I got a call from our social worker notifying me that she wants to set up a meeting with me and some other professionals. I was expecting her to call since I had a meeting with the therapist for help with the school situation with our seven year old son (that’s a topic for another post), and we agreed we’d set up a meeting with his principal, play therapist, social worker, this therapist and me, to jointly figure out a plan how to get him the support he needs.

But the social worker’s tone felt a bit urgent, so I asked her who was initiating this meeting. She clarified that it has nothing to do with school, that it’s going to be meeting with the head of the foster care agency along with her, her supervisor and maybe a couple of other people. This is not at all what I was expecting. Okay, I’ll come but why do you want to have a meeting?

Remember the guardian ad litem for the twins? I’ve never shared with you what has transpired and I still can’t. She hasn’t been pleasant to us, to put it mildly. The hope of the foster agency was that with time the GAL would see all the positive reports, see the dramatic improvement in the emotional state of the children and be appeased. We haven’t heard much since she was here for the home visit months ago and everyone assumed she was relaxing a bit.

It turns out she hasn’t been relaxing at all. She’s filed complaints with the court and now the court has sent that report to the foster care agency. I asked what the complaints about us are because I can’t think of anything. The social worker said that it’s very possible the GAL is lying/minimizing/exaggerating whatever she is reporting, but said the neglected appearance/hygiene of the children and our living conditions is a primary issue. She said they’ll go over in detail in our meeting what she’s saying.

I can’t even muster up anger about the absurdity of these claims. I am so done with defending myself from specious claims.

I asked if there are any reports from people who actually see the children documenting a problem with their appearance? It doesn’t seem so. It’s only been the parents who have complained in the past. They did the same thing to the past foster parents and it’s a typical thing that bio parents do so it should be understood in that context.

However, the children haven’t seen their parents for the last three months due to bureaucratic inefficiencies, so their parents can’t be complaining about how they look. Where could these complaints come from?

I asked the social worker what the GAL’s intention is, because we are we are and she is who she is, so nothing is going to be better than it is now. Does she want to take the kids away?

“No, she hasn’t outright said that.”

Well, to me it seems simple. If she doesn’t want them to stay with us, then they have to be removed to a different home or institution. There are no other options.

The meeting is late Wednesday afternoon. It was supposed to be at the foster care agency’s office, but then I was notified it would be at our home and the kids need to be there. Great, another walkthrough of our home, while trying to keep the oversugared twins calm after they get back from their school Purim parties while speaking to all of these people in a focused way. (My husband will take off from work to supervise the kids, which he did for the last home visit, too, and it was still very challenging.)

I wish it was next week since my schedule is packed this week and I don’t have much discretionary time but I’ll try to find some time to do some extra organizing in case they ask to open all the drawers and cabinets, as was done in the past.

My husband and I are having a conversation if continuing fostering these children is the right thing to do. The kids are very challenging, and though they are the best behaved around me, it’s not a walk in the part. It’s constant and draining and exhausting, and it takes so much time and energy. We’re willing to put in that time and treat them with the same love and care we give all of our children, and we do, but I am so weary of all of this extra oversight and investigation. I feel unsafe about someone filing complaints in court against us, no matter what we do and regardless of how well the kids are doing. I don’t have endless emotional energy and every bit that goes in the direction of the technicalities takes energy that I need to parent all of our children.

The question isn’t about how much harassment we can tolerate, but if we’re endangering our family to continue. My biggest concern is ds8. If they make a claim that we aren’t fit foster parents, that doesn’t affect just the twins – it would affect ds8.

The safety of my other children has has been my line in the sand from the beginning – I’ll do everything I can for the twins, but I won’t put my other children at risk.

This is very hard for me to contemplate. I feel our family is the only thing standing between the twins and a system that doesn’t prioritize their best interests. There’s no guarantee that they’ll grow up to be emotionally healthy if they stay with us, but I can sadly predict the chances go down to about zero if they leave – we’re their best hope. How can I give up on them?

I’m not making any decisions yet. My heart has been very heavy contemplating all of this. I put dd7 to bed and right before I left her room she told me, “You’re a lucky mommy!” “Yes, I am a lucky mommy, because I have such wonderful children. “

“And I’m a lucky girl!”

I swallowed the lump in my throat; she has no idea how fragile her place in our home is.

I’ll see what is said at the meeting, to learn more about what has been said to the court and how the agency wants to handle this situation. Hopefully it’s not as big a deal as it sounds right now; it’s possible we’ll hear what’s going on and it won’t be much of a concern after all. In any case, in a few days we’ll have a better idea of how to move forward.

Avivah