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We are still awaiting a potential kinship placement, and just can't believe how much more drama is involved after doing this for nearly 20 years with non related children.
Its already giving me a lot of insight as to what the family goes through with the shock and madness of a child being initially removed. Every relative has a different understanding of what is going on, as I guess if you haven't ever been involved with foster care before you are clueless as to how it works. We have relatives that think that Social Services can just give them custody without court or DFS involvement. We have relatives that think they can stop by and visit the child in foster care whenever they want. We have relatives that think THEY will decide what happens to the child. We have a birthmother who goes from believing she can call and see her child whenever she wants, to being totally cut off from her son, and told she can't attend school or doctor appointments and she doesn't understand what changed. I think we are also dealing with inexperienced foster parents that currently have the child, as I think they have led to some of the confusion. :eek:
We are still awaiting a family team meeting, which they were originally hoping to hold before the Thanksgiving holiday, but they aren't certain at this time if it will happen by then. All we know at this time is that we are in the front running to move the child to our house if they decide to move him from the current foster home, but that they can't or won't do anything before the family team meeting, so frustrating.
I could use any advice or support from kinship foster parents, and would be curious if there are any online forums that are specific to kinship care that I could visit. Thanks in advance!
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I thought attending school/doctor appointments was a standard right for bio parents, unless there's some specific reason not to allow it. Also, I remember hearing about a case where the grandma and step-grandfather had been primary caretakers, the grandma died, and DHS refused to acknowledge any relationship because he wasn't biologically related to the child, who went to her mother for awhile, then got placed in foster care. Sometimes I'm really frustrated by the emphasis on biological relatives, when what really matters is love, who is consistently involved in a child's life, who makes an effort, who is there at 3 am when the kid puked all over the bed, etc. I know studies have shown that biological relatives are better than strangers, but I'd like to see a comparison of chosen family with biologically related strangers.
eomaia
I thought attending school/doctor appointments was a standard right for bio parents, unless there's some specific reason not to allow it.
There is a relative board here where some of the kin providers post. I had trouble finding it when I saw it mentioned so I'll try to post link. [url]http://forums.adoption.com/relative-adoption-support/[/url]As far as advice, try to avoid the drama as much as possible. Assume that half of what you are told by relatives is just gossip & guesswork. Set boundaries early & often. It is much harder to stop people's habits (ie dropping in) once they are used to it. Just because it is a relative, you do not have to allow the drama into your home. My fs was originally with a gma & that's the main reason it didn't work out, bios & other relatives constantly on her doorstep fighting & causing chaos. I set rules, bios don't come to my home without my invitation. The chaos can take place elsewhere, sshow up on my door & authorities will be called.
Kinship care is HARD! BTDT. My best suggestion is to ask/require your SW to give you the same support regarding boundaries that they would for non-kinship placements. Visits arranged through DCF, all requests through the SW, etc. so that they can be the bad guy not you. If family members ask - for a visit, a legal question, etc. - saw "I'll have to ask the SW" which both puts the responsibility for the decision on DCF and also removes you from having to give answers in the moment or agree to something you are not comfortable with.
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Our kinship foster journey is coming to an end in two days when we finalize his adoption.
I totally agree with MomInCorzon....put it all on DCF. We did that every step of the way...even when we knew we didn't have to consult them first. I can't tell you how many times it saved us from doing something we weren't comfortable with!
Luckily, our DCF workers through the whole case were terrific. They knew we were pinning everything on them and they were more than happy to support us through that and act like the "bad guys".