# Help please! Foster/Adoption issues...



## EmmaRea

My story is long, and may put some people off. I am not a foster/adoptive parent, but I am married to a man who was in the foster care system and later adopted. I firmly believe foster/adoptive parents to be angels. I believe in their work and I would never say anything against most of them. But what happens if I believe I know of one foster/adoptive parent who isn't doing her job? And so my story begins...

My MIL gave birth to her only biological child, a son, in 1978. She divorced her husband later and adopted twin boys in the '80s. They caused her a lot of trouble. She lost interest in them (red flag #1) and adopted two more little boys, my husband and his older brother, who were 1 and 2 at the time. She set about dissolving the ties that bound these boys to their biological family, eventually moving out of state. The bio-son and the twins attended public school, but my husband and his bio-brother were 'home schooled'. Like fostering and adopting, I believe in home schooling, but only if done correctly. My husband's brother caught on quickly to reading. My husband didn't. Without any testing for learning disabilities or anything, she blamed his lack of literacy on dyslexia, and stopped schooling him completely. I have no idea how he slipped through the cracks, but today, at 22 years of age, he still barely reads. I have taught him most of what he knows since he tearfully admitted to me that he couldn't read the love letters I'd written him. He was so ashamed that he didn't tell me until a year into our relationship, and even then, he was terrified I'd abandon him. Right around the time she stopped schooling my husband, she adopted a severely disabled young boy. 
She had other foster children through the years leading up to 2005. In 2005, one particular little girl came into foster care, and my MIL was completely taken with her, calling her the daughter she never had and promising to be her mother forever. Notice I said the girl came into foster care. She is not, and never has been, available for adoption. Since 2005, this little girl has been in and out of the foster care system. The state always returns her to her biological mother. Her biological mother has since given birth to two more children. A year and a half after this girl came to live in foster care with my MIL, another little girl the same age as the first and the second girl's little brother came into foster care with my MIL as well. From the start, my MIL has maintained that she "just doesn't connect with [the second girl] like she does [the first girl]", and when the sibling pair were available for adoption, she didn't try to adopt them. In 2009, the first girl left my MIL's care for her biological mom's care. The second little girl and her brother were available for adoption until 2011, when the state and my MIL came to the conclusion that no one else would want to adopt these two, and in order to receive the tax breaks, my MIL adopted the boy and the girl. 
In November of 2011, my husband received a phone call from the county Sheriff. He had been to my MIL's house to follow up on a missing persons report filed by my MIL's mortgage broker. He had been in the house and discovered the secret my MIL and my husband had hidden for so long: my MIL is a hoarder in the worst sense. She has trash everywhere in her little trailer, the floors were sinking in, the bathrooms weren't functional, and the dogs had left fecal matter in the children's room (there was only 1 bedroom), making the smell absolutely foul. There were rodents boldly living in the kitchen. She later called my husband sobbing, saying if we didn't help her clean the whole place up that she would lose the children. Being naive and not wanting the family torn apart, my husband and spent all night long cleaning the place top to bottom, shoveling out the rubbish and making the place presentable. She ended up not losing the children. 
Less than one month later, in December 2011, the first little girl and her two younger siblings came back into the foster care system. Unlike the last several times this has happened, my MIL was not granted custody, on the grounds that her house was not habitable. After having the other two children live in squalor for years and years, she moved into a huge rental home the very next weekend. The state awarded her custody of the three children, for a total of five children in her house, not counting my husband's severely handicapped brother. 
All along, after the first girl went back to her mother in 2009, I started to help with the two children left. These two, the little boy and little girl, have me wound around their fingers. I was their regular babysitter. I had them every day. I helped with homework, drive them to and from school, took them with me everywhere. Before long, I loved them like they were my own. In December, when the first girl and her siblings came back to my MIL, something clicked in my head and my heart. I regretted the part I'd played in their stories. I wanted better for them, to be in a home where they are loved and cared for the right way. I regretted helping my MIL hide her deficiencies as a foster/adoptive parent from the state. I let my very strong opinions be known, and I haven't seen the children since. I stopped allowing my MIL into our home because my heart would break when I'd see the kids bing cared for improperly. She stopped calling because she was offended by my disapproval. 
Because she is my husband's mother, she wasn't gone forever. She recently stopped by our house to ask if her children could play with my animals. Because I'd just put all of my pets outside for the day, I declined. She then told my husband and I about how she has applied for a Habitat for Humanity house. She plans on selling the house on 5 years for a $130,000 profit. My stomach literally started to turn. She plans to profit hugely from charity. 
My husband and I, after much hard work at low-paying jobs (I'm still going to school, and he can't read... Well-paying jobs might never be our fortune), managed to purchase our own home in February 2012. We have three bedrooms, and getting pregnant after my miscarriage hasn't happened. Our home is empty. In the back of my mind, in my most secret place, I wish my MIL's adoption of the boy and the second girl hadn't already been finalized, so that my husband and I could adopt them. 

My question is, then, what can I do to remedy this situation? What would you do, if you knew these things to be happening? Am I insane for wishing I could adopt these kids? Am I wrong about the whole situation? I wish I knew another way to describe it, but my heart is broken. I love these kids and I want the best for them, but I feel like there's nothing I can do. My home will not have peace until this matter has been resolved. For any of you that have ever had family troubles, you know what I mean. Peace will not come with an elephant of massive proportions in the room. Help me, please. I don't know where else to turn... :shrug:


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## Eleanor ace

Wow what a story. To be honest if you have serious, well founded concerns about your MIL's parenting then I would tell the authorities. It's hard because obviously she is family, and you don't want the kids to end up in care again, but like you say they deserve proper care. 
Are you in the US? If MIL were to lose custody of the children would family be offered the chance to adopt? I really feel for you, that's a horrible position to be in! If you ever need to talk/rant feel free to message me :hugs:


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## Lolly1985

Wow what a terrible situation to be in :hugs: What does your DH think about this. I obviously I can't pretend to be in your situation, but I would hope that I would really break it apart and focus on what is best for those children, as opposed to the family backlash that may follow. As hard as that is, those children have been through so much already it really is so sad that they are now faced with this. Your MIL sounds like she has many issues to work through on her own first, but instead she is inflicting them on these children and that is simply wrong. I am very shocked that they allowed the children to be returned to her after discovering the state of the home. 

It is very sad that you did not get the chance to adopt these two LOs who by all accounts sound as if they should be with you. I am UK and so I really am not sure the way the system works where you are so i'm afriad I can't offer any advice on that front.

But I do feel if you stay quiet you won't forgive yourself down the line. This really is a safeguarding issue. Can you report it anonymously and get SS to do a spot check, that way they may get a true reflection themselves without you making formal statements etc?

Good luck whatever you decide. Thinking of you xxxx :hugs:


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## Nise

That is some story and a heartbreaking one at that. I am very surprised your mil was allowed to adopt so many children especially whilst living in a trailer. But that aside I think you have to really look hard within yourself and at the situation and make sure that you are not reacting in a knee jerk fashion to the fact your mil is not allowing you any contact with the children that you came to love. From where I'm sitting you have 2 choices, if you truly believe that those children are being neglected or in danger of any kind then you have to report it, however this may mean that they are taken back into care and neither your mil or you will see them again, but if this isn't the case then really your only other option is to swallow every ounce of pride you have and appeal to your mil to let you see the children. I wish you all the luck in the world in resolving what seems like an impossible situation. :flower:


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