Aren't kids in foster care overwhelmingly kids who have been removed from their biological parents care?

Question

Did the biological parents know that they were not "parent material" or did they not think about it at all and "parent" the child in the best way they knew how?

Did they want to relinquish the child for adoption but were encouraged by "society" to attempt parenting the child?

What happened to these kids before they got to foster care? and who did this to them?

Did anyone know before the first blow or broken bone that this would happen to them?

Should all biological parents be encouraged to "give parentling a try"?

I know this is a lot of questions but I'm trying to understand why some people so adamantly say that all parents should be encouraged to parent.

Answer 1

I can't answer for everyone, but I can tell you what my experience has been.

While my birthmother was pregnant with me she had decided to give me up for adoption. My birthfather was not in the picture for whatever reason. However once she had given birth to me she backed out & couldnt do it. So she quickly gathered what was needed for a baby & decided to raise me as a single mother. To be honest I don't know what exactly happened in my first two years, but before I turned three I do know that she became a substance abuser. After this went on for a period of time my grandmother sat her down to have a talk to say what she was doing wasnt right it was either time to get things together & do what was right for me or go back to her original plan and place me for adoption.

I was placed for adoption, to adoptive parents that severly abused me until I was 11 when I became a foster child until I was 18.

I have since become reunited with my birth mother.

Do I wish things had been handled differently?? Of course. Adoption can be a wonderful thing, but the people that adopted me, should never have been allowed to adopt anyone. My birthmother should have tried harder by getting off the drugs and being a mother.

I'd like to think that I'm not a bitter person. I don't blame the entire adoption system for what happened to me. I understand and realize that my adoptive parents were an exception to the general adoptive parents.

I think it's time that the adoption society as a whole (meaning adoptive parents, agency's, birthmothers and adoptees) was revamped. There's simply too many things wrong with it. Adoptees need to be given more rights, even if that means that some are taken away from the adoptive parents & birthmothers. We are after all the only ones in the whole equation that are given no say in the matter.

I also believe that birth parents that are considering adoption should be made to go through government paid counselling so that they fully understand everything they are going through and have a way with dealing with everything and are not being influenced in any way shape or form from either an agency or an adoptive family.

Answer 2

I'm going to take this from another perspective.  Children end up in foster care for a variety of reasons.  People have already answered the question in terms of the inability to predict future occurrences, such as death and abuse, but there are also relinquished children who end up in foster care.

Relinquished children can be placed in foster care right away or if an adoption fails.  Sometimes the adoptive parents end up changing their minds before the adoption is even finalized.  I was placed in foster care right away.  I was relinquished at 13 months of age, because circumstances (NOT abuse/neglect) occurred that made my parents feel it was best for me.  I was not an infant, so I didn't get adopted right away.

There are other relinquished people I know who had potential adoptions that never finalized, or adoptions that failed.  They end up in foster care, too.

Biological parents who are drinking, drugging, etc. throughout the pregnancy may choose to parent, but I personally would not encourage it.  I would encourage an alternate, capable family member be sought before outside persons, however.

eta:

It also must be considered that children are abused by foster and adoptive parents.  When I was a county social worker, a foster parent in another county had a four year old foster daughter.  The child commenced to have a temper tantrum that just would not stop.  Instead of contacting the department or some other type of help, the foster mother chose to give the child a beverage that contained 4 oz. (you read that right) of whiskey.  She wanted to quiet the child.  She did.  Permanently.  The child died from this "intervention."  This woman was a trained foster parent.  No one could have predicted this.

What do you think of a parent who becomes so intoxicated on a regular basis that he places his young daughter (5, 6,7 years old) on his lap in the car so she can steer the vehicle?  This was my best friend's adoptive father.

My point is only to say that abusive parents whose children end up in foster care come in all varieties.  Foster and adoptive parents who abuse weren't coerced into parenting.  They wanted very much to parent.  They even received training and/or passed home studies.

Failed adoptions have increased with the increase of international adoptions.  These children often suffer from RAD.  Some adoptive parents find out they cannot handle this and the adoption fails.

Some parents who were teetering with their decision and encouraged to parent instead of relinquish are today thankful for that, and have been very good parents.  One cannot predict.

This idea that we can compartmentalize is foolish.  Every situation is different and can only be judged by its own individual merit.  No one can really predict.

