[nursie]

I put this thread on the foster care thread also but thought someone from this angle might help.
We have a 6 mo old fd we hope to adopt. Her bdad came forward is contemplating whether to take her or to relinquish his parental rights. The CW has suggested offering him a once a weekend / month visitation to be written up in court as part of an open type adoption. We are thinking he would be more willing to relinquish if offered a contact agreement.

We are willing to keep open contact with him but I am not sure I want it to be in writing and be so specific. We want to feel as if we have some control over when she goes, etc. without having a court ordered documents making demands over who and when our daughter will go.Afterall, we will legally be her parents .

Has anyone done this type of plan and if so how well is it working and would you recommend it or not.
We want our fd to remain in our home and be safe and grow up with her brother whom we hope to adopt as well (his bdad is unknown.) But, on the other hand we don't want to have our life ruled by the Courts even after adoption. At some point we want to feel as if we have some control over visits and we are willing to keep in touch and allow contact but we feel we should be the ones to set the limits. Isn't one weekend a month a bit excessive ?
All thoughts and comments appreciated.

[mckenna]

are they suggesting unsurvised??? i would never have that in writing, when adopting from the foster care system.

with my son, we had an unwritten open agreement. i always did all the work to let his bmom see him, but now that her behavior is detrimental to my son, i have stopped facilitating the visits. before, i get slammed, she still has our phone number and if she were to contact us, i would start sending pictures, but she has said some very nasty things about my 3 y/o son (the same child she gave birth too) and at this point it is too detrimental to my son's well being to be involved with her. unsupervised would never be an option for me.

[nursie]

I believe that is what the CW was suggesting but I don't feel that would be a very good idea. I don't like the idea of unsupervised.
The CW did mention that either party could go back in to court at any time to change the agreement. Now that could be good or bad depending on the judge!

[mckenna]

never, you are the parent, you are responsible for that child, in your care or not. what if something happens when you aren't there. sorry but i don't think this is a good idea. i cannot believe they are even suggesting unsupervised. are open adoption agreements legally binding in your state? they are not in mine, so dfs stated they could not help out with any agreement between bparent and aparents after the adoption was final.

[momofmykids]

I'm jumping on the bandwagon with McKenna on this one. I don't think unsupervised visits with bdad are a good idea, especially through the fc system.

All my children are adopted through DCS which does not have open adoptions. I have, however, maintained contact with the bmom of 6 of my children. She calls, we exchange letters, I send pictures...all of that a couple of times a month. As much as I care about her, and as close as we are, I don't allow any kind of visits (she's never asked BTW) and would never even entertain the idea of an overnight visit! They were removed from her for a reason.

Think long and hard on this one, Nursie. Maybe you could agree to meet at the park or McD's once a month along with phone calls, emails, and pics, but not overnight visits.

JMO

Good luck,
Jill

[BrandyHagz]

If you’re not comfortable with unsupervised visits, let them know. Would you be ok with supervised visits?

I have to say, even in domestic infant adoptions, where a mutual respect and friendship has blossomed, I’ve never heard of unsupervised visits in an legally binding open adoption…the whole concept seems crazy to me…this isn’t a co-parenting type situation. Is it possible that you are misunderstanding the caseworkers suggestion?

Before you make a decision, you should ask her exactly what she means…Is it unsupervised or supervised? How will the agreement be worded in the legal document? Who will supervise? What does “visit” mean…an hour, two hours…the day…over night?

I’d find out more information before making the decision about this.

[crick]

I agree with the others in that you should not agree to visitation etc. without really knowing what you want, are comfortable with etc. However I also had another thought...

To me it sounds like the CW is proposing this simply because it will be easier to entice the dad to voluntarily relinquish his rights. That's shady in my opinion because he could be promised all sorts of things simply to give up his rights and then later on, you might decide "no, this isn't what we want". To me, it's similar to promising a bmom in a private adoption all sorts of things only to close contact as soon as the ink is dry on the finalization papers. It's not the right thing to do in my opinion.

I don't know the specifics of why he is not able to parent or why the child was removed from parental care, but until a judge or himself relinquishes rights, he is still the legal parent and has rights. I would hope that his rights are recognized and supported, especially if this is a situation where he did not know of the child and has just now come forward etc.

If there is a valid reason for the child having been removed from his care, then I would probably follow the protocol of having the judge terminate his rights. If it's found later that the system "encouraged" the dad to relinquish, it could cause a lot of problems and heartbreak later on....

Crick

[numbr1dbcksfan]

I am with Crick. Let the father decide for himself whether or not he wants to parent (Im assuming the the child was removed from the mother, not him...). Then if he asks for visits or pictures..... you can talk about them... or if he chooses adoption, just offer them of your own free will.

Good luck.
Christine

[nursie]

Thanks for your replies. Bdad has a criminal history of drug charges and was in prison for 2 yrs due to an assault. He is 25 and has fathered 3 children with 3 women of which he doesn't have a relationship with. He is in back support for child support to one child to a tune of $20,000. He is living with his mom (who lost him to foster care due to her drug history). His sister lost her children due to drug history. His first UA was + for marijuana, subsuquent ones have been negative.
He doesn't have a driver's license due to unpaid tickets.
He really doesn't have a lot going for him in many areas and I would hate to see him separate her from her brother as well as from us, we have raised her from birth with the intent to adopt them together. Bmom's rights are close to termination(long story here but you can catch that on my Foster care to adoption what is it like link "struggling whether to adopt or not".
We aren't trying to manipulate the bdad but he asked expressed confusion as what to do as is 'on the fence" as whether to relinquish or not.
Keep the comments coming.

