Why would an abused child want to return home?

There is also the fact that for kids, the familiar is almost always preferable to the unknown. Plus, even abusive parents may at turns be loving to the kid. They know mom or dad, they know what sets them off and how to survive, and sometimes how to avoid the blows. With a new set of parents, you don't know what sets them off or how long they will want you or anything else. Even with bad parents there were probably some good times and they love that parent, the one they had the good times with and they want that parent back. Some kids also feel responsible for the parent, it was their job to care for the parent and they worry about them.

I can't speak for all foster kids. I'm sure many have suffered serious abuse. But in my case, the abuse was the result of one person - my mom's boyfriend who is now her husband. She won't leave him and he has serious drug problems that make him violent and lead him to sexually assault my sister. My siblings and I were taken from an abusive home but it wasn't always like that and we always hoped that eventually mom would get rid of him and we could be a family again. We had a lot of good memories at home. Alot don't include mom or her boyfriend. We lost more than just mom when we were taken but everything we knew including friends, pets, neighbors. I don't like that people think we must have like Stockholm syndrome or something. Or think that all foster kids come from horrorific situations. What happened to my sister was terrible. But what my brother and I experienced at home wasn't enough to be taken away. So when we said we wanted to go home, it was to that - the place WITHOUT my mom's boyfriend.

When I was 4 years old, my mom lost a set of twin brothers, and suddenly my life turned upside down. Shortly afterwards, she left my dad and started physically abusing me. When I was 6, she fractured my skull, and I spent weeks in Children's Hospital. I remember a doctor giving me a doll and telling me that it was my mommy -- I tore the doll's head off but refused to talk to the doctor. I spent much of that hospitalization crying for my mom...screaming for her actually. My mother was not an evil person -- we had some great times together...and some horrible times together. She could be a LOT of fun, often playing with me for hours. I remember being very protective of her. Before my parents divorced, I remember climbing up on her bed and handing her Kleenex to dry her tears with after my dad had beat the crap out of her on numerous occasions. That protective side of me never went away -- I was ferociously protective of her up until the day she died a year and a half ago. If anybody messed with my mom, they always heard from me. The one thing that really stands out in my mind is how I split my mom into two people when I was a little kid: the nice mommy and the mean mommy. And that's truly how she was with me for over 50 years. She could be the best mommy in the world one day...and then be horrible and mean the next day. The good times vastly outweighed the bad times, though. I'm not explaining the dynamic of why abused kids want to stay with their parents very well. But I do know that I never wanted to leave my mom when I was little, that I refused to talk to the doctors, and that I refused to tell the school nurse what was going on at home in the dark of night, which is usually when my mom would rage. I remember in times when I felt threatened by other people or situations, I clung to her so tightly. I loved her...she was my mom. I could see myself being mirrored back in her eyes, her smile, her face. It's so simple...and so complicated at the same time.