Answer 3

Ok, this is just my personal experience, and I'm sure my experience is limited.  But from what I have seen, most if not all birth mothers who choose to attempt to raise their children do not see any problem.  (I'm speaking now only of mothers/parents who lose their children to foster care for good reason.)  I told the story on another post of a woman who was happily married, and I met her in the hospital right after she gave birth to her third child.  This couple were GOOD people who had fallen on hard times and didn't know how to get out of it.  The mother had gotten hooked on heroin and lost all three of her children (the last one, she lost as soon as he was born).  They lost their house and jobs...at the time of their third child's birth, they were living in their car.  As a recovering addict myself (albeit, my addictions are nicotine and food...same beast in a different costume), I understand how this happened to them.  They honestly failed to see the problem, and they firmly believed that if they could just have one chance at raising their child, the mother could get clean without any help whatsoever (even though she had been taking heroin throughout her pregnancy, and up to 10 hours before she gave birth).  

So, my belief is that they either do think they are parent material, or they didn't think about it and tried to do their best.  I was raised by my biological parents in a very abusive home, and I recall many times hearing this, "I was beaten black and blue as a kid, and I turned out just fine" - this was my parents' way of justifying their bloody method of "parenting".  No one even considered that my parents shouldn't be parents.  Matter of fact, I didn't even think about it until I was about 12.  However, as an adult, I have seen all sides of this issue, and I can't say that I would have been better off anywhere else.  My best friend spent some time in foster care, and for her, foster care was far worse than her psycho-abusive household, and she was glad to be placed back with her parents.  And, of course, after reading on here how adoptees feel (some adoptees), I also can't say I'd have been better off if I had been adopted.

So, I guess I can't give a blanket answer.  In my case, I'm just glad that I didn't follow the same path as everyone else in my family.  If I had gotten pregnant at 16 like my mother, sister, and everyone else I am related to, I would have ended up carrying on the abuse to my own children.  I am also glad that I made it to adulthood alive, and am now able to make my own decisions, and do what I need to do to heal my own pain, and help others heal theirs.

I can't presume to know an answer to your question.  It's different in every case, and opinions on all sides of this issue abound...and none are necessarily "wrong", either.  You can't make a blanket statement that "all" birth parents should be encouraged to parent, when some obviously have major roadblocks that will prevent them from parenting effectively.  Although, in those cases, I do think that a judgment call needs to be made, like in the case of the mother above who was hooked on heroin.  IF it was possible for her to get clean and parent her child, she should have been given that chance.  She had 6 months to get back on her feet...and she couldn't do it.  That does NOT mean that she is a bad person.  It simply means that she wasn't able to be a parent.

ETA:  Sorry this is so long.  Julie J said something that made me think...abusive parents and birthmothers who choose to relinquish at birth ARE two different sets of people...VERY different.  It stands to reason that a birth mother who is seeking out an adoptive placement for her child because she feels that someone else can give this child a better life would be doing so because she cares deeply for this child, and the child's welfare.  This is NOT a person who would abuse her child!  Of course, that isn't guaranteed by any means, but generally speaking, someone who shows that much care and concern for this small person would probably end up being a darn good parent to that small person, if given the chance.  It is those who DO NOT think of their child's welfare, are in the midst of addiction, have no desire to make a good, or even decent, life for their children...these folks are the ones whose children are ending up in foster care.  I'd say the line between these two distinct groups rarely blurs.

Answer 4

I understand where you are coming from. But a lot of times circumstances come up later in a childs life that cause these things.

Maybe the parent had a parent die and they did not take it well and started doing drugs. Or the parent becomes severly depressed and doesn't know how to cope with it. Sometimes it can be an unseen bipolar condition that gets out of hand.

None of these things can necessarily be forseen when a child is born. And therefore I don't think they are giving parenting "a try". They went into it thinking the best. And life threw them a curve ball.

Answer 5

Most people who abuse their children are people who never ever considered relinquishing them.

Please stop labeling parents who relinquish their children as abusers.  It is not the same thing at all.

Answer 6

I'm not sure what the answer is.  It is true that no one can know for sure how a person will parent.  You cannot predict what stresses will come up in a person's life. This is true for bio and adoptive parents.  But there are indicators to abuse... When these indicators are present it does seem risky  to encourage parenting at all costs.  It  seems unfair to ask a child to wait and see.  It is often a matter of weighing the risks.