[sugarbabysmommy]

It sounds like you know his history, but have you gotten a chance to know him?

Put aside what the social worker suggests and consider what you are comfortable with and let him know. If that means you end up chosing the one weekend per month on your own, you know it was your free will, or if that means letters and pictures plus a visit once or twice a year supervised, then it was your free will. We always feel better about what are doing if the decision comes from us, you should no more feel dragged into an agreement than he should. Then he knows where you stand and it's up to him to take it from there.

You said you would hate to see him separate her from her brother, does that mean would consider the SW's idea if you knew it would bring closure? If so, I think that's a very bad reason for agreeing to something. Only enter into what you know you can live with, and if more comes later and the relationship between all of you blossoms, that'd be great.

Personally, I have a very open adoption, but would never have agreed to unsupervised visits. I love and trust my child's birth family, but I was a child who was involved in court ordered monthly weekend unsupervised visits with my biological paternal grandparents. Knowing I had no say in whether or not I could see them bothered me a great deal, especially when they continued to undermine my parents. And when I reached the age when I was told I could finally decide for myself, it was clear I wasn't supposed to speak up, fear of upsetting everyone and possibly having to return to court mediation kept me silent. If the day comes and my child says hey, I wanna spend the afternoon with so and so, like with any relative, great, but I want for my child to make that choice.

[LisaCA]

hi,

we did a regular domestic adoption and are negotiating with bdad for a legally binding open adoption agreement. I think you should view this document as a bare minimum, what you're comfortable with. Yes, you can go to court and change it, but this has an impact on the relationship with bfamilies. If you're uncomfortable with unsupervised visits, then say so. bdad sounds as if he's unsure about the whole thing. maybe having a sw explain what an open adoption agreement is, that you're willing to negotiate it, is a good way to go, but not to pressure fdad into relinquishing. It is good to reassure him that he'll be able to see his child, that his child will know who bdad is.

take care,

lisa

[jojobear]

Nursie,

let me tell you we are in an almost identical situation. Our FS bmom signed surrenders she was going back to prision. All she requested was one current picture. I gave her like 25 that was almost a year ago and she has never ever contacted DCF again. She now has no legal rights to him anyways. The Bdad now on the other had fought for custody and has always made things very difficult for the children, We were called many of many names and he wanted to co-parent. Rights were terminated and he of course appealed. Well he contacted DCF and said he will drop the appeal if he can recieve a couple of pictures and send money. It was agreed upon that everything go through DCF and that be it. Well he hasn't held up on any part of his end of it so we were told not to send pictures until he does so.

MY OPINION: Do NOT give or promise UNSUPERVISED visitation to a parent that may loose parental rights. I maybe would agree to a public place with you present. But NEVER Unsupervised visitation.. There is a reason this child is not with this parent as it is. Even if he is the non offending parent why is it this child is still with you. There is some reason the department didn't give him custody. Sounds to me he is very similar to our fs biodad.

Good luck and remember YOU have to PROTECT your Child. NO ONE ELSE WILL.

Jody

[crick]

Based on his current drug usage, I'd be very leery of signing anything or even agreeing to anything. Would you feel comfortable now saying you'd send pics & updates but anything beyond that will have to be considered in time?

My feeling is just that he not be made any promises you won't keep, and that you do what you are comfortable with and in the best interest of your fd. The CW shouldn't be encouraging an open adoption agreement just to sway him to sign...that's basically my concern when I talked about dad's rights, kwim?

You do have to protect her and do what's best for her. I think based on the uncertainity of things, no promises should be made beyond what you are completely comfortable with.

[BethanyB]

I would not agree to unsupervised visits. I would agree to sending pictures a few times a year and if that was not enough for him, I would allow short visits at a public place a few times a year. And I would do those things because only if it felt comfortable.

I have had my fost/adopt son his whole life (9 months)and the TPR hearing is in May. Before his bmom left town (in December) I had hoped to have a semi open adoption for my son's sake. I was going to get a PO box and ask her if she wanted to exchange pictures and letters over the years. And then someday if my son expressed an interest in meeting her...I would have her information. I knew that because of her drug history that she could be a dangerous person. Plus she has a huge anger problem and is in a big deal of denial. So I was not open to the idea of visitation or her knowing where I lived. BUT in December she took of and has not been found by DYFS yet. She has missed several court dates and they do not expect her to resurface.

But again, these were things I was comfortable with for my SON'S sake.

Would you be open to visitation if bdad already had his rights terminated but just wanted to be in his child's life? I know you would do anything to keep your child with you and that is totally NORMAL! But remember that you do have to live with whatever decision you make. I WOULD NOT allow unsupervised visits. This is a tough one.

Again, I would go for the whole pictures and letters through a PO box, thing. It would be GREAT for your child to have those things when he/she gets older and wants to know more about bfamily. And it's not a threatening situation. I would see if bdad would be okay with that. If not, then go from there.
This is a tough one! But for me, if it came down to it...and I was going to lose my son...I would do anything to keep him!

Good luck and let us know what you decide!!!