The rollercoaster continues

Last Wednesday I received an unexpected, very upsetting phone call from our newest case manager. She informed me that the interstate compact had been approved and the children's uncle was willing to come get the children this weekend. She stated CPS would be filing a change in physical custody so he could move the children prior to his 3 week work trip. I was devastated. I called the children's lawyer and told her what was going on and my concerns about this move.

• Baby girl got tubes put in her ears less than a week ago. Her follow up appointment is scheduled in another week to see if she can pass hearing exams. I requested the GAL (kid's lawyer) make sure the uncle gets her to an ENT doctor for a follow up in case they do move the kids this quickly.
• Baby girl had thrown up numerous times that day and we had not yet determined if it was related to the ear surgery or not.
• Uprooting the kids from everything they know in order to have the Uncle out of town for 3 weeks after they move to another state. In foster parent training you learn about the "honeymoon stage" when kids are disrupted. Basically the kids are angels in the beginning because they don't know what else to do. Once they realize the situation isn't changing, they start reacting to it. Right when they start reacting to it, the Uncle will be gone - who will help them through this transition?
• The uncle has shown little to no interest in the kids. He has visited with the children once for 2 hours in the last year and a half.

She was also disturbed by the the news and hadn't heard anything prior to my phone call. That night she e-mailed the Assistant Attorney General (The state's lawyer) stating that she would be objecting if they filed the change in physical custody. On Thursday it was filed. Scared the children would be leaving that weekend we called an impromptu party with our families to celebrate our children. Jon's parents were amazing and quickly threw together a dinner for both our families. 

By Thursday night I had heard the kids would not be leaving this weekend due to the objection from the GAL. This was good however they were having an urgent hearing sometime next week to decide if the kids should move. 

Jon and I reached out to family and friends asking for prayers as we were unsure what would happen in court. 

The response we received was absolutely breath taking. Everyone's prayers were heard, court went as well as we could have hoped. To begin with, the judge stated that it was completely inappropriate to try to move the kids so quickly and abruptly. The GAL requested a best interest assessment which the judge agreed to and is now court ordered. The main question the court has for a psychologist, simply put is which option is in the kids best interest-

A: To leave them in the current situation which is not family; but also the only situation they have known.
B:To disrupt the kids from their current and consistent situation; due to the belief that family (blood) is best.

The judge stated that she believes both families are most likely very loving and safe, and that it isn't a matter of which family is better, but which situation will allow the kids to thrive the most.

Basically the kids will stay in our care at least until the best interest assessment is done. So we can finally take a much needed deep breath and a short sigh of relief. Please continue to keep our kids in your thoughts and prayers. Again, thank you everyone for all of your support, it is uplifting to know how strong our family is and how many people love our little ones.

In super exciting news, baby girl has become extremely interested in the potty in the last 3 weeks. She regularly wants to sit on the potty, never did anything just sat and giggled on the potty. This past Sunday she came up to Jon and said "I potty". Jon rushed her to the bathroom and sat her on the toilet. I ran in behind him and she actually went pee! We were at Aunt Becca's house and all the aunt's and uncles came running in to give her high fives! Then two days later she tells me she has to potty so I rush her to her potty and she goes poop! Again she got lot's of praise and high fives. We are so proud and lucky to have a little girl who seems to be potty training herself! We are going to keep encouraging her and we'll see where this goes!

Both kids are talking so much, everyday I feel like they say a new word to surprise me or they follow an instruction they hadn't previously understood. There is something about watching a child learn and put things together that is just pure. Every morning I look forward to the giggles and every evening I look forward to discovering what they learned about the world today that I learned many years ago but seem to have forgotten just how amazing it is.

Thank you for all your love and support throughout the past 19 months. Please continue to keep our family in your prayers as the state hopefully comes to the conclusion that we already have, this is our family; blood or not; we are happy.

PS MAPP 7 & 8 & Home Safety Inspection

Again we are playing catch up - we were out of town for Memorial Day, preparing for our home safety inspection, and working long hours. If we think we are busy now, I can only imagine how crazy life will be once we have 1 or 2 little ones to keep track of also. Google calendar is going to be an essential in the Lyons household.

PS MAPP 7: Helping Children Leave Foster Care

This class was about disruptions, dissolution, and transitioning the child from foster care. The main goal of foster care is reunification with the birth parents so we discussed how to help the child have a successful transition through communication, thoroughly explaining things to the child, helping the child prepare, updating the child's Life Book, and honoring and celebrating going home.

The most interesting discussions of this class related to disruptions and dissolutions and how to identify the signs of a disruptions in order to fix it and move forward.

Disruption: an unplanned move from one foster or adoptive home to another out-of-home situation

Dissolution: the legal act of ending an adoption, much like a divorce in marriage (Yes, this does happen and yes, we were flabbergasted that this was even an option!)

 The stages of disruption are very similar to the stages that lead to a divorce:

1. Diminishing Pleasure: In the early months when the negatives beginning outweighing the positives

2. Child is seen as blame for all

3. Talking to friends and family begins increasing the bad feelings

4. A critical incident occurs that is almost the last straw

5. A timeframe is set for improvement or a threat is given "One more time..."

6. The child fails to meet the deadline or ultimatum and the parents decide to disrupt


PS MAPP 8: Understanding the Impact of Fostering or Adopting

Confidentiality was the big topic of this class. Information about the child should only be given on a "need to know" basis. This is going to be a difficult thing to understand as we will not be able to discuss the reason the child is in foster care with us unless it is pertinent to the situation. We are not even allowed to share the child's first name when discussing the child's behavior in a foster parent support group, however if the child wants to participate in Little League, we are allowed to share the child's name as the Little League team has a "need to know" in order for the child to participate.

We also created a family map that allowed us to see what activities we get energy from and what activities we give energy to. After we created it we had to pick a child scenario and adjust our family map accordingly to include the child in our family. The goal was to identify our strengths and identify what child would best fit into our world.

The last thing we discussed was what to do in the first 24 hours with the child.

Home Safety Inspection

Our home safety inspection was Wednesday, May 29th at 2pm. Jon was off work in time to get home and I was able to take my lunch break a little later in the day. The inspector was right on time and started in the kitchen. He went straight down the list - see page 15 of the DES Checklist. We had a minor hiccup with the fridge temperature due to Jon making some adjustments but the inspector let us turn the gauge down and he re-checked it at the end of the visit and we were in compliance! He basically walked throughout our entire house opening all cabinets and drawers and asking us where different hazardous items were stored. All smoke detectors were checked to make sure they were in working condition. My favorite part of the inspection was the emergency evacuation plan. Apparently most people fail the whole inspection because they can't follow these simple instructions:

1. Identify 2 routes to evacuate from bedrooms used in care
2. Identify the location of fire extinguishers
3. Designate a safe meeting place outside the setting
4. Maintain the plan on the setting

If you know me, you know my love for Excel. I looked at the example and realized I could use excel and got right to work. Here's my finished product:

At the end of the day we got the golden stamp of approval! We are now certified by the state of Arizona as living in a house that is safe for children!