The people I know who work with CASA or CPS feel that they can't win.  They try to preserve the family...this IS the intended outcome these days.  But things often go wrong and then they are blamed for not being able to predict failure.  I guess what I'm saying is that it is really so very complicated. This issue cannot be summed up in a tidy slogan.  It has to be decided on a case by case basis.  Family preservation works for some but goes woefully wrong for others.  I'm not against people trying to fight for preserving families and encouraging people to parent but I'm disturbed by how simplistic the issue seems as sometimes presented on this site.

Answer 7

Because bad parenting can't be predicted and children shouldn't be removed from their parents BEFORE they abuse.

Separation from the mother damages infants. If abuse hasn't happened, our society should encourage women to parent their children because that is the best outcome for the CHILD.

Removing the child for a home that has more "money" or "two stranger parents, compared to one natural parent" isn't the best situation for a child due to the damage losing a mother causes on an infant. Adoption should be a last result. Except every time you drive down the freeway or click on Y!A you see how its SUCH A BEAUTIFUL THING. When its not, its damaging brain development in babies brains JUST FROM LOSING THEIR MOTHERS. You can't act like adoption is the next best thing to sliced bread when its scarring people.

YES, all parents should be encouraged to try to parent unless they've been deemed unfit already through patterns of abuse and neglect.

You can't compare the abused children in foster care adoptions to the infant adoption industry. Thats two completely different situations. There is foster care adoptions, these need to happen MORE.

Then there are newborn infant adoptions, and these families haven't even been given a fair chance. Its not fair to exploit pregnant women to benefit off of their children without giving their family a chance, and leave the children in foster care without a chance.

Children are being treated like commodities and the VALUE of family has been neglected, overlooked and then is preached by the very people responsible for the demand that drives the system.

If adoptive parents can understand the importance of family for THEMSELVES, why can't they understand the importance of family staying together FOR OTHERS?

And this isn't ALLLLLL ADOPTIVE PARENTS. I'm primarily directing this to the ones who don't believe in family preservation first, and don't see adoption as a last option.

Unless a child has been removed or neglected or has parents who truly DON'T want to parent, they should not be removed from their parents. PERIOD.

Answer 8

I can see the point you are trying to make here.  

I don't think all parents who surrender their kids for adoption are potentially abusive though.  In fact I think many of them would probably have made wonderful parents, given a little support at the time they needed it most.

By the same token I don't know if any of the parents of kids who end up in foster care even considered adoption, I doubt it

If we start taking kids from parents who could be 'potentially abusive' or 'potentially useless parents' we would be harking back to days of old when women who weren't married were considered damaged and therefore tied to a bed to give birth, drugged and relieved of their children - now THAT was abuse

Answer 9

Um, just so you know not all biological parents are these evil, uncaple, nasty people you paint them to be. I'm so thankful that my parents always spoke about my birth mother with respect and dignity. Things happen in life some by life choice and some by choices of others. This is what I believe: If a child is being abused, and not cared for, then yes they should be removed.

Answer 10

Hi School Nurse,

I just answered a similar question like this one earlier today.  You cannot know which parents are going to abuse their kids ahead of time, any more than you can know which adoptive parents will abuse their kids before it happens.  

Are you suggesting that you are preventing child abuse from happening by separating parents and children at birth?  By taking a child away before any crime has happened, you are punishing somebody for something they did not do, and for something that you have no proof they ever will do because nothing has happened yet.  

Here is the reason why:  The infant adoptions are NOT the same as the foster child adoptions. There is a misconception out there that if infants are not placed for adoption, they will end up abused and in the foster care system. There is another misconception that the parents whose children do involuntarily wind up in foster care are the same ones who considered relinquishing their children for adoption when they were infants. They are not.  Those are two separate groups of people! So when you hear resistance to the idea of infant adoption, it is not resistance to foster care adoption. There is a distinct and very important difference of which people should be made aware, so as not to be misled.

All parents have the right to parent their own children.  All parents can lose that right by abusing their child.  It could happen to any family, not just unmarried parents.  To suggest that those babies need to be removed from their parents at birth smacks of rationalization of infant adoption under the pretense of preventing child abuse.  Abuse cases would not stop because you are targeting the wrong group.  While your intentions might be good, the logic doesn't follow there.  If there is no reason to separate a family, then they should be left alone to be a family.  They should be encouraged and helped to be a family.  

Hope that helps clarify that for you.

julie j

reunited adoptee