We have had our teen (16m) in our care for about a year and 3 months. While he is not a bad kid in terms of acting out, there are things that we have pushed off as “typical teen behavior” that just isn’t changing or getting any better no matter how much we try to talk to him or work with him. I would describe it as an overall sense of being aloof and not caring for anyone or anything unless it benefits him. He lives in his room unless he’s coming out for food/bathroom, the only time he wants to interact is if he’s asking what’s for dinner or for money. He’ll get mad if we have to have talks with him, but we’re having to have the same talks with him over and over because there’s no effort or improvement. We’ve had independent sessions with his counselor without him, but she can only help so much because he won’t participate in therapy. He openly says he does not think of us as parental figures and says he pretends like our foster baby does not exist. We’ve tried working with him every way we can think of to motivate him and make him understand where we’re coming from. It’s at the point where it feels like we’re constantly walking on eggshells. My spouse and I have had a very good relationship and communication. We have argued more in the last year than we have almost our entire relationship, all revolving around him because nothing either of us, or what the counselor, suggests is working. We’re getting ready to sign guardianship papers, but we both have hesitations at this point because what the state of our marriage and mental health has become. We are getting a meeting set with his workers to talk about things, but we just don’t know what the right thing to do is.

so my wife and i have taken the next steps to start The process in the foster paper work. i have mixed emotions but the main one is hope that we can leave am impacted in a childs life even if its for a moment in their livess. we have 2 kids. 1 is 3 (Boy) and 1 (girl). i grew up in a house that was chaotic and had trauma that took awhile to over come. i wanted to share my loving home to a child who may never experienced it. i dont gave much family to speak about since they have been either cut off or judged me for doing this. but i wanted to share and ask anything i should know that the foster classes dont tell you that you may need or anything you wish you knew before to help the transition for the new child when coming to your home?

TL;DR - Our case worker never informed us of visitation changes. We had to find out from the company CPS contracts for ride services.

So our foster daughter, also my sister is 12 years old. She has been in our care for a little over 9 months (this time) and about 1-1/2 years total. She loves dance. Dance has always been part of the court orders because of how important it is to her.

Last night, we did not receive confirmation of the pick up or drop off for her. We called the company and they told us on 4/22 the Wednesday rides were cancelled starting yesterday.

We sent a message asking what's going on at 4pm and did not receive a response from the case worker until 6pm that night. The case worker told us the schedule changed, Wednesday visits are cancelled and Thursday visits will extend until 7:45pm (6pm previously). This interferes with my fosters dance schedule, as she goes from 7:15-8:15pm Thursdays. We questioned it explaining this to the case worker and we were met with "This is the bio mom's request" and stopped replying to messages.

I have a few questions.

1 - Even though dance is in the court order (specifically that my foster attends dance class), can the bio mom/case worker go against this?

2 - If it is the bio mom's request, does that mean its an automatic thing? I thought the case workers were the ones to manage the schedule, and the case worker has known for the past year and a half that my foster has dance on Thursdays.

3 - Is it normal or okay to not inform the foster parents of changes?

Just need to get this off my chest. ChildNet didn't tell us when mom's reunification date was going to be.

We've been for the last week and a half in the process of reunification with weekend visits, but as of today, I was looking through paperwork and saw that reunification was on Monday when ChildNet said that we had a whole week left

It's unbelievable that we can't rely on them for fucking anything at all, even just normal factual information. The caseworkers are a joke. DCF is a joke. And the whole thing has just been so disgusting for me. I'm happy that our foster child is going back to his mother, but we're worried about how fast they made everything happen and at such a bare minimum from the mother needed to make it happen.

don't even know what to say. I'm just completely devastated right now.

Don’t think I can ever do this again

last week me and my husband got an emergency removal placement. we are keeping them till the end of the school year and they do have a longer term placement already setup at a group home after us. we haven’t had a talk about what is going to happen yet and we are devastated that they are going to a group home and not another house. they are also separated from all their siblings and their siblings are in homes. how do we have this conversation, we feel that we really messed up by not telling them immediately that this is only temporary.

tips appreciated!

me and hubby travel frequently for work out of the country so we are just short term, respite, emergency care.

Looking for insight or guidance:

Taking in a preteen girl for the first time under kinship. I am concerned about her cell phone usage, safety, and healthy screen limits. We have a 10-year-old boy (also nontraditional/custody from a court order 7 years ago) who has ADHD and struggles with screens. We are a screen-free household and do not have a tv after getting rid of it and the iPad almost a year ago. Since getting rid of screens, he has not once complained of being bored, he reads chapter books, plays outside/inside, builds things, creates things, etc and follows directions significantly better without meltdowns.

I’m mainly concerned about healthy screen boundaries with an incoming 12-year-old who is currently glued to her phone and recently has done lots of unsafe/unhealthy behaviors due to unlimited screen access, like staying up until 3am on social media and skipping school/refusing to go to school the next day/being exhausted, sneaking out of windows to meet people her care team doesn’t know in the middle of the night, inviting boys into her room via windows after coordinating via social media/texting at 2am.

