Hi to all my blogging friends. I had a great vacation for our 5 year anniversary. We went to Traverse City which is beautiful and had a lot of fun. I will try to post these pictures the end of this week if not the beginning of next week.
I would also like to thank Savannah from "Countless Tomorrows" blog who is my blogging buddy for telling me about this blog " http://anothersmalladventure.blogspot.com/ . It is a great blog. Every Monday for those who are thinking of adoption or planning to adopt, she puts children who are looking to be adopted on there. They are of all ages. It is funny because a lot of these children I have seen on the state website but I didn't know how to pursue it at the time. I think this is a great blog that I felt I must share with all of you.
I feel like some times anyone I talk to in the outside world that I talk with every day truly don't understand what I am going through and when I come on here and blog I feel like people can relate and give great advice and this is one of the situations I ask all you blogging friends to help me with. So these 2 little boys I have been waiting to hear back on. Well I didn't update you on this because I didn't even have an answer before we left on our trip. She said 2 weeks ago at DHS she would call me and know more the end of next week which was last week. Well I e-mailed her on Thursday of last week to see if she had heard anything since I didn't hear from her yet. Well I checked my e-mail 2 times on our vacation and I know bad me. No e-mail from her. Then I waited until Tuesday to call her. I don't think I can go into to much detail but I will try to explain the situation. Well I called and got a hold of her and asked her what the status was. She proceeds to tell me that the foster mother wants to adopt one brother and not the other and that DHS won't separate the boys. This is the way it should be I am thinking. She said that this women does a lot of fostering for them. Which makes me think that are being careful to upset her for some reason. I don't know the foster care world very well so I don't know. Then DHS said will I be willing to do respite care. She said it really isn't that but they call it that when the foster parent can't take care of the kids for what ever reason (going on vacation, needs a break, passing in the family, ect.) that we would watch the kids for her for like a day or two. I was a little hesitant then she explains that she is only asking so #1 we would get to know the kids and #2 that the foster parent would meet us and may feel more at ease when she meets us. So we said sure. But, I still don't understand so if someone knows please let me know, if the parents rights are terminated, I know that they make sure all relatives are not going after the child, then they offer the children to be adopted by the foster mother and if they decline that they get put up for adoption. Well if DHS tells the foster mom no that she would have to adopt both or none of the kids why wouldn't DHS let them go up for adoption since they offered and the foster mom is not agreeing on the offer. And it also doesn't make sense because it feels like they are trying to stay on this foster mom's good side so she will continue to take in more kids but why would you want someone who would want sibling split up to foster more children. I guess I don't get it. It makes no sense to me. My reason I really need advice is that when I talked to her on Tuesday she said that she didn't call me back because she got a call from foster mom on Monday on her voice mail and she needed to call her back to find out the status. She told me once she calls her she will e-mail or call me back later that day or early today. Well surprise, surprise no call back or e-mail from her. How long do I wait to contact her back? What would you do if you were me? I heard that people have said to stay on top of a social worker but I don't want to make her mad or annoyed with me but I want her to know I am here. I feel like she keeps telling me she is going to do something and never follows through. It is like why tell me something if you are not going to follow through. This is my life on the line and my world on hold and I feel like that is not important to her nor do I feel like she understands. I need some advice please of what to do or what is the process or issue. I am just frustrated. Every time there is good news it feels like another road block. I just want her to tell me if there is good potential of them being ours or if not so that I am not stopping what I am doing, and dreaming of what it will be like to have a family, and thinking about all the stuff I would need to buy before they come, and how I will surprise our families with meeting them for the first time. Yeah they don't know what is going on with the adoption. They know we are on a list but I we have gotten our hopes up before and I don't want then to get there hope up with us, or to ask everyday if we heard something. Not only that but when you get pregnant you get the exciting ways you can thing of to tell your family. I always planned that if I got pregnant that I would let them know by writing a card to them from the baby and say something like "I can't wait to meet you (grandma, grandpa, aunt or uncle) mom and dad have told me so much about you and I can't wait to finally be spoiled by your love" and then attach a picture of the sonogram. Something like that. I always thought that would be cute but with adoption they are just waiting and if I tell them about a potential child that may join our family and it falls through it is like a miscarriage or they feel funny asking you anything as to not upset you and then if we get them were is the big surprise of us telling them. I was hoping to get the boys and I imagined calling them and asking them over for dinner and them meeting the boys. I thought about if it was this labor day (which I highly doubt would happen now but a few weeks ago it sounded possible) I would bring the boys up north for the trip we take every labor day together and meet everyone. Tim's Brother is coming for labor day from Chicago and we don't see him and his wife much and I thought that would be neat for the whole family to meet them. I don't know these are just my hopes and dream but as we all know they don't always come true which is the hard part. Thank you all for listening and I appreciate it if you do know anything about the process of the foster care world or what you think of the situation or what you would do.
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I'm sorry about the roller coaster ride you are on right now. We aren't looking into Foster Care so I really don't know much. But my instinct still says, stay on top of this lady. Maybe she hasn't called you back because she is still trying to get a hold of the foster mom. Or maybe she is busy with new children entering the system. It could be a number of reasons. But don't let her forget you or your desire to become a parent.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure what to suggest about the two boys and the being split situation. I am sure the state has their reasons and they will do their best to work it out. Just be patient, hopefully it will happen soon. Keep dreaming, that's what always keeps me going.
I agree with you about the surprise. Infertility takes so much from us and the "announcement" is another one of those things. I think it's awesome that you still want to somehow surprise your family. Also if you adopt older children (not infants) it might be a good idea to take a few days with jut them. They will need to adjust too. I'm no expert, but that's what I would do if it were me. We are still looking at infant adoption and we want to take a whole week without telling anyone. Everyone else gets 9 months to expect their babies, we want a week to just enjoy being a family. I'm still not sure how I will tell people, but I thought it would be fun to call my mom and give her a grocery list. I'd say something like "I need milk, bread, diapers, eggs, yogurt, formula," and see if she caught on to what I was saying. I just think that would be funny.
Good luck, I hope you don't have to wait much longer. I would call every few days so she doesn't forget about you. My prayers are with you!
I agree with Savannah, keep on top of the social worker. They have a lot of clients and people and maybe get confused for who is for what. I also heard with older kids they don't just immediately take them out of their foster home. I think they like to transition them to their new home. I hope this pitiful, small bit of advice helps and good luck to you. Keep being positive and know that we are praying for you too!
ReplyDeleteDefinitely stay on top of the worker!!!! Especially if she has a tendancy to not follow through..its her own fault. In these situations the squeaky wheel gets the grease.
ReplyDeleteAlso, smart move on doing the respite. Its also a great way to get the "experience" some committees want the adoptive parents to have.
Every state is different so the advice you get from one person in one state may not reflect how it is in your state.
They may have asked you to do the respite because they are thinking of you as alternate source to take the boys if the foster mom really only wants one and wont change her mind (there is always that possibility). In my state, splitting up siblings because someone doesnt want "both" is not really an option and the sibling bond is very important and they will choose someone willing to keep the kids together over someone who says they dont want both. So, that is your ace in the hole. Doing respite will infact ease the foster mom's mind about who the child (who she is obviously attached too) will be going to...and will just be easier on her when dhs tells her "no, we will not split up the boys", so she will be relieved if someone she knows takes the boys, and someone the boys have gotten to know...a big load off foster mom's mind if she cares about these boys and it sounds like she does.
DHS needs all the foster parents they can get, and if she has been a good foster parent, they want to make things as easy on her as possible (it sounds like to me)when they decline her offer to adopt one of the kids....does it make sense now?