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Hi, my name is Ruth and my husband and I are just starting into the foster/adopt program in Pennsylvania. Maybe you can answer some questions? How difficult is it to find an infant in the foster care system? How long does it usually take? I have 2 teenagers of my own and really don't think I want to deal with any more older children at this time. We are looking forward to this, I am just not sure of the wait. And does age really make that big a deal? Thanks, Ruth
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Ruth,
I don't live in Pennsylvania, but on this topic I think the statistics are probably similar from state to state. I see that no one has responded yet to your question so I'll try to tell you as briefly as I can what I know and learned during our adoption process. I'll try to use words like "many" and "most" because of course there are always exceptions and nothing is absolute.
There are not many infants in the foster care system that are legally free for adoption. Most times when a child is taken into protective custody the birthfamily will have a period of time to follow through on goals established by the state in a "Family Service Plan". The objective of the FSP is to determine what needs to be accomplished to help the parents work towards family reunification and to protect and nurture the children during this time. The length of time varies from state to state, where I live it is 18 months. If the family does not at least make progress during this time then there is a strong likelihood that the state will begin working towards the termination of parental rights. By the time the child is legally free for adoption there is a good chance that they are a toddler. Some of the exceptions to this are children who have serious special needs (i.e. mental and physical disabilities) or in cases where the parents have crossed into an area of behavior where the state begins immediate termination (i.e. they tried to kill the child or have been convicted in the death of another child, etc.).
Even then, toddlers will often not show up on the state listing. If you go to the internet listings you rarely find profiles of younger children. Foster families are usually given the first opportunity to adopt children in their care once they are legally free. It stands to reason that many of these younger children are adopted by their foster families. Because of this families who want to adopt younger children are encouraged to do this through foster-to-adopt as opposed to the adopt-only programs. Foster-to-adopt is a big decision in itself because it means that you, as a family and individual, have to be willing to love a child unconditionally knowing that the situation has some uncertainty. Once you have an agency you might want to talk to them about this and decide whether you and your family are willing to take legal risk children or not. I will say that in our foster licensing class there were many couples who had chosen the adopt-only route, but had found themselves waiting for such a long period of time that they had eventually come to the decision to do foster-to-adopt. One advantage of foster-to-adopt is that you have the opportunity to have a positive impact on the life of a child whether that child is reunited with their birthfamily or becomes your own.
You asked too whether age really matters. This, of course, is a personal decision but there are things to consider. Many families decide that they can only adopt younger children because of the age of other children that are in their home. Some families do not want to adopt out of birth-order, some families are concerned that older children may pose a risk to younger children. Some people have the perception that the younger the child, the less significant the issues they will have. I think that many people could give you stories to attest to the fact that this is a misnomer. Every child is an individual and every child is different. Of my 3 children that we adopted (a sibling group - ages 6,4, and 3) my three year old is by far the most challenged and most challenging in the behaviors and needs that are a result of their past. Deciding on the age of a child to adopt is something that calls for us to look into our hearts - are we adopting because we want an infant, because we want those baby years (nothing wrong with that, by the way), or do we want to adopt to provide a child with a loving home that might otherwise not have that? Many children over the age of 3 or 5 in the system stay there for a very long time before finding an adoptive home or just age out of the system.
Me and dh were looking for much older children than were placed with us. We did foster-to-adopt and listed the ages as anywhere from 3 to 13. Our agency had a sibling group of 3 that was an emergency foster placement and voila, here we are now a forever family.
Hope this helps!
Blessings,
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I am a FP in PA for 1 1/2 yrs. We were licenced for 3 weeks before getting our first phone call. 2 placements went to different agancies and 1 I had to turn down because of medical reasons. All were under 1 year old. after 1 month on the "list" we accepted a newborn straight from the hospital. He was 3 mos premature and was on an apnea monitor. It was hard and exciting at the same time. We loved him immediately. We have regular visits with the bio family, but are hoping for termination soon, we are praying for God's will and that he become a permanamt member of our family. (which seems likely, but the not knowing is the hard part)
Good luck!
Jenni
I am also from Pa. and am near the very end of my homestudy. My youngest son is 18 , and Im a single parent. I really would like to adopt a girl or two between 12 and 14 years. Im feeling that there may be a very long wait for children in that age group without severe problems. I feel that being in my early 50's and a single woman may work against me, although I did raise and support my three children on my own. If there are any women my age, how are you progressing. Have you been successful at adoption? How long did you wait?
