Strollerderby : foster parents

Foster Parents TOO Special for More Kids

JeanneSager — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 18:27:00 GMT

Note to parents up for interviews with the foster care system in Australia: don't mention your stellar parenting.

Although experts on how to be a good interviewee have long said you have to sell yourself, a set of Australian foster parents who were trying to bring home their foster son's biological siblings were denied. The problem? A psychologist said the couple thought they were too special.

The parents description of themselves as "excellent foster parents" denoted "perceptions of omnipotence and specialness," according to Toni Single, a psychologist for the department of community services. Single also considered the couple rude for saying no to a plate of sandwiches. Perhaps they weren't hungry?

There are myriad reasons to deny potential foster parents children, and it is important that social workers take seriously the role of handing kids off to foster parents (in general, I would say they do!). But doesn't this strike you as splitting hairs? This couple has already been deemed good enough to care for their foster son, who has lived in their home since 2002, and his sister, who lived with the family from age eleven until eighteen when she aged out of the system.

So they called themselves "excellent foster parents." Would it have been better if they described themselves as good-for-nothing shitheels? Would that make you hand over two more children?

The sad thing here is that a set of siblings will be housed in separate foster homes rather than kept together. The couple's foster son, in particular, is distraught - he asked that his parents gain custody of his two little brothers. And this isn't the first time Single has taken it upon herself to come up with a wacked out reason for denying foster parents' kids - check out this story my colleague Shannon wrote about her earlier this year.

Would you describe yourself as an "excellent" parent? Do you think that means you've inflated your opinion of yourself?

Image: Center for Family Studies

"Angels in Waiting" Apparently Still Waiting

Kate Tuttle — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:30:00 GMT

For all the ink spilled in the whole Octomom saga, not much has been written yet about the group that has offered to take over the care of the octuplets (free of charge!). Angels in Waiting, which was introduced to the drama via a Fox News interview also starring Gloria Allred, says it's willing to take the eight babies, keep them in "a home" (presumably not Suleman's), and provide the care they need as medically fragile premature newborns.

All of which sounds fairly generous -- a point repeatedly made by various bloggers who are dying for Suleman to turn over them babies! -- until you read more about them. Angels in Waiting is not devoted to helping stressed-out, possibly mentally ill mothers of multiples take care of their kids -- their goal is to prepare babies born to meth addicts to be adopted out. From their website:

Angels in Waiting is dedicated to moving these special little angels into loving homes with Registered Nurses as their foster parents and then on to adoptive homes in which they could recover or stabilize, grow and now flourish; their troubled pasts overshadowed by their hopeful futures.

Founded by a registered nurse whose own life was changed through the care and ultimate adoption of a micro-premie born to a meth-addicted mother, Angels in Waiting is clear about its mission: putting babies into homes, not with their birth parents, preferably with a foster mother who is also a nurse. And who works for Angels in Waiting!

It's a little unclear to me how this model fits into the Nadya Suleman situation. Despite the seemingly endless questions about her ability to care for these babies, she has expressed a steadfast determination to parent all her children. If she proves to be unfit, as many have predicted, I have no doubt child protective services will step in. But CPS's goal is twofold: help the children, and help support the parent so that the family can be re-united. This is not the goal of Angels in Waiting, whose website is filled with gauzily religious testimonials about "tiny ones" and "injured ones" -- and which has a "donate" button on each page. One thing not made clear on the Angels website is how many babies they have actually helped, how big their operation is, or where donated money actually goes (though they do make a big deal about the need for scrapbookers to help create memory books for the angels).

As nutty and publicity hungry as Suleman has appeared so far to be, she has some stiff competition here.

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Foster Mom Loses Job When Muslim Charge Converts

JeanneSager — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 17:26:00 GMT

A Muslim teenager's conversion to Christianity has prompted British officials to strip her evangelical foster mother of all responsibilities after ten years fostering kids for the government.

The woman, who has fostered eighty kids in the past decade, says she's being persecuted as a Christian. What's more - she says she tried discouraging the girl, now seventeen, from switching religions.

Not named because of legal reasons, the foster mother told the British Daily Telegraph that she offered the girl alternatives to living a Christian lifestyle, despite her own church-going practices. The caregiver attends an evangelical church and says family services was aware the girl had chosen to attend with her. They were OK with it, until the girl was baptised.

