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Instead of taking TPR to trial we decided to offer an open adoption to BF. Our PACA is legally enforceable and we thought at the time it was best for our daughter. Our open adoption is to be overseen by a therapist and all communication between DD and BD is supposed to take place with the therapist. DD has never met BD but has been aware of his existence her entire life.
The problem is that my family moved states a couple months ago and have had to go searching for a new therapist. BD (who is also my ex) has used this change as an opportunity to attempt manipulate my husband and I and make this process as difficult as possible. To date we have offered 3 options for therapists and he has found a reason to not like all of them. Most recently, he agreed to move forward with a respected child psychologist (via a phone voicemail to her), was cc’d in all emails agreeing to and setting up care, privy to us placing a $2,500 retainer with her and a week and a half later he emailed us freaking out and accusing her of lying to us and not communicating with him.
That was over a month ago. He has provided one therapy group to us upon our requesting his assistance in the search (that took him over a month to do but as well). The problem is that the “therapy group” he provided is a reunification program, the kind that just became illegal in California. This worries us on so many levels and we feel it says a lot about his lack of understanding of his role as a BD and not a legal parent. He is a stranger to our daughter in every sense of the word accept biologically. He has also tried to insert his opinion on how often she needs to be seen (he would like weekly, prior therapist set a max limit at once per month based on our comfortability) and is insisting she be seen in person. I have a feeling this is because he knows we live an hour each direction from a city with therapists to choose from.
He is making our lives incredibly difficult. I have made contact with more than 30 therapists in a two month period. The fact is that no therapist seems to have an understanding of our roles in the adoption triad and how to facilitate the open adoption without infringing on our parental rights. The type of therapy ordered in our PACA doesn’t actually seem to exist. It’s beginning to feel like BD thinks he got out of the responsibility of having a child while securing a visitation schedule when he signed over his rights… Maybe he has? I’m tired, drained and lost. I don’t normally suffer from insomnia but have begun waking up at 1AM and not getting back to sleep before it’s time to take the kids to school. I finally cried this morning and I couldn’t stop. I feel like I failed my daughter by agreeing to this open adoption. I just started looking up local therapists for myself because I’m hitting my breaking point. Open adoption seemed like such a fantastic option in theory. In practice it’s draining the life from me.
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