[sgtfirstwife]

My foster babies age 1 and 2 left us last Tuesday. We only knew they were going to leave us two days before court. There was no transition. They had never spent more than four hours with their parents. No overnights or even whole days. They just picked them up and took them. Anyway when we went to court, the judge ordered the parents to let us have visitation since they had been with us over 18 months. We are on the fence as if we should do this or night. The social worker says we can even have overnights if we want to. I would love to see my babies again, but I don't want to open up old wounds for me or for them. I am worried that they will not understand that they are just visiting, but I don't want them to feel we just abandoned them. In some ways I feel that that it would be more for us than for them.
So what are you opinions? We are on a three week vacation right now, but the social worker wants us to contact her when we get back. She thinks it would be painful but good for the kids.

[thelowlanders]

Just thinking of you....

Hope everyone has some good input for you. I have not dealt with this before so I don't have advice. I would just say that maybe it depends on how they're doing over there. But on the other hand, they could be suppressing their feelings.

[LoViN_LiFe]

Ive never gone through this...but I can understand how you are on the fence. I dont think that overnight visits are a good idea, and if you have a good relationship with bio parents maybe dinner together. But I do think that it will help the kids if you dont completely disappear. Just my opinion tho

[jp4ga]

I really do not understand why you as a foster parent were given visitation rights if the children have been placed back with their parents. This seems strange to me and makes me wonder if the system thinks the kids will end up back in care.

I would not agree to doing overnight visits. It may be good for the kids to see you but overnights may set the family back and prohibit the children from becoming attached to their parents. I think the best thing would be to plan to meet the family for dinner or a picnic at the park. The visit will be hard on both you and the kids. You need time to grieve the loss of the children and seeing them often for long periods of time may not be in your best interest.

When "my" boys were returned home it broke my heart. When I saw them out one day at the store it sent me back to the day they left. We had no notice, we went to court and they were ordered back home. Both children left the court house crying and I had to go home and pack their stuff.

It is hard for everyone but I really don't see how visits will help the children it may make things worse for them and their parents.

[mrstkg1]

This is just my opinion. It is based on nothing else except experience and gut feelings. I think you should visit, but I would do it as a group and not taking the children away from the bio family for the visit. That way it stays clear that the bios are the parents and now your role has changed to family friend. I wouldn't do overnights. Sorry about this sad turn of events. I personally would stay involved. It is possible that you could do some very valuable parental modeling for the bios. If you heart can handle it, I would.

[Sooner]

It does seem possible that they could come back into care so i think I would stay in contact just to monitor & stay involved as resource.

[AmahMama]

I visit prior foster kids as often as I can. We tend to meet at the park or McD's (or similar) so that the visit does not feel 'formal'. Many of my prior fk's think of us as extended family that they spent some extended time with. Of course, or kids have been small - and it is handled rather matter-of-factly - so it is a total non-issue for them. I still get photo's, school pics, holiday pics, etc. that I put on our digital photo album of nothing but kids.... I love to watch the slide show and reminice over the 'old days'! LOL

But, on the other hand, if you feel as tho' it will be traumatic for you - don't do it - the kids will pick up on that and realize that it is an issue - and it might very well be detrimental instead of healthy.

Good luck in whatever you decide

[snc2007]

If I'm understanding correctly from your signature, it would seem to me that these kids think of you as their parents, having been raised by you from birth for one child and for as long as the other can remember. For you to just disappear completely would be devastating to them. They need to have some sort of transition. Why did everything happen so quickly in your case? Please try to see them and let them know you are ok and that they have your blessing in their new home (even if they don't.) In the end I hope it will be good for all of you.

My dd was three when she was removed without notice from her foster home. 18 mos. later she is still confused, sad, angry, you name it. I'm still trying to figure out how to give her some closure.

[Ariah_Zada]

This is almost the same thing that just happend to me. My FFC are 2 and 3 and I had them just shy of 18 months. At the 18 month permancy review, three weeks after the kids were returned home (we did transition for a whole month), the judge ordered that I be given visitation rights that should be determined and set up through the guardian ad litem and sw. The judges reasoning was that the kids had known and been attached to me for more of their life than their parents and that me suddenly disappearing would be detrimental to their emotional health. I was shocked by this (thrilled, but shocked that the children's well being was being put first). So, a schedule is now being set-up (I haven't seen the kids in a month). We'll see where this takes us.

[stevenstwin]

Originally Posted by jp4ga

I really do not understand why you as a foster parent were given visitation rights if the children have been placed back with their parents. .