"I offered to take her to friends or family. But she said to me from the word go: 'I am interested and I want to come [to church]'," the woman told the Telegraph. Her case against the government - an attempt to regain her "job" as a foster mother (which did provide her income), is being funded by the Christian Insitute, which has charged the government with violations of both the girl's and women's right to religious freedom.

I'd tend to agree that a child of sixteen making a religious conversion is markedly different from a child of five or six (it's one reason I've always argued for baptism later rather than at birth). Teens have some sense of the gravity of decisions, and they're also relatively open to change. Teenagers like to make big decisions and take some control of their own lives. The fact that this girl had a troubled childhood, pushing her out of her home and into foster care, would understandably make her more willing to make a change in her life - especially one that would please a caregiver.

Does that mean the caregiver MADE her do it? Maybe. Maybe not. But maybe this could have all been avoided if the government either a. placed her in a home with a Muslim foster family or b. provided some means for the child to attend Muslim services, then checked up to see why she wasn't attending. At sixteen, she could have answered for herself.

She has answered for herself since. The girl is back with her own parents now and says she supports her former caregiver. She's staying a Christian, and she doesn't regret it.

So what do you think?

Image: BeliefNet

Family Adopts Eight Siblings Separated by Foster Care

JeanneSager — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:02:00 GMT

It's like Jon and Kate Plus Eight without Mother Nature pulling the punches. Or maybe 17 KIds and Counting without all the baby-making.

An Ohio family has added eight children to its brood completely by choice - they've adopted a set of eight siblings, who were previously split between three separate foster homes.

Oh yeah, and they already have seven kids of their own living at home.

The presiding Judge, Allan Davis, says this is the most unusual adoption he's seen in all his years on the bench in Hancock County, Ohio. But it's no less heartwarming.

The kids - whose ages range from five to seventeen - were removed from their biological parents in 2006 when social services found they were living in a deplorable conditions. There was just one bathroom in the house - and the plumbing didn't even work (imagine, no potty, and eight kids?). Dubbed mildly mentally retarded in court papers, the parents reportedly failed to complete a case plan and were unable to obtain appropriate housing for their kids - resulting in a complete loss of parental rights.

The eight kids have spent the last six months living with their new family as a sort of "trial run," to ensure it was more than a hunch that that this group must somehow form a family. (hum along with me folks. . . ). Monday, they were all in court to give the judge their own OK on officially becoming the kids of their new parents.

I'd be terrified to have that many kids, but good for these folks - for realizing siblings need to be able to stick together. I know the foster system tries as often as possible not to break up families, but in a family so large, this was likely the only chance these kids would have at a normal life.

The new, big, happy family jumped in a van to go home after the court appearance - any guesses on whether they stopped off for jerseys? They've got just enough for a rugby team.

Image: University of Nebraska

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Kid Woos Prospective Foster Parents With Letters

JeanneSager — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 19:57:00 GMT

His dad is long gone, and his mom has just lost her rights to the state of Michigan, but Alex wasn't ready to leave his future up to chance.

The seventeen-year-old ward of the state pulled a list of prospective foster parents off of the internet and started writing impassioned letters. He told his life story - his parents divorced, his father deported back to their native Romania when he was a tot, his mother changing after a devestating car accident.

"Truly all I need is someplace to stay, even if I have to pay a couple hundred dollars a month in rent, for the 2008-2009 school year," he promised.

Alex was heading into his senior year at Stoney Creek High School in Rochester Hills, Mich., when he started his campaign to stay there until graduation. An honor roll student with near-perfect ACT and SAT scores, his school has been his rock since his mother's car accident. A university professor with a doctorate degree, who Alex describes as a "really good parent" with a "strong moral compass," Alex's mother suffered severe head trauma in the accident and has since been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. The state first yanked her custody rights in 2001, sending Alex bouncing around the foster system.

When he was in eighth grade, the family lost their home and a middle school adminstrator offered Alex temporary shelter. School staff get Alex birthday cakes. They go the extra mile for a kid who is on the path to the Ivy League, a probably National Merit Scholar.

But after being sent from foster home to foster home, Alex landed in a children's home in Gross Pointe Woods, putting him out of the Stoney Creek district. He was a junior with one year to go, and he felt like he'd once again lost his home.

So he started writing his letters - thirty in all - not exactly the way most foster kids navigate the system.

"My school means everything to me. When chaos reigned at home, I immersed myself in my studies and my friends, forging strong bonds of compassion and support," he told his potential new parents.

