted about 7 weeks and my homestudy was completed a few weeks after that. It took about a month to be licenced (which by the way was LONG compared to others in my class.) The person in the office of licencing went on vacation! So everything was backed up. After I got certified I got the call four days later for my son. He was in the hospital waiting for a home. I went to see him that next day and took him home the day after! I am SO glad I found this private organization! And now I have a gorgeous baby boy!

Good luck! Getting the call for a child is the most exciting thing ever!

[Mummy_Big_Bird]

Sorry, but I'm from MA. I'm half scotish, and come from a long line of 'Mummies'

[Corgar2004]

Here is our time line. We just got our first foster son this last week (2/6/05.)
began classes 3/04
finished classes 6/04
homestudy completed mid 9/04
certfication finalized after Christmas 12/04
first placement 2/6/05

So ours took almost a full year till our first placement. Apparently many take a quarter of this time but for some reason this was pretty average for our particular class. Apparently we were the first class to have contracted home studies done and it threw everything off. Those home studies didn't get back into the CPS office for a LONG time. It was very frustrating and just crazy. But now we have our first placement and we are in love with him! He's absolutely adorable. He's 17 months and most likely will go back to birth family. We are certified as foster and foster/adopt and adopt. It's been a long difficult road to get here but we're FINALLY here and it was definitely worth the wait! Hang in there and remember that almost every office is overworked and understaffed. It's great to keep a positive attitude toward at least the workers themselves as it (in my opinion) is rarely their fault for how slow things go. They are being asked to do WAY too much so of course nothing gets done quickly.

Blessings,

Courtney

[mn_mom4more]

Mummy, we had our home visit last Thursday. We turned in our paper work 2 months previously. The background check can take several weeks, so that is typically one of the reasons for the hold up. It can be very frustrating to play the waiting game, I completely understand!

Our SW told us that we were good to go after our home visit, which means we are officially foster care licensed! YAY! Our county is greatly in need of foster homes and I don't expect to go very long without at least a phone call for a possible placement. This week our info should be in the computer, or where ever.

We are only foster care licensed, not foster-to-adopt. We are also willing to take kids up to age 11 yrs. old and are licensed for 3 kids. We are mainly interested in Crisis Nursery and Respite for DD kids. Crisis Nursery, in our county, is a service for families who are in crisis, or stressed and need a break from their child(ren). We are expecting Crisis Nursery to come out for their home visit this week or next.

During our "waiting game" I've tried to keep busy with different projects and get my office/paperwork more organized. It helps with the sanity!

Mummy, good luck and hang in there!!!

[HBDolphin]

Why do we have to wait so long? We started our classes 04-2004, foster care license 10-2004, adoption homestudy approved 11-2004, still waiting 02-2005. We are going through the county and I was told recently that there are 43 families ahead of us waiting for the same thing we are. We would like a child under age 2. I'm not a patient person either, but I sure am learning. I've been waiting to be somebody's mommy for 6 years, but according to the county, I've only been waiting for 3 months. Someone told me last week that they waited for 2 years to get their baby through the county I'm licensed with.

[TexasJingles]

HBDolphin -- Are you looking only for one child? Singles under 2 are hard to come by. Now, if you want to have siblings, you probably wouldn't have to wait as long.

We don't have an infant (and weren't looking for one at the time), but we were offered a sibling group with a 11th month old little boy. My dh really wanted a little girl, so we passed on this group (it was all boys). My point is that we could have had an infant within a month of being licensed.

Good luck to everyone.

[Katrinad]

Ah well, there's the link!! Scottish heritage, most of us kiwis have got some scottish in there somewhere!!

I've just finished saying to a friend, so I will repeat myself, I'm going to go ahead and make the bassinette and cot up (as in linen and everything), and get all the clothes in the drawers. I'm erring on the spiritual side in the hope that seeing how ready we are, we will soon get "the call". Previously everything has been piled up in a corner of the room, waiting for a placement. Am I making sense? At the very least it'll give me something to do in my down time. The systems between our two countries work very differently, adoption here can take months, but foster care is 2 Saturdays (either parent attending, doesn't have to be both), police checks, 2 references, home visit, registered. It took 2 months to be fully registered, although we were on the list as soon as I finished the second day, back in Dec. So really we've only been waiting about 9 weeks. It's funny, it drives me nuts at times, then others I forget completely about it!

[2boyz1girl]

Get used to waiting on social services. This is just the beginning.

We were also originally licensed through a private (therapeutic) agency (definitely the way to go). It took us maybe two months total to get licensed -- 13 hrs of training, background check, homestudy. We were told that the background check is what holds things up the longest. We were licensed on Nov. 2, and our dd was born on the 19th and came home from the hospital with us on the 29th. However, that was a rare occurrence. We were actually intending to take older children with behavioral problems and dd was the first newborn our agency had ever received. We then moved out of state and had to relicense with our current county which took a total of three months. So, licensing itself didn't take us so long, BUT dd is now two years old and we just finalized her adoption 2 weeks ago. First they extended their attempts at reunification longer than they legally should have, then the adoption process got held up at each and every step of the way. But it all worked out in the end .

[michelleb]

yep!!
We are WAITING, too!!!
I feel so helpless!! When there was paper work to complete at least I had something to control...now...nothing!!
We started this process in Dec 2003...we had a possible adoption situation that made us put our paperwokr on hold for a few months but then we jumped back into it in April 2004.
We JUST got our license Last week! Almost a full year later!!
Now...we have had our license for 13 days and NO calls.
We, also, are waiting for babies. Birth - 3yrs old.
I am so anxious!
A few people have told me to literally be a pain in the neck and call your CW all the time...if your name is in the front of her mind - YOU will get the call. I just know how busy these people are and I hate to be a nuissance!
I am SOOOOOOO instant gratification...this waiting is making me nuts!! All the statistics you hear on the news about children needing homes - WHERE are they?!
It's not that I am wishing bacd things on children just so I can foster - I simply have a hard time believing there is no one in need at any given time!

Blessings while you wait!

Michelle

[Nixie]

Guys there are tons of children that need homes, just not newborns. Majority of families do want the babies, who wants older children who have been through hell and back and have issues!

[Katrinad]

That is so true Nixie, it's was certainly a big issue for us, although foremost we have three boys of our own, nearly 3 , 5 and 7, and decided not to jeopardise their security by bringing an older child with significant needs into our lives. Another consideration was to keep our family in a natural birth order, so we have also specified birth to 2. But hey, look into the future, those of us starting out caring now with babies, may well end up caring for older children as our own kids grow up!