Renaming a child that might be reunified (Long)

Our first FS was a legal-risk pre-adoptive placement -- his adoption social worker told us to call him by the name we wanted to give him (he was an infant). We did. For 9 months. DSS lost the TPR trial and we had one week to start calling him by his original name before he was RUed. It was awful! At the least, I'd call him by both names.

I need your SW to talk to my SW. I have twins who have been TPRd, I have been designated the adoptive resource and I STILL don't get to rename them. They are "too young" to chose a name change and can't be "stripped" of everything - "they've already lost their parents." - PUKE Granted the names are not satanic.....but they are twin and have variations of the same name - like Matt and Mateo. I can change middle name but must keep the first. I plan to cll them by their middle names. Using both to start and eventually dropping the first nsme and just using the middle/nick name. Sorry, didn't mean to Hijack- for those who have seen my other posts - I thought I was over it.....maybe I'm not:)

No; I didn't rename mine until the adoption. If there's a chance of RU the kids are wards of the state.

I totally don't get this. YOU"RE adopting the kids. The judge explains it that they're as much yours as if you'd given birth to them. You should be able to rename them. have twins who have been TPRd, I have been designated the adoptive resource and I STILL don't get to rename them. They are "too young" to chose a name change and can't be "stripped" of everything - "they've already lost their parents." - PUKE Granted the names are not satanic.....but they are twin and have variations of the same name - like Matt and Mateo. I can change middle name but must keep the first. I plan to cll them by their middle names. Using both to start and eventually dropping the first nsme and just using the middle/nick name.

Am I the only person that finds this disturbing and sad? I'm not saying give the parents years to complete a plan but come on just to set them up to fail..that is just very wrong in my opinion.

momof2fabtwins, I did read your other thread and was shocked to find that they won't let you change your twin's names even at finalization. I always thought it was a given that you could do that! I guess just using their middle names is a workable alternative, but I like you, would be very upset by this. It's like they trust you to raise the kids for the next however many years, but don't trust you to choose a name! Anyway, congratulations on making it to TPR and being chosen as the adoptive resource for the twins. I can only imagine how excited you must be to be this close to them being forever yours!

I'm glad to see that I'm not the only person feeling disturbed about the OP's county's policy on reunification (or lack of it) for foster kids. Intentionally not giving parents enough time to "jump through the hoops" set in place for them is wrong on so many levels, IMO. So...no, you aren't the only one feeling this way, EanDmom. :eyebrows:

EandDmom and RavenSong, I think I gave you the wrong impression. It's not so much that they are setting the parents up to fail by not giving them enough time to "jump through the hoops", they just don't allow them to continually refuse to jump through the hoops by extending the deadline over and over again. They are given a caseplan to work based on their issues and then expected to really work it. They generally aren't allowed to go month after month after month failing and restarting or picking and choosing which part of the caseplan they wish to work. The goal is to get the kids placed in permanent homes as quickly as possible and avoid the heartbreak of young children being bounced from home to home or being torn away from the only home they know because the bio-parents choose to work the caseplan 2 years later (although that does occassionally still happen). The goal is also to make the bio-parents really prove themselves to minimize the chances of the kids coming back into the system at a later time (although that still happens too). This comes after many years of the county working the other extreme. Parents were given chance after chance and kids sat in foster care for years or bounced in and out of care. I have a friend who adopted her son when he was 10 years old about 15 years ago. He entered the system at 6 months old and bounced around from foster home to foster home while his parents spent 5 years trying to complete the caseplan. Finally, they gave up and disappeared, but by this time, he was too old and had too many problems to be easily adopted so he bounced around for 4 more years until my friend got him as an emergency placement when he was 9 (she usually only accepted kids under age 5, but there was a foster home shortage and the caseworker begged her to take him for just a few days). The really sad part is that by that time, caseworkers had given up on him ever being adopted and his goal was "permanent foster care". My friend had to really push to get them to TPR the parents (after 9 years in foster care!) so that she could adopt him. The system in place today aims to avoid this type of situation. I don't know if the way the county does it today is the best way. Maybe there's some happy medium between the way they do it now and the way they did it 15 years ago. I don't know. But I do feel strongly that if they are going to error, I would much rather they do it in the way that gives the kids the best chance possible of having a safe, permanent home. If nothing else, I think today's system accomplishes that.

It'd be nice to see our area get a bit more strict w/the caseplans. Actually following through with the deadlines and other requirements given. The statistics in your area are shocking though. Even Me, someone who leans more for giving them a safe,permanent home ASAP was a bit shocked at how impossible it seemed for bios to get their kids back.

I don't think the statistics are so shocking countywide, though. The 2% reunification rate I quoted is just for my agency. This agency only does fost-adopt, not straight fostering, and they only accept kids whose parents are judged to have little chance of successfully completing a caseplan. These are families who have either a long history with CPS or many, many severe issues. Almost all kids under the age of 3 enter the system as fost-adopt, but many of them are still expected to be reunified because their parents have less serious issues or no prior CPS record. Adoption is just the backup plan in these cases, but my agency won't accept cases like these. Since they are an adoption agency, not a fostercare agency, they only accept the cases that have a high likelihood of becoming adoptable. The goal on paper may be "reunification" but because of the family's history or the severity of the issues, it is not really believed that reunification will be successful. I don't know what criteria is used to make that decision, but apparently, they are pretty good at it given the low 2% reunification rate. This is the reason why I choose this agency. I don't know what the reunification rate is countywide, but I would guess it to be somewhat higher than 2%.

I see. I wonder if we have something like that around here.

You and I are from the same state and that's the impression I was given too. We were told that CA was attempting to take steps to prevent children from being in long term foster care. I know enough people who have adopted young children through foster care here to believe that most judges do not give parents repeated chances to get their children back. We were told that parents are given 6 months to work a caseplan with full support (free counseling, classes, etc.) If they don't appear to be working their caseplan, they get 6 more months but the support is removed. They have to jump those hoops on their own. If a year goes by without substantive progress, then they move to TPR. We also worked with an FFA that only does fost-adopt.That said, we did not change our son's name until he was adopted. (We actually kept his first name.) I would not be comfortable changing it before adoption. Even when R/U looks unlikely, we still aren't the parents until then.

Well I would agree a year is enough time to prove you want to parent your kids or not.

we are still in the early stages of fostering our FD but I would love to change her name if we can adopt her The name her mom gave her is a very plain basic name however the spelling of her name is nothing even close to how you would say it! lol It's so much fun when we are in the dr's office and they call her name, for fun lets just say this is close to what it would be like "Pattyscarry" when the child's name is pronounced Patricia, this is just a very close example of what it's like lol I swear it is that bad! lol :eek: We ended up calling her a name that someone from the shelter said they called her which is cute but again I am not crazy about it. So soem of you have changed your little one's name at age 2 with no problems?? I will have to remember that!

I agree, that’s incredibly sad and horrible.