Over the summer, a set of parents stepped forward. They took Alex in, and he's now midway through his senior year at Stoney Creek, with an acceptance letter from the honors program at the University of Michigan, and his fingers crossed that Harvard will accept his application.

If his entrance essay is anything like the letter he wrote (click here for the moving excerpts at the Detroit Free Press), it's a slam dunk. Who wouldn't want this kid in their home?

Image: Detroit Free Press

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Smokers No Longer Allowed Foster Children

Brett Singer — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 16:45:00 GMT

The East London borough of Redbridge will no longer allow smokers to be foster parents.

From The Scotsman:

The ban, which was passed unanimously at a cabinet meeting of Redbridge Council last night, means that children in the east London borough will not be placed with foster carers who smoke after January 2010.
Councillors say the move is crucial in protecting children.

I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, children shouldn't be inhaling second-hand smoke because it is a health risk. On the other hand, this is discrimination, isn't it? I'm actually a big smoker's rights guy in certain areas. For example, I think it should be legal for me to start an airline that lets people smoke – Up In Smoke Air. Make smoking illegal on commercial flights, fine. But why can't I start a business where the whole point is to give smokers a place to go? (I'm not a smoker, but I was for many years.)

Another publication, Business Report, has a little more info on the ban:

"Some people will feel it is an intrusion on personal freedoms," said councillor Michael Stark. "But we also know that smoking increases the risk of serious illness in childhood.
"On balance, we have decided children in our care shouldn't grow up breathing second-hand smoke."
...
A spokesperson for Forest, a pro-smoking group, said: "It's going to exclude people who could be outstanding foster parents.
"It sends out an insidious message that smokers in general are unfit parents and I don't think any politician has the right to do that."

Look, it's a nasty, unhealthy habit that has proven to be unhealthy for children (and everyone else) to be around. But is it better for kids to stay in a potentially worse situation? And if this ban is OK, doesn’t that open the door for banning other behaviors? I'm slightly surprised at my reaction to this story, actually. What do you think – is it OK for a government to ban smokers from being foster parents? Or is that going too far?

Source: The Scotsman, Business Report,

Image: Church Times

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Mommy? Not The Mommy -- If You Adopted, Contest Says

Amy Kuras — Thu, 15 May 2008 18:31:00 GMT

When is a mom not a mom?

When she's an adoptive or foster mom, apparently.

Let me back up a bit here. NBC and Teleflora ran a queasily saccharine "America's Favorite Mom" contest leading up to Mother's Day, which allowed people to vote for their favorite moms in a variety of categories: single mom, working mom, "chairman of everything" mom (gack—this means stay-at-home mom from what I can tell), and oh yes: "Non-Mom Mom." For adoptive, foster, and grandma-acting-as-mom moms.

Uh-huh. For those of you who adopted a kid, all this time you've been changing diapers and handling bedtimes and doctor's appointments and late-night screams for "MOMMY!" turns out according to these folks you are not actually a mom because you didn’t gestate this little person you love and care for. Because it all comes down to the genes and the uterus, apparently.

In Teleflora's defense, once the controversy hit the blogosphere they changed the category title to "adopting moms" and put a very prominent apology on the contest website.

Still. Can we say ignorant? Did no one think, before they insulted and hurt a sizable minority of mothers?

I know this is a TV and internet contest with a level of class and sophistication about what you’d expect from an event hosted by Donny and Marie Osmond, but come on. Often, people make the decision to adopt after years in infertility hell, and even when that's not the case the adoption process is fraught with stress. Adoptive parents have been through enough crap just to build families without being told, in so many words, they don’t really count as mothers.

Marie Osmond, in introducing the category, said this, according to the Wall Street Journal blog The Juggle: “We’ve created a special category for all of those who are not only moms to their own families but they brought their passion and energies to helping kids who otherwise wouldn’t experience how much a mom can mean.”
Horrifyingly? She's an adoptive mom herself.

Fat Guy Gets Go-Ahead to Adopt

Madeline Holler — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 21:27:00 GMT

A super overweight guy who was convinced that a judge denied him custody of his cousin’s son because of the man’s size has once again regained custody of the little boy.

Now the wheels are in motion for him and his wife to finalize adoption of the now 8-month-old, who the couple began caring for when he was 1-week-old.

The judge denies that the man’s weight was ever a factor in denying custody. At the beginning of the battle, he weight 550 pounds. Now, after a Dallas doctor offered free gastic by-pass, he’s 200 pounds lighter.

