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My son and daughter-in-law have had a girl, placed with them at the age of 8 weeks, in their home for 23 months. They are the only parents she has ever known and they made clear their desire to adopt her from the beginning. She was taken from the birth mom due to signs of neglect and substance abuse, in temp foster care until she was placed with them. The birth mom appealed TPR months ago, and they have just been notified birth mom won the appeal to receive services. They are receiving conflicting information from their caseworker. We are wondering what the chances are birth mom will recieve reunification with the girl. Any insight would be appreciated.
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My understanding is that where I am once the permanency plan gets changed from RU to Adoption that TPR remains the plan no matter what - it doesn't get changed back to RU. Once the TPR goes through the bparents have 60 days to appeal but they can't appeal the actual TPR ruling (they've still lost their rights) but they can appeal that the paperwork was done incorrectly. In which case they do the corrections and TPR again. Is this not the case in other areas?
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OP: You son and DIL should insist on a meeting with the DCF attorney handling the case to get all their questions answered and find out how they intend to proceed. DCF could change the goal back to RU, or they could continue concurrant planning while birthmom gets services and another chance to work her plan. Even if birthmom works her plan, DCF may have a case that it is still in the childs best interest to be adopted. They may want to do a bonding study... Ask about that.
My heart goes out to your family.
My daughter was taken from me at 3 weeks by DPFS because my oldest child was hospitalize for acute psychotic mania associated with Bipolar I. He is 12 this years old today and my daughter is 1. After 8 months she was allowed to return home.
Even after this short time I worried about bonding issues and how the transition was going to affect her. I made strides to ensure she spent as much time with me as possible through out her time in foster care (twice a week an hour a visit) as well as I kept insisted in having constant supervised communications with the foster parents so that I could have some say in her care. Reunification was always the goal however the length of time this was going to take was opened ended. They had to be certain my son was stable before my daughter was returned.
I had to quit my job to keep up with the demands of DPFS as there was no way I was going to be able to make this service plan work while working. Luckily my husband could support I and my other two children still in our home. As hard as it was too do ... I did what I had to for my daughter who I wanted home so badly.
The service plan they do manage to make as difficult as possible and for most parents its not realistic for one to quit a job while the other one keeps up with the intense service plan the state will require. I spent 25 to 30 hours a week doing services ... and my son had to endure many days out of school as well in order to meet the requirements of the service plan. It was nearly impossible to do but we did it .. and only by Gods grace.
I dont know what the BM's story is or why it has taken so long for her to finish her service plan but please try to have some sympathy for her as well. You have no idea what it is like to be on the other end of this or just how impossible they make these service plans. I know there is a reason for what they do but know that how they go about doing what they do isnt always right. We all want to believe it is but as the foster parents of Maddy and myself have realized after Maddy came home .... they dont always do things on their end in a timely manner nor do they make things easy (or possible in most cases) for the reunification to happen with in the 12 month specified time frame.
Every mother has the right to parent their own child just as long as she is capable to provide a safe and loving home for her little one or ones. DPFS doesnt always make that easy nor do they always err on the side of justice for the children or the parents. There is alot of buearacrecy on the other end. Please keep that in mind. I know they want children .... but please dont let their wants and desires get in the way of what is truly best here in this situation.
Like I said I dont know what this situation is ..and during my time in the system I have met alot of derilict parents who did not deserve to have their children.... but I also met alot of parents such as myself who had their child or children in some cases removed because of things out side of their control... (too often children wrongfully removed) I have a great relationship with foster mom and dad... and we are finding out now that you are not always given either all the facts or accurate information by DPFS. It puts you in a very bad situation ... and the bparents in a very poor place.
I would say please consider the bps here in this situation and what you understand to be fact. Please keep an opened mind to what is happening here... and dont be so quick to want to have these children taken from their parent or parents.
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If she wasn't offered services from the beginning then the caseworker and agency are at fault and Mom deserves a chance to work her case plan. It sounds like the agency dropped the ball on this one. It could be that Mom doesn't complete the case plan and even if she does, she still may not be RU'd. In my situation, Mom has attended all of her classes and completed most of her services, however, DSS was ready to start TPR paperwork. Due to a change in Mom and Dad's relationship status, Mom is being granted more time to show whether or not she can handle parenting on her own.
So sorry that your family is going through this. But remember, it is best to have Mom go through all the services and work her plan to really see if she is serious about RU with her child. Welcome to the rollercoaster, you're in good company here as someone ultimately has been through something similar.
Did tpr already occured or was this going to tpr? If this was going to tpr and mom appeals that then the goal was never changed and it is still ru. Now if this already went through tpr and mom appealed the tpr and won then it a whole new ball game. Winning an appeal after tpr is rare. When it is won is couse the case was not done correctly. Either mom did not get the help and services she needed? Was the case plan so hard that there was no way mom would complete it? Either way when an appeal is won it means that the tpr was not legal, thus will be revoked. Usually if appeal is not dismissed there is a court and then the appeal will be granted or not. If it is granted, then the tpr will be revoked and mom will have her rights over her child again and has the right to work on a new case plan to get her child back. If that is the case...then someone really messed up. Thats why tpr takes so long, couse sw must be sure there is no couse to question the tpr.
This makes me so angry! I think that reunification is downright stupid in cases like this. By all accounts, the girl is your son's daughter! And to the little one, your son is her only father and her mother is his wife.It's not in the best interest of the child to turn her world upside-down and place her into a potentially dangerous situation, at that. Where was her biological mother until now? You can't be so flakey about deciding you want to raise a child or not. UUUGH.
