Thread for the Formerly Fostered

bumping up.

Hey I found it! " don't know if it exists anywhere on this board, but it seems that the formerly fostered are forgotten. There's a place for the adoptee, the birthparent, the adoptive parent, the foster parent, but what about those who were formerly fostered?" I haven't seen anything on the formerly fostered :( Must be plenty of us out there, right? maybe they are just not coming to this forum. Okay, my mother abandoned my siblings and I when we were young children. She paid two girls aged 10, 11 to take care of us for a few days, (we were aged from 7-20 mths) disappeared, then never returned. Social services were informed through neighbours discovery of us kids on our own. After a couple of months of my step-father trying to take care of us, (he and my mother had already seperated before she left), for reasons I can't state on here, that all went wrong... So my step-father's family came and took me and one sibling to be fostered within their family, and moved us right away. My other two siblings were left with different neighbours by my step-father, then fostered seperately. From age 7-14, I had been in 4 foster homes, my fifth when I was almost fifteen. So, not nearly as bad as Louise, who has been in 40 foster homes, distressing to say the least. ((((Sorry, Louise)))) Myself and my sister that I was fostered with were seperated around age 12/13.....she ended up in a children's home. This upset me badly, having already been seperated from my younger siblings at an early age, to be seperated from the one sibling I had grown up with, I felt I had nobody left. I got moved again later, and had the choice of a children's home, or another placement. So of course, I chose yet another placement, as opposed to a children's home. I still remember being removed from that foster home....social worker come to my school, gently explained that things weren't working out, and my choices. Drove me back to the house to pick up by bin bags full of clothes....I will never forget crying uncontrollably in the back of his car, on the way to the next placement. I finally was lucky enough to be given the foster dream family, at my last placement at 15, they gave me back my life, my self confidence, made me feel part of the family :) I did ask could my sister come live with us, but their home was full. Four kids of their own, and numerous foster placements, coming and going. Well, I hope we can get a few of us talking on this thread, thanks for starting it Liberty..... Collette

I am so sorry for both you and Louise, Collette! My husband and I are foster parents right now and currently have three siblings we are trying desparately to keep together. They were birth to 31 months when we received them and we've had them a year now. The middle one, now 2 years, has had parental rights terminated on her and we are adopting her. She was in over 7 placements in just ten months. The oldest (half sib to the other two) is scheduled to return to his father and the youngest (the full sib to the middle one) is scheduled to return to his mother in drug rehab. We are heartbroken for these thre as they are ripped apart, particularly the youngest two. The older one does have full sibs with his father. My sister-in-law was in foster care for several years as a child as her mother had TB. She has warned me repeatedly to do whatever I have to in an effort to keep these sibs together. I was wondering if you had any sibs, Louise, and if you did, how do you and Collette feel about sibs being separated. What impact has it had on your life? If you were one of these sibs that we have, what would you hope would happen? I want to be a voice for these children and I want to be sure to voice what they would probably really say. While I didn't set out to adopt this baby (the older two were a concurrent placement and the baby just sort of happened to be born during transition visit with the other two), it is breaking my heart to see them send him back to his mother in rehab when we are all he's known (except for weekly hour visits with mom) and he loves his sister very much, as does she love him. If they separate them, how do I explain that to her when she is grown? If you don't mind, if you could respond and not repeat any of the details of my case in your reply, I might be able to share them with the judge on our case to support keeping these two together. If, however, you feel that it would be better to separate them if it meant at least one having his birth mother I will respect your opinions. After all, you've been there............

Hi Collette and Beansmom, Glad you both found the new thread. Don't know where it's headed but hopefully somewhere! Collette, I'm going to respond to your thread first thing in the morning but wanted to just say that I'm glad to hear the good news that you're going to put the article on the back burner. I think it's ideal to keep everything in neutral gear for the chance that you and your siblings can reunite with your half sisters that have been kepts apart from you. Which brings me to Beansmom's question. No brainer! THEY HAVE TO STAY TOGETHER!!

God bless you, Louise. I didn't mean to stir up a lot of uncomfortable emotions for you. You are the living, breathing example of why I fight night and day for these children to be together. I once told the worker that if the mom is well enough to take the baby, she should be well enough to have the 2 year old as well (the 3 year old is out of the question for her to have as the court will not even consider it and is commited to giving him back to his father). The worker got mad at me and told me that the 2 year old does not understand that the one year old is her birth sibling and that she will look upon our other children as her siblings and will simply "get over" the one year old not being here. They are exact clones of one another! They have to know deep down inside that they are related. These two belong together. She watches over him like a mother hen. He mimics her and looks up to her. Sure, they fight like little kids do too, but they share a bedroom and wake up each morning talking to each other and giggling and such. I have watched this relationship grow and I have nurtured it now for a year. After all, that's why they placed them here together, right? So that they could be together. And now I'm supposed to just sit back and let them tear them apart? It's killing me. Really, it is. I thank you for your boldness in sharing your story. Yours is the heartbreak I hope to help these kids avoid. They know their mom as the big person they go visit once a week, but she has never parented any of her children and they don't see her as "Mom". Why take the youngest and toss him into the wind when he is in a stable, loving home that is willing to keep him and his siblings together (if the court will allow that)? I just can't make any sense of it at all........