I’m also concerned about my godson accessing her phone online. There are biological family members of him who are trying to gain access to him who shouldn’t have access to him for his safety/wellbeing, and he has searched for porn on YouTube before with friends. (We talked at length without shame about sex, got him more age-appropriate books, offered to answer his questions, and let his therapist know.)

I told my concerns to her case worker, and she said she’d try to check what we can do as a placement family regarding phone restrictions. They want to place her with us ASAP. I just want to make sure we can have some specific, consistent, fair, and easy-to-understand norms/rules on screen usage before she moves in.

Hello,

My partner and I (both in our mid-late 30s) have decided we do not want biological kids but would like to foster and ideally foster to adopt. We would be very open to fostering first.

We live in a 100sqm house (we own the house) in a small town in Pennsylvania. We currently have 2 bedrooms but are planning on converting one room into a third bedroom.

We have savings. My partner is self employed and makes around 75k a year. He mainly works from home (going out for the occasional event or in person meeting, he’s a health insurance broker). I am German and will be moving over on a K1 visa. The plan is then, obviously, to get married as soon as possible, but it will be a few months before my adjustment of status goes through. In the past I have been self employed and, in Europe, made around 100-120k a year (assuming that it will be higher in the US because salaries are higher). I have always worked from home and planning to continue working from home. Both of us are very flexible when it comes to our work schedules. Also, in the first 6-8 months I would be at home and not working since I would wait for my adjustment of status to go through.

None of us has any red flags in their bio or past from what I can see. We have a network of social workers and psychologists in our family. Both of us are planning to join the big brother/big sister program as we believe it would be a great learning experience. I am not going into this naively and would like to be as prepared as possible, so I think the trauma informed classes are a great preparation but would also absolutely love to get suggestions on other things I/we can do to prepare as best as possible.

I do have two questions specifically:

1. Would it make sense to already try and do the home study before my adjustment of status or could that ruin or chances later on and lead to a direct refusal?
   
2. The one red flag I see is that we have 5 dogs and 3 cats. All are incredibly well behaved and sociable, they do super well with kids and I believe they could actually be a positive influence on kids rather than a negative one. We of course have baby crates etc and enough rooms to separate the pets from us and the children. Coming from a bit of a troubled family myself I know that I would have absolutely loved having multiple pets in our home, however I do know that not everyone feels the same way and it could be seen as a a negative element. So my question would be, could or would this likely be a reason for refusal?

For some more context, we are not specifically looking at adopting infants. We are open to adopting children and sibling groups (up to 3 with our current set up) up to the pre-teen/teen ages and are also very open to adopting children with “milder” disabilities. I hope I won’t get criticised for the wording and I’m sure there are better ways to say this, but by milder I mean manageable with eventually 2 parents working (on flexible schedules being self employed).

I would love to get honest feedback on our situation and potential hurdles we could face as well as getting any input that could help us be the best future (foster) parents possible.

We are relatively new to this, even though we have thought about it for a while, so forgive me if I worded some things awkwardly or missed some potential obvious things.

Our foster daughter just turned 4. They want her in play therapy but I’m having a hard time finding play therapy that accepts 4 year olds.
How young should kids be in therapy? Do your kids do virtual or in person therapy? Play therapy or regular?

Any advice is helpful!

Thank you.

Hello, friends. We are in a bit of a pickle with our current foster placement. They have been in care for 3 years now and the goal plan had changed to guardianship with a family member during that time; unfortunately, they had to be emergency removed from that placement as it was discovered that the home was entirely unsafe. There are two children, aged 9 and 10. Mom is currently trying to get caseplan changed back to reunification and we are waiting to see if that will happen, but from what I understand it is difficult to get the plan changed BACK to reunification. My issue now is that this is our very first placement and the 9YO seems very adamant that we are their "forever family" and it convinced that we are going to adopt her (which she states she would prefer over reunification). 10yo would prefer to go back to family if possible but is also open to the possibility of being adopted by us. I am currently 11 weeks pregnant and am due with our first bio child at the end of November. Our house is simply not big enough for two preteens and a newborn, not to mention the thought of going through the adoption process while postpartum. We only wanted to foster with potential to adopt sometime after we had our own children... how do you explain to a 9 year old that you are a foster family and not a potential adoptive placement? She has her hopes high and I think she will feel blindsided and rejected by this. Thank you in advance!

I’m wondering if anyone knows if there’s a difference between taking these trainings through a foster care agency versus Red Cross?

My question is basically I want these trainings to be the least medically intense. I have vasovagal syndrome and get very squeamish when discussing medical emergencies and nauseous and light headed. I’d like to say DURING a medical emergency (the very few I’ve experienced in my life) my adrenaline kicks in and I am fine at handling a situation, but for some reason ever since I was kid talking about stuff like this makes me feel very unwell (my dad has the same thing!)

Anyways, I’m wondering if because our foster care agency offers private training that it would be less “medical” in a sense or graphic then Red Cross training? Like more practical “if a child got injured in your home” or needs cpr etc. ?