Instead, the judge says the man improperly moved the boy across state lines. He was born in Texas, but the family now lives in Missouri, where the case is being adjudicated.

The overweight man has been fighting to regain custody of the boy since this summer, when he was placed with another (skinnier?) family, also interested in permanent adoption.

I’m happy for the big guy and the little boy. Weight shouldn’t be a factor when deciding where to place children, particularly in places like Missouri! Jesus! In Missouri, food is love! So I’m glad this is being resolved. But now I’m sad for that other family.

Minnesota Getting Tougher on Would-be Foster Parents

Karen Murphy — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 18:04:00 GMT

Hey! Want to help out one of the almost 15,000 Minnesota kids needing foster care? Well, get your fingerprints ready...those wishing to become foster parents in Minnesota are about to have a much tougher time of it if the new requirements that are being proposed go through. The changes, part of a $1.2 million-a-year overhaul of the foster parent system, are being proposed partly to comply with federal standards designed to keep sexual offenders from preying on children. Lest you think that the Land of Garrison Keillor is rife with child molestors who become foster parents, apparently only 1/10th of one percent of Minnesota foster kids were found to have been sexually abused in 2005. That's obviously 1/10th of one percent too many for the children tragically involved, but statistically is insignificant and certainly doesn't warrant the new changes which are said to not be enough to have flagged a warning in the recent case of Perry Wayne Pfitzer who has pleaded not guilty to molesting his two foster daughters, ages 4 and 6, last summer, and became a foster parent despite a 1982 indecent exposure conviction. So why these sweeping changes, keeping a new team of about a dozen workers busy checking records and requiring fingerprints even from family members who wish to foster, while forcing kids into shelters while they await the results of this laborious process?

Because anybody who's ever been sexually abused knows how helpless it makes you and everyone around you feel. But throwing legislation at the problem isn't going to make it go away, and my fear is that good people who truly have the best interests of children at heart may be scared away by the new regulations, leaving children without homes.

More Bans on Same Sex Foster Parents?

Sarah, Goon Squad Sarah — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 18:46:00 GMT

It looks like the Arkansas state legislature is going to try to take some steps to make sure that nobody accidentally confuses them with a progressive state. You see, last June the Arkansas Supreme Court ruled that a state ban on homosexual couples being foster partents was unconstitutional. Sadly, The Family Council and some of the Arkansas legislators are out to get the old ban written into law.

According to this slightly confusing article by Doug Thompson, The Family Council feels that they won't have any trouble finding a sponsor to get a bill passed banning couples from being foster parents based on sexual orientation.

You may have read a post here a week and a half ago by CityMama talking about the new restrictions that Texas is using to stop people from becoming foster parents. I guess Arkansas could join Texas in a system that wouldn't allow same sex couples to participate in an overburdened foster system.

Feel free to disagree with me, but I don't see how placing a child with two people (unmarried, gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered) who are genuinely going out of their way to take in a juvenile that needs a good home could not be in that child's best interest. These children need a place to live. The state needs people to help. Do these states assume that all homosexuals are also pedophiles? It doesn't make sense. What sort of 40 year old stereotype porpoganda are these people working off of?

I have friends with gay parents. I have gay friends that are parents. I have not noticed that the children turn out any different from those of us with parents of opposite genders, with the possible exception that most of these people end up slightly more open minded.

That doesn't seem like such a bad thing to me.

Texas Foster Parents Not Allowed to Smoke Cigarettes in Front of Kids (Briskets and Ribs Okay)

Stefania Pomponi Butler (CityMama) — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 13:02:00 GMT

Texas is joining Vermont, Washington, and Maine in passing a new law stating that foster parents are not allowed to smoke in their homes or cars while children are present. The law takes effect on January 1, the same day that a buck-a-pack tax hike goes into effect. Personally, I could give a rip about smokers feeling like their civil rights are being violated, I'm all for laws that keep second-hand smoke away from our country's most vulnerable children.

Critics say that the state shouldn't "tighten foster parent eligibility when an increasing number of children need help." They say the law will discourage people from becoming foster parents. I say foster parents can go outside to light up. Many smokers with children smoke outside or away from their kids out of consideration for their health.

This surely won't be the last restriction Texas places on its foster parent community. After all, this is the state that wants its foster parents to be heterosexual despite the fact there are about 43,000 gay and lesbian couples who are willing to foster children. They can't all be smokers.

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