Update

She's definitely coming into care when she gets out of the hospital tomorrow. And the homefinder director (who used to be our social worker before she got promoted to head the unit) has made it so we're back in the system and we will be the ones getting her.

So she'll be coming to us tomorrow. Until at least early next week (with the holiday and all, they don't know when the court hearing will happen).

She is hurt. Her eye is swollen shut and has a hematoma ("she hit her face on a radiator") and she has extensive bruising and chafing all over her thighs and crotch ("they have no explanation for that"). I can't even begin to try and process that.

This is EXACTLY what we didn't want to happen - for her to go home all happy and "fixed", and then come back to us later on totally broken. We thought she was going back to a safe home. We weren't worried for her in that way. We knew her life wouldn't be the same as if she had stayed with us, but it would be a good life.

I feel like we failed her. We should have fought harder for her. I should have known that, if her parents were rough and yelled and her while we were there picking her up or dropping her off, then they must be even worse when we're not there.

But, of course, it's not my fault. It's theirs. I just want to turn back time. I want to give this little Niblet another go at the past year.

I don't want her back. It wouldn't be the best thing for our family - fostermama, Squeak and myself. But it *would* be the best thing for Niblet, so we'll do it if that's what it comes to. Her aunt & uncle have said they want her, so she may very well go to them if they check out. I'm feeling not-so-generous about that, as I'm sure they know more about what was going on with her than we do, but if they really want her and they're appropriate, then so be it. But if we get any inkling that they're NOT good for her, we're lawyering up. We'll fight for her. She deserves it.

Niblet back in care?

I just got a call on my cell from CPS. They want to talk to us because Niblet is in the hospital. Something happened on Friday, I don't know what, and she's been in the hospital since then.

Unfortunately, sort of, we saw her on Friday afternoon for a few hours. So, of course, they have to talk to us and see if we're part of the investigation or not. The CPS worker and a detective will be by our house this afternoon to talk to us. Mostly about Niblet's father, she said, but I know (gee, how do I know...?) that they'll be looking to see if we're in the wrong in any way.

She said Niblet will be released tomorrow, and may be put back into foster care. I made it clear that we want to take her if that happens, and she said that a few people have stepped up and that we'd have to go to court and talk with the judge.

Anyway, I'll keep you updated. Keep little Niblet in your prayers.

I'm shaking with the news. I don't know what to do or what will happen.

I wish she could talk

I wish we could ask Niblet what she wants, how she feels. I know that, even if she were talking like an average 2.5 year old, she wouldn't be capable of that kind of conversation. But I wish it anyway.

Lately, we've been not as anxious to see Niblet. We've skipped many weekends. Sometimes it's been because she's with other relatives and her parents forgot to have her back in time for us to pick her up (which is great, in that she's getting to be with various family), and sometimes it's just because we're too busy to see her. Or we really need to relax or get things done.
Being with Niblet is great, but it takes a lot of work.

It's becoming additionally hard as Squeak is getting older and more possessive. It's actually kind of cute. The last time she was over, Niblet and Squeak literally fought over EVERYTHING. Toys, our laps, the same square of rug, anything. And Squeak's not really old enough to win these battles, but he sure does try.

So to avoid possessiveness, and keep our sanity a little bit, we like to spend most of our time out of the house. Which, with the colder weather, is becoming harder. Especially since Niblet isn't really old enough to enjoy things like museums or other indoor kids' stuff.

Really, the main problem is our continued lack-of-relationship with her parents. It's getting easier to plan visits, but anything else - like talking about what new words she has, what things she likes to do, or how they keep her from throwing everything - is nearly impossible. So we end up with a 2.5 year old who we basically don't know anything about. Which is a hard thing to do, regardless of the situation.

From Niblet's point of view, as far as I can tell, she still adores coming to visit us. She pulls out every ASL sign we ever taught her (more, please, apple, food, light). She loves visiting with our friends. We'll usually give her a nap by laying down on our bed with her, and she just closes her eyes and goes to sleep. It's miraculous, considering our year-long sleep deprivation when we had her.