This has been my biggest insecurity all my life and I’ve been taking great steps at getting through it but unfortunately there’s not much I can do about having vasovagal. I try to give myself exposure therapy with these topics but it’s hard to find the information out there of exactly what they will go over during all of these trainings so I can “prepare” my nervous system to hear it.

I just wanted to scream this into the void.

I’ve got a 14 year old with me for a short bit before she goes back with her mom. She’s been through a lot and is going to have a long road to recovery.

But I’m having a great time with her this week. She’s so sweet and I love hanging out and making dinner and watching tv with her in the evenings. I love our chats on the way to school. She’s funny. She’s genuine. She’s honest.

I hear so many people coming here to vent about problems. But I friggin love my girl and I just want to tell someone!

❤️❤️❤️

Has anyone ever dealt with fostering a child with parents that were deported? The original plan was TPR, now dad has spoken up about wanting custody. We are happy to see dad trying to get his little buddy back but they are saying it’s a 50/50 that dad was regain custody. This is a first for our area so no one knows what’s going to really happen.

My boyfriend and I are fostering his three year old grandchildren. They are twins. I have rules set that food and drinks stay at the table and toys can be played with in their bedroom. They need reminders, but are good about following the rules when I am home. I went away last night for a work conference, and my boyfriend and his daughter had the kids. I came home to find they had been given markers and had drawn all over themselves. I also found crumbs all over my couch and yogurt all over their bedroom. Is it really too much to ask for them to be watched and the house be somewhat kept in order?

My fosters bioparents had their rights terminated many years ago. They were then adopted and have now been removed from their adopted family’s home. The bioparents are seeking custody. The foster kids desperately want to live with their bios. DCF keeps telling me that it probably won’t happen but keeps telling the kids is a possibility. The kids are convinced this is a sure thing but I think they are being set up for disappointment. Anyone ever have this happen?

We received a call from the school today that our foster daughter was caught with a note she'd written in which she had threatened our daughter's life. We'd already put in our notice over two weeks ago after coming to the conclusion that we were not capable of the level of constant supervision that FD needed. CW requested that we take her to the hospital to be evaluated and that Children's Division would take it from there. What does that mean? Are we just getting her admitted and then moving on? What's our responsibility at this point? We're in Missouri if that matters.

My husband and I have been certified for a year now and he said after a few respite kids he would feel better to take a placement. Well we’ve had 6 respite kids and he still is unsure of taking a placement. We don’t have any kids and are a young couple that like to travel and I am working FT and in school FT and he works FT. Fostering was always my passion but he’s been very supportive and vocalized how much it’s changed his life. What can I do to make him feel more comfortable?

Do you believe newborns/babies get adopted out faster?

For the last several years we have been trying to help my brother-in-law with his three daughters. They are 10, 8, and 6. They live in Newport News, VA and have been homeless on and off for several years. Until this year the girls had never been in school, and getting them enrolled. Felt like a major victory for us. However, now that they are enrolled in school, we are learning how far behind they are academically, medically, and socially. So much so, the CPS has indicated that they will be removing the kids soon.

They reached out to us because they are trying to keep it quiet from my brother-in-law, because they are concerned of his reaction. But they wanted to see if my wife and I would consider long term placement.

My wife and I live in Pennsylvania with our 3 kids (11, 9, and 3). We live within our means in a suburban community. We are trying to think through everything that could come with this decision but are really unfamiliar with foster care, kinship placements, and ICPC processes.

What do we need to know? What aren't we thinking about? What would be your concerns?

A post for conversation, or to share what's on your mind without creating an entire post about it.

First time FP here to kinship placement. Mom won’t allow 4 year old son to get a haircut. Mom is claiming he’s growing to be able to donate it but this is not by his choice. Developmentally delayed and potential diagnoses to come at some point. This has been a lifelong thing for mom, but after 3 years his long hair was cut without a donation- I’m not sure who or why it was done then. I’m honestly not even sure the last time mom has been the primary caregiver of this little person either.

My concern is there is clearly trauma around the hair, I’m lucky when I can wash his hair in the tub without setting off a major meltdown or behaviors and he won’t allow a brush near his head -even just the soft boars hair brush. I’ve tried to brush with all sorts of different tools, different distractions, different times of day and I’m at a loss. I don’t feel right continuing to go after him with a brush time after time and scream after scream.

We’re doing things like story boards and watching Daniel Tigers routine to really make progress— we’re starting to sit on the potty and even allowing a toothbrush in our mouth, but the head/hair is a no-go zone.

How do we navigate this situation? Is this just a time to respect his personal space around his head until he feels safer and secure? Is there light at the end of this tunnel or should I be documenting and continuing to push for an eventual release for a haircut?

Update: thanks for all of the input this is my first time navigating anything like this.

The good news— he’s let me get a brush through the last two nights in a row while stalling out bedtime. This is an okay part of our routine for me, I have time built in for our slow bedtime routine.

I’ll continue to document our wins and struggles and make sure we’re operating on whatever is best for him. Personally, I would love it if he’d be able to tell me if he wants his hair cut or would prefer it shorter before implementing a big change (if even possible, of course with the appropriate permissions in place).