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Talk to cw's, CASA and anyone else who can let you know what's going on. But also wait and see. bio mom of my 2 oldest asked me about adopting them during the summer. Court in October said goal was RU. TPR occurred at the end of October. Sometimes mom's aren't capable of raising kids. but sometimes they are. I did respite for a girl who's bio mom was in rehab. She was supposed to visit bio dad but he was drunk and the cw didn't want to leave her. Her bio mom called her every ten minutes to reassure her and make sure she was ok. That was a case for RU.
omzig
My understanding is that where I am once the permanency plan gets changed from RU to Adoption that TPR remains the plan no matter what - it doesn't get changed back to RU. Once the TPR goes through the bparents have 60 days to appeal but they can't appeal the actual TPR ruling (they've still lost their rights) but they can appeal that the paperwork was done incorrectly. In which case they do the corrections and TPR again. Is this not the case in other areas?
cdurante, thank you so much for sharing your story. There are thousands out there in the same spot. Clearly social services is working upside down in these cases--it was your son that needed services, not your infant daughter. I know of a mom who had to plead guilty to neglect and get her rights terminated before the state would place her son in RTC; at that, she had no guarantee that they would do so after her TPR, she had to trust. He had to go because if he didn't, they were going to charge her with neglect of him and endangerment of her other children. She simply did not have $120K/year extra for RTC for him. Who does? Parents should not have to make such choices in a just society. breakspencils, there is nothing that says they "can terminate rights" after 22 months. The federal law regulating Title IV-E funding says that the local social service agency must petition for termination if the child has been in care for 15 of the last 22 months. If RU is still the goal, then the burden is on them to show why TPR is not now in the child's best interest. That is, the presumption of best interest shifts from RU to TPR and adoption after the child has been in care for 15 of the last 22 months. At that, state statutes for "best interest" rule goal selection--RU, adoption, guardianship, APPLA--but a completely different set of state statutes for "grounds for termination" rules TPR. So a child could be found to have a best interest in the goal of adoption (usually to be shown to the level of "more likely than not"), but if the grounds for termination (usually to be proved "beyond a reasonable doubt") are not met, then you have a problem. I suspect many children are left in foster care limbo because of this. For the op, many good scenarios and possibilities have been put on the thread. Another is that because the appeal goes to a different, more public type of court, sometimes the judges there, who are far less cognizant of the issues than family court judges, are reluctant to uphold TPRs. In some states, these are elected judges, so.... What happens is that they overturn the TPR but send the case back for services. When/if it comes back to them on appeal a second time, then they feel confident and safe in affirming the TPR. They may also think they are erring on the side of caution and family unity/integrity. I'm not taking a position on it either way here, just explaining what I've seen and been told.
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Hadley2
The federal law regulating Title IV-E funding says that the local social service agency must petition for termination if the child has been in care for 15 of the last 22 months. If RU is still the goal, then the burden is on them to show why TPR is not now in the child's best interest. That is, the presumption of best interest shifts from RU to TPR and adoption after the child has been in care for 15 of the last 22 months
cdurante007
My daughter was taken from me at 3 weeks by DPFS because my oldest child was hospitalize for acute psychotic mania associated with Bipolar I. He is 12 this years old today and my daughter is 1. After 8 months she was allowed to return home.
Even after this short time I worried about bonding issues and how the transition was going to affect her. I made strides to ensure she spent as much time with me as possible through out her time in foster care (twice a week an hour a visit) as well as I kept insisted in having constant supervised communications with the foster parents so that I could have some say in her care. Reunification was always the goal however the length of time this was going to take was opened ended. They had to be certain my son was stable before my daughter was returned.
I had to quit my job to keep up with the demands of DPFS as there was no way I was going to be able to make this service plan work while working. Luckily my husband could support I and my other two children still in our home. As hard as it was too do ... I did what I had to for my daughter who I wanted home so badly.
The service plan they do manage to make as difficult as possible and for most parents its not realistic for one to quit a job while the other one keeps up with the intense service plan the state will require. I spent 25 to 30 hours a week doing services ... and my son had to endure many days out of school as well in order to meet the requirements of the service plan. It was nearly impossible to do but we did it .. and only by Gods grace.
I dont know what the birthmom's story is or why it has taken so long for her to finish her service plan but please try to have some sympathy for her as well. You have no idea what it is like to be on the other end of this or just how impossible they make these service plans. I know there is a reason for what they do but know that how they go about doing what they do isnt always right. We all want to believe it is but as the foster parents of Maddy and myself have realized after Maddy came home .... they dont always do things on their end in a timely manner nor do they make things easy (or possible in most cases) for the reunification to happen with in the 12 month specified time frame.
Every mother has the right to parent their own child just as long as she is capable to provide a safe and loving home for her little one or ones. DPFS doesnt always make that easy nor do they always err on the side of justice for the children or the parents. There is alot of buearacrecy on the other end. Please keep that in mind. I know they want children .... but please dont let their wants and desires get in the way of what is truly best here in this situation.
Like I said I dont know what this situation is ..and during my time in the system I have met alot of derilict parents who did not deserve to have their children.... but I also met alot of parents such as myself who had their child or children in some cases removed because of things out side of their control... (too often children wrongfully removed) I have a great relationship with foster mom and dad... and we are finding out now that you are not always given either all the facts or accurate information by DPFS. It puts you in a very bad situation ... and the bparents in a very poor place.
I would say please consider the bps here in this situation and what you understand to be fact. Please keep an opened mind to what is happening here... and dont be so quick to want to have these children taken from their parent or parents.