This poster has had the children since birth. Perhaps a judge realized that it would be in the best interests of the children not to have relationships with the only parents they've ever known suddenly severed! Imagine how having them just disappear would affect he emotional health of these kids. In the eyes of the law, it is "only" 18 months, but for these children it is a lifetime, literally.

[wantonemore]

I just want to say, I am sorry... this musst be so hard. No advice, just hugs.

[lazshay]

I'm probably in the minority here, but when our 2 fks left after a year, I decided there wouldn't be anymore contact. They were 2 and 3 when they left. They barely knew their mother (she didn't even have them before they came into care) but I thought it would be too hard on them to see us. I don't think I could see them now and it's been 3 years without bawling and I don't think that would be good for them. And what if they weren't taken care of like I thought they should? How would I react? I have just convinced myself their mother is taking good care of them.

[sgtfirstwife]

I do think the judge set this up since the kids had been with us so long. Like one poster said, since birth for one. The other child we had since last Oct., he had been in another foster home (who hoped to adopt also), but after a year they got discouraged and "gave up". We were told that if we took the older child we would be able to adopt them both. It had been such a difficult transition for the older child to our home. I had a lot of difficulty bonding with him, but we were taking bonding classes together, so it was getting better. The baby was my heart and soul. I loved him so much. His favorite person in the whole world was his daddy (my husband).

DCFS were pushing for adoption until two days before the trial. Then they did a complete turn around. We had little time to prepare them or us for this quick goodbye. The childrens atty objected to the reunification and made a formal objection in court. She also ask the court to put the children back in our home should the ru fail. He ordered this also.

As far as us visiting with the parents, I don't think we can do that. There is a language barrier for one thing, the mother is mentally ill and they have very different parenting skills than us. So if we visit it will have to be alone with the kids.

I don't know what to do. I really want to see them again. I worry they wonder where I am. It was so quick. I was told they were asking for us. That makes me so sad, but I also wonder if since they are so young if it would not be better for them to just leave things be. That is there home now. Nothing like ours.Sorry if I am rambling, but the pain is so new.

Thanks for all your responses. I still question what is the right thing to do. Guess we will just have to go with what our hearts tell us to do.

[RNFosterMom]

Wow. What an unbelievably stupid way for the court to reunify 2 small children who know only you as parents!!! I'm really stunned that they were removed from your home in such an insensitive way, and then to set up visits with you seems like such a backwards way of going about things -- as if they are making you somehow responsible for how the RU goes.

For the 2 kids we've had in our home for several months, we did manage to see them briefly a few times after RU. This helped us to get over our feelings of anger and sadness about their being gone. However, it's hard to say whether it has made a difference for the kids. They are old enough to have been attached and we know that they grieve in some way for the loss of the relationship w/us, but I am not sure if it can be known at this age level whether a weekly or other occasional-type visit would alleviate their grief or stress due to the RU transition.

I would also advise you to be a bit careful about interacting w/bios in this new scenario. If kids end up back in care, bios may believe it's due to you reporting something you observed. We have a FC in our home now who was RU'd and then came back into care a few months later. We had absolutely nothing to do with FC being removed again, but bio Mom seems to think we did and we no longer have the friendly relationship we had before.

[AmahMama]

for RNFosterMom - it seems like bio's are always looking for someone to blame. They can't or won't admit to themselves that they are not fit for parenting.

as far as the quick ru ~ I can't tell you (because I didn't keep track) how many times the children are 'ordered' to immediate ru. Even with 1 set of sibs - they went for a pre-adoptive 'visit' (which I told the 3 yo was a pj party) - and they never brought them back. the worker just came by for their things. And then acted like I was the *ss because I reacted so badly to not being able to say goodbye to them. They had only been in our home for 8.5 months (this from the cw). Another 19 month old, 2nd from the youngest of 9, was ordered home 'by 3 pm' during a review - she was napping when I got the word. The cw had stopped by for her monthly visit that morning since she was in the area for court. Another sib set (more twins) was ru'd with 1 day notice and came back into care 5 wks later because the bio had no idea they 'were so hard to take care of'. No transition so she didn't realize they were mobile (they'd been in care for 2 years) and were 2.5 yrs old. And those are just what I remember off the top of my head!

So it happens more often than we'd like. sometimes I think the mandated time frames have run out and the court has no option but to let the bios 'sink or swim' because there isn't 'quite' enough to terminate - and not 'quite' enough to feel comfortable about sending home - so drag it out hoping the bio just does something to get off the bubble.

Just my opinions. And I honestly thing that cw's and judges should have to deal with the system from our side for 6 months (like actually becoming fp's) before they can make life altering decisions for children.