In answer to your question, it is an immediate response of YES, YES, YES. Try to keep siblings together, do whatever is necessary. When my mother abandoned us kids, I was the oldest of four, aged seven, the youngest being 20 months old. I must have had a very strong bond with my siblings. It was me that took care of them when my mother left, I know because I have been told. It was when I could not stop my youngest sibling crying, that I went to a neighbour for help. My memories of this all happening have totally gone. Or been repressed :( Although I can remember things from before my mother left, when we were all together. I didn't know what happened to my two other siblings until I was in my twenties. Because of the distance apart we live now, and because we really are trying to get to know one another all over again, it is very painful, painful to be in the same room together, for it just brings it home to all of us, that what happened should never have happened. It hurts. It also gives you a great feeling of helplessness, because we couldn't have any control over it. Like Liberty, no-one ever stopped to ask us kids, what did we want. We never had a choice. Adults made the choices for us. When I was 12/13, and my one sibling I had been raised with, was there one minute, but gone the next, imagine the effect that had on both of us. luckily after a few years I was able to reconnect with this sibling, and we are the closest two out of all four. :) Collette

Hi Beansmom, We really need to keep the kids together. I've posted a reply to your paragraphs, so it may come off choppy or look a little like I'm saying it's okay to split up the kids by letting mom have the baby and dad have the older boy. That's not what I believe at all. They all need to stick together. So on to your post/my reply: thanks for caring. I wish there were foster parents like yourself back in the 70s... back then it pretty much was a babyfarm business. I'm sighing here because sometimes the sick are only well enough for one, if even that... I think matching the boy up with his dad is a good idea since Dad won't have to diaper or spoonfeed, so it makes parenting more managable. Whereas for Mom, maybe all she can handle right now is a little doll, to be used like a comfort toy for herself? So the two year old is what? A child who requires help by a responsible adult? LOL. But so long as Mom is talking like "I can only handle the baby" just let her have the baby and write her off. Chances are, when the baby becomes a toddler, she'll dump her and then get pregnant again... that's called trying to make a "do-over" -- my mother did the do-over thing five times and my dad did the do-over thing eleven times! sorry, but the social worker sounds kind of stupid to me. I was going to say "naive" but thought I'd really speak my mind. Of course the toddler is aware of her baby sibling. But she wants one thing and that's to have the full limelight. it's tough competing with another kid for that spot, but know what will happen when you take the baby away? Trauma trauma trauma. Honey, I am sick with you. I have a bad feeling about this, but I think the mother is going to win in this situation and she will be awarded custody of the baby and split up the kids. The Law's logic is that it's in the best interest of the child to be with his mother, but the mother is thinking "I can handle one" but if she's anything like my mother was, she's also thinking "I hate work, welfare is free money." Another wretched matter is that you have no access to the family file to determin what kind of mother this Mom is... so all you can do is appeal to the Judge and say, "please, I urge you to review the family file. The only stability this infant has known has been in my home with his sister and brother. The three together make a complete family. Please don't separate them. They are all necessary for one another to heal and grow. They are learning to co-habitate and form their unit that will endure throughout their lives. True, it is tragic that their parents failed them in the past, but it is the recent past. Have their parents fully recovered with parenting classes, anger management training, family budgeting, and are gainfully employed to support even one child to that child's best interest? I believe not as you should, too, and because these parents are not ready to parent ALL their children together, they ought to return to the drawing board and only return when they have proved they've done the legwork to support the children as a whole. That's because all that has happpened to the kids is SENSELESS and CRUEL until you've accomodated their healing with your stable, safe home. And why are the kids visiting her once a week, why doesn't she come and visit them once a week? Mom needs to step up and start proving she can go out on a limb for her babies before even one is considered to be 'returned' --- argh!!!!!!!!!!!! Glad you are here! I'm sure that Collette and I will be rallying along with you for the long haul.

I am totally with Liberty on this one...how can you send back one child to their mother, and not the other? If she cannot or will not do whatever necessary to take care of all her children, why should the siblings be split up? Being seperated from your mother is traumatic enough, without being seperated from your siblings too, on top of it. It is inviting more trauma. You said: "The worker got mad at me and told me that the 2 year old does not understand that the one year old is her birth sibling and that she will look upon our other children as her siblings and will simply "get over" the one year old not being here. They are exact clones of one another! They have to know deep down inside that they are related. These two belong together. She watches over him like a mother hen. He mimics her and looks up to her. Sure, they fight like little kids do too, but they share a bedroom and wake up each morning talking to each other and giggling and such. I have watched this relationship grow and I have nurtured it now for a year. After all, that's why they placed them here together, right? So that they could be together. And now I'm supposed to just sit back and let them tear them apart? It's killing me. Really, it is. The 2 year old would have already bonded with her one year old sibling. As you say, you see it, they live with you. How the social worker can say, she will just "get over" her sibling not being there, is beyond me......Does the social worker know that from personal experience? Has he/she been seperated from her siblings at a young age? I really feel for you, I know this is tearing you up inside, and what a wonderful foster parent you are for thinking of the children first. Keep fighting, we are behind you, at least if it doesn't end the way you want it, with the siblings staying together, you will know you tried your hardest for them little kiddies. Collette