Depressed
I’m having a really hard time dealing with what happened last week at court. I can see the physical manifestations of it…wanting to sleep all the time, clenching my jaw, grinding my teeth at night so I wake up with a horribly sore mouth, upset stomach.
I love those kids so much.
And even though I love them so much, I could deal with this better if I knew Mom had made an effort. If I thought the team thought that she really had a good chance.
But she hasn’t, they don’t, and I am dealing with the fallout here with some very confused little kids.
And I don’t ever want to encourage someone to fail, but I find myself hoping that she won’t show up for the visits.
I’m just sad. Just so very sad and scared.
August 18th, 2008 at 10:26 am
It’s because you love those kids so much that they will make it through this.
August 18th, 2008 at 10:32 am
I hear you- I was in a similar boat last fall and it is very hard to encourage reunification when the odds are so bad! hang in there-
August 18th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
It’s incredibly scary, isn’t it? It was at this point when my wise husband said, “Remember that our job is to care for them RIGHT now and if something happens and they do go home, they will have all of this that we have done for them and taught them to take with them.” I try to remember that often with our kids when the time is getting close and we aren’t sure what’s going to happen. It’s good advice and it’s gotten me through some rough patches. So, keep loving them, teaching them and giving them good memories. The confusion is a whole other issue, but you are obviously capable of dealing with it. Don’t think too much about the future right now, try to focus on each day as it comes. That helps some too.
August 18th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
When you love your kids, as so many of us do, it’s so hard to know that you may lose them to “lesser” circumstances. The whole idea of foster care is to get these kids some permanence. Ideally that is always going to be with a natural parent that can keep them safe so that’s why agencies fight so hard to keep the bio’s in play. The best of foster parents express to their children that while they are living away from bio parent, this home is their home in every way to include that foster parent is just as much a parent as they want them to be. Children rise to your best expectation if nurtured to do so. You’re going to have to frame this for them as exciting and hopeful news (”Aren’t you proud of Mommy Sharon’s work to build a home for you?”) while also expressing your love and how much you’re going to miss them if they have to leave. The great travesty will be if these kids leave you and weren’t even aware of the possibilty. They’re resilient but sometimes they achieve this by demonizing you or the agency or everyone involved including the parent they now are forced to go home to.
Can you offer more stability, more overt tenderness, more material and educational oppotunity, and on and on? Hell yeah you can, but very little matches the permanence of biological connection…not to mention the Orwellian disaster we are headed for if we strictly place kids based upon some checklist of who can offer “more” to them. How many of us could have stayed with OUR biological parents if such a checklist had existed and someone else had wanted more for us?
What I hope for is that kids that come into contact with me realize that there is a different way to do things and they take that piece (and peace) with them. I also hope that the agency does some followup and monitors the situation.
I’m in your corner, but you’re killing yourself over something you have very little control over despite the insanity of it all. I have a friend I see at foster family association meetings and he always asks my advice. He’s had three kids for four years. One of them ONLY knows him as dad. They are stopping adoption proceedings because someone 30 years ago accused him of physical violence. There was no conviction, and he is a church pastor. TPR is complete and they refuse to remove the kids, but he’s still not “good enough” to adopt these kids. I told him to try to get the opinion of the GAL who’s supposed to be working in the kids’ best interests. Maybe that would work for you also. But don’t push or cry-they will be quick to label you a crazy.
August 18th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
My heart breaks for you…
My Mom took care of my cousins for over a year while her sister tried to straighten her life out. We live a 1000 miles away, and we had to take them back to her because their bio dads grandparents were threatening to do some horrible things to my mother if she didn’t.
My Mom cried for 1000 miles when we drove them home, because she knew the life they were going back to was not the one she wanted to have to see them grow up with. (Long story there, I’ll share if you want, but thru email)
Fast forward 11 years, and they are now 19 and 16. They have had a rough go of it, but they remember everything my mother did for them and how much she loves them.
Love those babies Baggage, with all of your might, so even if bio mom does get them back (I hope not, but I am bias) they will have that love imprinted on their soul, and it will help them through. It’s scary and it sucks, and I wish none of you had to do any of this. I hope they are not doing this just to see if she fails (someone said that in comments in another post), because that is sooo not fair to those kids.
I am thinking of you and the kids everyday.
August 18th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
I am heartbroken for you and the kids. I am so sorry. I am also so glad you have such knowledgeable and compassionate commenters who understand what you are going through and can give good advice that I cannot. Thinking of you.
hugs.
August 18th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Whenever you’re feeling down I’ll go and click on a bunch of your sponsored ads and browse for a while. Does that make you feel any better? (((hugs))) Love ya
August 18th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
I am glad you have an outlet or two to voice these feelings.
I keep saying that I know I should not say it, but in my heart, I hope she fails. I cannot see it any other way.,
I’m off to click on sponsored ads.
k
August 18th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Everyone else has had such amazing, kind, wise things to say, all I can add to this is that I’m thinking of you, and I truly hope that everything will turn out the way you want it to. You and those kids deserve the best, and this just hurts my heart.
August 18th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Every minute they have with you gives them a better life, no matter what happens in the end. Just remember that and keep counting those minutes. Hopefully the court system will soon realize its mistake.
August 19th, 2008 at 6:58 am
Yeah . . . what she said–but especially Jenn’s comments–
I was a psych major (would you like fries with that?) and one of the things I remember so clearly is a study on resiliency in children who’d been abused. One thing they said was that children who have ONE positive-influence person in their life at some point in their childhood–one person who cares for them and goes to bat for them–are way more likely to survive and even thrive.
So yeah, what she said. I want to see them stay with you, too, but try to hold on to the knowledge that you are giving them a foundation, that they will go through life, no matter what happens, knowing that SOMEONE loved them more than words can say.
August 20th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
Okay- I’m confused… If the kids’ team doesn’t think mom should have them, if mom hasn’t done what she was supposed to (besides the 11th hour cash), why prolong this?
I hope the kids get to stay with you too Baggage.