She still gets emotional when we drop her off, though. And often will start tearing up when we go to pick her up, as well. But everything is all-or-nothing with Little Miss Niblet, and I try to talk to her about her feelings, as best I can, so that's all there is to do.

I guess the thing I'm skirting around, is that it seems like it might be easier to stop seeing her. I don't think I'll ever be able to actually make that decision and follow through on it, but it might actually be the best thing. I don't know...

Our biggest goal at this point, is to make sure she gets into HeadStart as soon as possible. She'll be 3 in the Spring, so she can either start then, or in the Fall, I'm not sure how it works. Her parents just got an apartment "out of the ghetto" (as they put it) by a few blocks, but I'm sure it's still near a HeadStart program. If they're still here when it's registration time, we're going to bring them the information and forms and ask if they need any help getting her set up in a program. I think that's the best thing we can do for Niblet. So, I guess, in order to do that, we have to stay in her life at least until then.

It's just such a weird situation. And, to top it all off, I can't stop myself from occasionally daydreaming about the "what ifs". I would take her back in a heartbeat and really want to stop hoping for that, but I can't yet. It actually annoys me, but there it is.

Alright, that's it for now. I'd like to keep up on posting here, but I don't know what to write about. I almost signed up for NaBloPoMo, but it seemed like too much. So if you guys have any questions or would like elaborations on anything, please speak up. I know I have one request out there for an adoptive breastfeeding post, and I'll get on that, but what else?

I'll be a killjoy...

As awesome and relieving as it is to be cleared, it feels somewhat hollow as well.

We still can not do foster care again, because we'd risk the same thing happening. I'm really sad about that!

And we know this is happening to lots of other foster parents in our area and around the country. Our placement worker (the one useful person at the county) said it's happening a lot right now. Craziness! As I said to her, this is one sure way to get rid of all good foster parents.

Someone posted on a listserv I'm on about how Alameda, CA has this approach to foster care that really prioritizes the kids' rights (silly things like permanency and safety), and I am so jealous! I wish I felt I had some power to create change here.

Plus, the huge (for us) amount of money we spent on this is a real sore spot. We really need that money, especially with all Squeak's medical issues.

The caseworker who screwed us is spending her days harrassing other bio parents and foster parents around the county, with her inept supervisor smiling and nodding and being clueless. I'm sure there are no repercussions for her for how she handled this. Nor any training on how to do it better in the future.

It's just SO upsetting.

I started out doing foster care after MAPP class feeling really good about the system here and thinking it worked as well as it could given the crazy situations it handles. Oy, was I wearing some rose colored glasses! If the caseworkers and their supervisors were to actually **receive MAPP training**, maybe things would be better. But they don't. They have no idea how it's even *supposed* to work, much less how to get it there.

UGH.

I wish I could be a foster parent. I wish I could recommend it to my friends and acquaintances who show interest. I wish my life hadn't had this cloud hanging over it for *half a year*, and I wish I hadn't spent money I don't have on getting cleared.

I really appreciate everyone's enthusiasm about us getting cleared. It's nice knowing we've got cheerleaders. :) I just can't quite get behind the "hooray"s. :(

Unfounded!!!

We came home tonight to find 2 very thin envelopes from the state office of children & family services. I ripped one open immediately and scanned it to find the words "As a result of this review it is our decision to legally seal the report. Therefore, in accordance with the law, the report has been amended to show it is unfounded..."

WOOHOO!!!

We are NOT child abusers, and now the records show that!
It is such a f'ing relief. I don't honestly know how much of my psyche has been muddled up with this over the past 6-7 months. I suspect I will, eventually, feel so much more relaxed.

So much of our future plans rided on whether we were cleared or not, and now we are free to do whatever we want.

I can't believe that we had to go through this, but at least it's over and it won't rear it's ugly head ever again.

SNAFU is just our status quo

What's been going on Chez Fostermoms, you ask? Everything and nothing.

