sadden heart!

dx, I'm not sure which posts you have been reading, but I wanted to let you know that fostering to adopt is not an easy road either. You may get a child more quickly, but then you have to live with the unknown. Our dd was placed with us at the age of 10 days, the first 17 months of her life were the hardest of mine. We fell in love with her on day one, but had to prepare ourselves twice to let her go. I can't begin to tell you how hard that is. Luckily, God's plan for her was to stay with us and we finalized our adoption this past Monday. The majority of children who go into foster care do return to their biological parents or other family members. The ones that end up getting adopted usually take years to get to that point (our daughter is two now). Even with the expedited permanency or fast track laws, which are now in place in most states, it is a long process. If you truly want to do foster care it's not too late, I don't know what the difference in requirements is in your state, but I'm sure you could go back and get the additional training to become foster parents. However, I wouldn't recommend that anybody do foster care in hopes of adopting. If you want to do foster care, do it for the sole purpose of giving a child in need a good home while you can. If that child happens to become available for adoption -- GREAT! But if you go into it hoping to adopt, you are likely to be broken hearted :(.

2boyz, Great response! Congrats (again) on your finalization! Our story is very similar to yours, only we got a bonus "little bubba" :D . Our daughter was 20 months when we finalized and we got her at 2 days old. We had 2 bio-sons and I knew I would love having a daughter, but we did not go into fostering with that as our goal. I would add that we have been blessed beyond my wildest dreams not only by the two wonderful kids we now call our own, but also by all the ones that we had the privelege of loving for a short while! dxf, You will be in my prayers and I am hopeful that if you are hearing God's voice calling you to foster that you will not turn a deaf ear. Come back anytime for support. There are such great people here who will get you through all your fears and insecurities, as it sounds like your heart is on the right place.

Praying now!!

2boyz1girl congratulations!!!!!!!!! thats great news. and i also agree with your post. with straight adoption, the children are already TPR'd, the good news about this, is that they are legally ready to be adopted, and you can finalize in 6 months (pending the state your in) if you did go the foster/adoption route...(which we could not do)...of having the child in your home, then having to say goodbye....well, i cant even imagine it. preparing to adopt takes a lot out of a family and now seeing that adoption only may not get us results faster than foster to adopt saddens my heart! IMO after reading your post....i think you made the right decision, if your waiting is already taken alot out of the family, i cant imagine if you get a child, then the child goes back to birthfamily. Talk about taking alot of the afamily and saddens the heart.

My hubby and I have been fostering for several years now. Foster to adopt is rough. Sometimes, there is a good match and sometimes not. It depends on what you desire. I know foster to adopt weighs heavy on our hearts because we have been so dissappointed with numerous failed placements and ones that we almost got to adopt, but had to be returned. We have been without a placement for a year and six months. Our candle flicker is burning thin and we are thinking about throwing in the towel. There are sooo many children, but we can't get any placements that work. We can't have children. This is the only way for us and unfortunately I get tired of people coming up to us saying,"God is picking out the perfect child for you." They don't understand the system, nor foster parenting. I do believe they have compassion, but not being realistic. We hear all the wonderful stories about people getting babies and our agency hasn't called us with any referrals for over a year. We call them all the time saying "hello remember us." We have changed our search and criteria of what we want several times. Nothing has worked. Please prayer that we will get a child to keep forever to make our family grow.

We started with the expectation that were were going to go the legal risk (fost adopt) route because we were told that the chance of us getting a free and clear kid was very small. We told our home study that we could do it once. If a foster kid whom we hoped to adopt was taken from us, we would never be able to do it again--it would take too much out of us emotionally. We were VERY lucky. Just a few weeks after we did our home study, we were called to say that social services wanted to do a presentation and that the little girl was free and clear. Four months later we have our finalisation in April. It has been commented that the speed at which all of this fell into place for us is uncommon. We feel blessed.

We did straight adoption too and NEVER regretted it. You can always go back and become foster parents, nothing is stopping you from changing your mind.

Please keep your chin up and keep trying. Foster to Adopt requires some MAJOR soul searching and that constant thought of will this really go through is always there. We are just days away from a TPR hearing that everyone 'says' will 'go right through' and both birthparents will be signing off, but there is no guarantee, things could totally change direction at that hearing. Make friends with as many social workers as you can. Having your name out there makes a difference. Make sure every social worker you talk to knows what type of child you are looking for. Best wishes Diane

My hubby and I became foster parents - just to be foster parents. We did, however, go ahead and take the additional classes for adoption for a "just in case" situation. Well.....Gregory was placed with us in October 2003 as "foster to adopt". He was removed from his second foster home and placed with us because we were out of his county and we would adopt him. His case was suppose to be one of them "open and shut" kind of cases. He was originally placed in April 2003 when he was eight-months old and has been in foster care since. Now - fast forward to December 2005 - we are having to make plans to send him "back" to his birth parents. Why? Because a cw might have made an error sometime last year. ALL recommendations that have been given to the courts have stated "Don't send him back to his birth parents". These recommendations have come from Dr.'s, CASA and the DFC. So, we are on one heck of a roller coaster ride!!! I am one that believes that "For every negative - you should be able to find a positive." The negative is - we are loosing Gregory sometime in early March. The positive is that so far, we have been able to raise him for over twenty six months and we hope that we have been able to provide him a WONDERFUL start in life. Wishing everyone a very Happy Holiday. Christina

Wow Christina.....what an incredible outlook you have. I'm at a loss for words. What a fortunate little boy to have you in his life for this long.

Hi Christina. I only wish that the family that your foster boy was going to was "worthy". The abandonment issues that this little boy is going to encounter is a little terrifying. We are adopting a 5 year old girl that came through our county social services and we are keeping her in close contact with her foster family to ensure that she doesn't endure another loss in her life. I believe that this family has become our lifelong friends. And I'm grateful to them for giving our girl such a stable environment prior to her coming to us. I will keep Gregory in my prayers.

Christina, I am so saddened by your loss, and I am humbled by your outlook. What an extraordinary woman and mother you must be. I am not particularly religious, but I will pray for you and your dh, and for Gregory. Please PLEASE know that as alone as you may feel, there are people out there in the world, who may be strangers to you, but who are PRAYING for you and keeping you and Gregory in our hearts. Wishing you peace.