Relative Foster/Adoption/Guardianship

[BabyMaybe917]

Background: DH and I have been fostering our niece (4) and nephew (7) since April of this year, kids were removed from my sisters home in February. They stayed with my aunt for 2 months until our home was approved, it was across state lines so it was a mess to navigate but we did it! So now we are approaching the next court hearing which is the end of this month. The hearing is for termination of maternal rights to both children and paternal rights of our niece as well. They have different fathers. We are 99.9% sure termination will be ruled by the judge as he's been ready to rule on this for a while. The kids haven't seen their mom since March or talked on the phone even since May. They don't ask about her at all and only on rare occasion do they tell a story of their past including her. They are truly happy and have adjusted amazingly well. Our plan is to adopt our niece because both rights will be terminated. However, the father of our nephew wants to maintain visitation rights so we will do a Guardianship most likely. So, he will live in our home go to school in our district etc, etc. but he will still have so many weekends and holidays with his dad.

Anyone else been in a similar situation. I'm nervous/scared as we don't have kids of our own (yet). We are fully committed but the scariest part is the waiting for this to happen and figuring out how to co-parent with someone I barely know. And our newest curveball... we're expecting twins!

Our family, the children's caseworkers, all attorneys involved on the kids side are on board with our plans and we shouldn't have any bumps once the next court hearing passes. But through all of this I've learned that there are far more bumps in the road than you can navigate sometimes!

Also wanting advice on how to handle telling the kids we're expecting because we haven't yet since I am so early... and also how on earth do we tell them they won't be with their mom again. Such a tough situation.

 

[ayclobes]

My DH and I adopted our son through foster care 11/13. Our niece is our son's birth mom. His birth dad hasn't seen him since 12/12(maybe). We agreed on a contact agreement with him,but he hasn't even tried to see our son at all! He demanded 6 visits a yr, plus skype and phone calls. He hasn't done a thing. Can you do a contact agreement with the bdad?

 

[BabyMaybe917]

Well a lot has happened since this last post. We are now a family of 5! Maternal rights were terminated to both kids and paternal rights were terminated to our niece. We are in the process of adopting her. We have completed all the paperwork and our homestudy. We've been told that noone else is being considered so it's just a matter of paperwork. We have secured guaedianship of our nephew and we work out visits with his father on our own. His father consented to the guardianship.

And now our little girl has arrived to add to the craziness of our lives! We lost her twin at 9 weeks gestation. We announced the pregnancy to the kids after we felt comfortable that we wouldn't lose our survivor. They were excited throughout the whole pregnancy and are even more excited now that she's here. They havent gotten to meet her yet because of nicu guidelines. They decided on their own to call her their sister not their cousin. We've decided that's their choice. They took the news about their mom very well. They're just amazing resilient little kids.

 

[sethsmummy]

aww hun im so glad things went well for you! That is so sweet that they have decided to call her sister instead of cousin xx

 

[MimiMomma]

So glad things worked out. Were there any contracts required?

 

[BabyMaybe917]

What do you mean by contracts?

 

[ayclobes]

That's wonderful! The craziness feeling will get better, but its still crazy..i know the feeling but so glad things worked in the way god intended them to!

 

[heidi87814]

So glad to hear how things went out. My daughter's actually my biological niece so I know what you're going through. She's been in my care for over 7 years now so if you ever have any questions or need some advice, I'm happy to help.