First, the Niblet situation:
Niblet's not going anywhere any time soon. The last time we picked her up, fostermama asked Niblet's mom about the whole moving-out-of-state thing. Her mom said that her dad just got approved for Section 8 and there's a rule that you can't transfer your Section 8 out of state until you've been living in your current state for one year. So he can't move for one year. So we have Niblet for at least one more year. As we know, a lot can happen in a year, so whatever. We're just enjoying her in the moment. We've actually skipped a week here and there because there's been a lot of other stuff going on with us and it's pretty all-encompassing to have her around. We don't really get anything else done. Hopefully, though, we'll take her for an afternoon/evening over the long weekend.

Niblet herself is still CUTE. She's enormous, in my eyes. Still only about 26 pounds soaking wet, size 3 diapers fit her very well, but she's tall and mature-looking. She's slowing communicating more, but she still doesn't initiate words. She'll copy back words and she uses ASL signs with us that we've taught her, and she babbles and is a huge fan of NO!, but no real "talking" as I would define it. She's behind in that regard, but I suspect she'll eventually catch up. And she UNDERSTANDS everything, no doubt about that.

In SqueakLand: Squeak is now 7 months old, sitting like an uber-pro, and thinking about becoming mobile. He launches himself at the world and is really good and getting stuff that we think are out of his reach. Silly moms!
We found out recently that he has many food allergies, as well as allergies to our cats. This has created a lot of problems to be solved in our lives. Our cats are our "first children". We're "those crazy cat people", truly. We're devoted to our fuzzies. But between them and our kid, well, there's no contest. They're going to live with a family member, for which we're eternally grateful. The idea of having them go to a stranger and possibly never seeing them again was killing me.

Otherwise, we're learning to live with a baby who lives to put everything in his mouth and who needs, for the safety of his life, to be kept away from anything with food on it. (Okay, not all food, just anything that might have any possible traces of: milk, egg, peanut, other nuts, wheat and soy - see that's not everything, right?) It's complicated, especially since most of our friends have toddler (which, by definition, are constantly sticky with food).


Because we're breastfeeding him, we've cut all of these things out of our diet and are on a crazy elimination diet so we can test everything else slowly and make sure he doesn't react to anything else. You can only test for a few things in an infant blood test, because you can only take a small amount of blood. Next time we'll test for more, but for now we just have to test them the old-fashioned way - by mouth.

It's hard to even know how I feel about this, because it's just become a part of my life so quickly, so easily it seems. We carry around an Ep1-pen wherever we go with him. We wipe his hands (and anywhere else he can reach with his mouth) whenever we've been out in the world, just in case he got something on him. We're still in the hypervigilant phase. I know we'll always be like that, unless and until he grows out of the allergies, but I think it will eventually be subconscious instead of the first thing on my mind.

And, in case you thought it had just gone away of it's own accord, we're STILL waiting to hear the result of our adminstrative appeal for the stupid indicated abuse report. We sent in our lawyer-written letter about 45 days ago and they have 90 days to give the decision. We don't expect an answer until the 90th day.

That's how it is here. Any other questions?

Goals

Inspired by the other fostermama. For context, check out this post..

What a good question. I was about to start listing, and I realized I didn't know what to list. I am an obsessive plan-ahead-er, but the chaos of our lives for the past few years has muted that a bit. At the moment our big plan is to get FosterMommy through grad school to be an OT starting fall of 2008. Assuming we're not determined to be child abusers :P There are other plan-type things along those lines (adopt another child, beginnings of plans for me to be a lactation consultant for adoptive moms...).
But that's not really the kind of goal setting your post makes me think of.

I personally detest self-help books. I have only recently conceded that they sometimes have something useful to add, but then only because FosterMommy reads them and shares some of their better ideas. I guess I have rejected this type of goal-setting, but I really like this exercise you set us. Here are my results so far:

For each of us to be in a career & job that is fulfilling and enjoyable.
To have a strong family unit, full of mutual support and warmth and good communication.
To feel energetic more often than exhausted.
To actively think about what I want to teach my kids and how I want to be with them as they grow up, and then do it.
To remain healthy into old age.
To live in community (this one I feel like we're already doing, but I want it to continue to be true).

I think that's a long enough list for now. I will have to set myself to thinking more about each of these, and to thinking about the question of Goals more often.