Hi!I read your post about you and your husband wanting to adopt a baby and wanting to know if it is very likely.Well,when my husband and I got our license in July '99 we were asked what we would prefer age-wise.I said that I would like a baby(preferably a girl,since we already had 3 sons).Well we were told that not many babies come into the system.2 days later I recieved a phone call from the agency that they had a 7 month old baby boy needing placement.I was ecstatic!I rushed to the agency and when I laid eyes on that baby it was love at first sight!I couldn't help it!We were told that it would be for only 6 months or so but I'm happy to say that baby is now my 4 year old son-we adopted him in April 2001.At the time that he was placed with us,there were at least 3 other babies placed in care in our county and several more over the next few months and they were ALL placed for adoption, most were adopted by the foster families.There is a lot to go through just to see if you can adopt a foster child.We had to wait for the agency to determine if parental rights were going to be terminated,then when that was figured out we had to wait for the adoption hearing.I was so scared that he would be sent back to the bio-parents,or that the agency would decide to place him with another family.Luckily we had him long enough that removing him from our care would be detrimental to his well being.Our caseworker was wonderful and she explained how the system worked and why we had to wait,but in the end it was DEFINITELY worth it.I know our experience with the foster to adopt situation was wonderful,and so was several of our friends'.Each family has their own story and some are sad while others are great.If you are willing to open your heart and home to a young child,even if you only have that child for a few months,you have made a difference to him/her.I'm not saying that you will definitely get a baby or even a toddler,but the point is to love that child unconditionally.The time has gone by so fast since we got our bundle of joy from the agency and today he is a very energetic 4 year old.I love him just as much as my other 3 sons.Good Luck in your foster parenting adventures!
Ruth, I saw your post a while back. I was wondering if you have had any children placed with you as of yet. I am also from Pa. and my children are already grown. I am looking to adopt 12 to 14 year old girls. It has been six months, but I think I'm getting close to a placement. I'm being considered more often lately. Im a single parent, so naturally thats
part of the reason it's taking so long.
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Hello, yes I have had placements. Since August I have had a 2 day old little boy who was later placed the grandmother. Then I got a 4 day old premature little girl who was also later placed with a grandmother. I now have 2 children, a 5 yr old little girl who has been with since halloween, and a 3 month old little girl who came to stay with us the Monday before x-mas, they are waiting for background checks to come back on 2 relatives so they can send her home. This system sure does seem a little to soft on these parents when it comes to returning these children.
Here is what I mean, the first child they placed with us, the little boy is now missing. The grandmother gave him to his mother and she took off with him and noone knows where they went or if this little boy is okay. I have been worried sick about him. He was our first and made an impact on us.
I hope you get a placement real soon. Having the five year old sure did make the holiday that much more fun. Good luck and write back.
Ruth
Ruth,
Did you go through a private agency or a county to be a foster parent? Our agency knows that we will only take low-risk foster-adopt referrals and would never consider giving us children that we would only have for a couple of weeks. We have an 18 month old that has been with us nearly 10 months now and is the light of our lives. Terminating parental rights there may take some time if it ever happens, but we're willing to take the chance knowing we will at least have made a significant difference in this child's life. A couple who went to classes with us to be licensed at the same time brought an infant home from the hospital a couple of months ago. Parental rights for their child will be terminated later in January. I think there are lots of success stories here in PA with the foster-adopt program with very young children, but there are probably an equal number of stories similar to yours where the child ends up going to a grandparent or other relative. I hope things go well for you in any future referrals that you wish to turn into adoption. I feel very sorry for the boy who is "missing". I know that must very upsetting for you.
Sorry to ramble. Happy New Year!
Well they found the little boy and brought him back to pa on the 29th of december. since we had a baby in the house already they placed him with someone else. then the next day we found out the infant we have in our care will be leaving on monday. so we lost out on both of them. I am grateful he is safe but i wish he would have been able to came back here. Oh well.
We went through the county.
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WOW, I am glad I found you ladies!!!!
Here is our story!
My husband and I started our Foster paperwork in November and then got an out-of-the-blue email from a birthmom who wanted to place her baby with us so we HALTED our foster paperwork. She is due in 2 weeks and has decided to keep her baby! We are happy for her.
SO, I called our Foster Care Coordinator yesterday and re-started our paperwork!! That poor lady thinks I am a NUT! haha
Anyway,
Our bio children are 5 & 6 and we want to take only babies to start out with and we are prefering SHORT term care simply to EASE into it for our children (and my husband, who is supporting me in this but not 100% convinced it is for us)
Our coordinator told us there are very few babies available so when I popped on this thread I was like "YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!"
We are in South Eastern PA so you all could be North Western PA and then your statistics would be very different form ours but it still gives me hope that we will be LOVING a LITTLE one very soon!
Looking forward to making friends with all of you PA-FPs!
:)
God BLess!
My interview is this Friday the 12th. I'm crossing my fingers that the interview goes well. It will be around noon. i heard today that a caseworker called on my homestudy and wanted me to read another child profile. This girl is 13 and is mmr with severe learning disabilities. I would not have a problem with either of those except I would have to have a child be able to stay at home once in a while for an hour or two by herself. It would depend on that. With my profession, I can usually adjust my schedule, but there will be times when I wont always be at home. This is the second time I've made it to the actual interview, so things are looking up. It just takes soooo long. Wish me luck.
thanks for your support. This is something I really, really want to do. Having already raised three children as a single parent, I am confident that I can do it. I am so looking forwrd to opening my heart and home to a few more girls. I have always heard that there were so many older children without homes, but I expect it to take so long for a match. I think the way PA goes, they choose three or four good mathes then they choose the one best suited family. Maybe it just seems long to me. Well, thanks for your prayers and well wishes.
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