Going for it. (Agreement Reached!)

[mickeysaver]

After too many months of walking around with a huge acid lump in our stomaches worried to death about the future of our great niece, we have been given the window that we have prayed for in order to file for custody. While we wish the window had not opened in such a manner, it's open now and we are filling out the paperwork and have Child and Family Services on our side.

Currently, her mother is in jail for violating her probation by using drugs again. Her father is not allowed to see her mother due to his abusive and violent behavior. Her grandmother aka Gabby's sister is in the hospital ICU recovering from a series of seizures that caused her to have a huge open laceration to her head when she fell out on the sidewalk in the neighborhood. None of them will be eligible to fight for custody of the little angel that we have been caring for for so long.

I am so looking forward to our family status being legal, where we have control over her future. This can't get settled soon enough. I am on the fast track to officially being called "Mama", without the guilt.

 

[DOPEYLUVER]

As you said, not an easy track, but:

GOOD FOR YOU MAMA

 

[C&G'sMama]

I'll keep you in my good thoughts!

Keep us posted.

 

[OrlandoMike]

You seem to have had quite a good year this past year!

Glad to hear things are working out for evryone involved! Great news for the baby! She needs a stable home!

 

[mickeysaver]

We filed the paperwork for temporary guardianship since we were acting as the baby's parental caregiver already. Baby Daddy contested it. If he shows up in court and so does F, he could be arrested for violating the protection order. He has paid no child support at all. He also hasn't seen the child in months. I doubt she would even know who he is at this point. With his history of alcholism and abusive behavior, I sincerely doubt the judge will hand over a vulnerable infant/toddler to the likes of him.

F has been out of jail for a month now. We have had the baby for the majority time that she has been out of jail. DCF told her that if the baby was not with her, that no one else was to keep her except us. DCF also told her that if she messes up, even a little bit, the baby is ours. DCF has already done a home study on us. F has only kept her for a full 24 hour period once since getting out of jail, she had her a few nights too. F filed paperwork late with the court to contest it. We received a copy of the letter she filed. It was not written by her, you can tell by the handwriting and the way that it is worded that it was Gabby's sister who wrote the letter. F told her mother what to write, says that she never read it to see what her mom actually wrote, proceeded to sign it, and then filed it with the court. The letter claims so many things that are just lie upon lie upon lie. The paperwork also says that she wants to ask to the court to restrict us from all contact with the baby. Verbally, F claims that she has no intention of keeping the baby away from us at all. She said that she did not ask her mother to write that. We shall see.

We go to court on Monday. We understand that we got, "the good judge", so that helps. We have been making notes documenting what we can to help the judge determine the truth vs. the mountains of lies that the other side is asking the court to believe. On a sort of funny note, the info that I posted since she was born here on the DIS has come in handy to help establish that we were not desperate baby crazy lesbians that have been trying to adopt the baby since we found out that F was pregnant. It shows the journey that we went through, while not complete, it does show how conflicted we were about what to do and the fact that we did try to let F raise the baby.

At this point, it's in God's hands. We would appreciate whatever prayers that you would like to throw towards this situation in order to help the baby, who is 17 months old now, be placed in the best situation possible so that she has a chance at a healthy, happy, and productive future.

Thanks to all of you for being my sounding board through this wretched drama. Maggie

 

[OKW Lover]

Sending some your way

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

Good luck!!!

 

[mickeysaver]

Thanks, trying to trust in the process, but about to head off to bed with so many things zipping through my head. We have so much stuff to present, but in the end, will the judge feel that it's enough? Prayers and thoughts are appreciated. I will update this tomorrow once we know. Thanks friends!

 

[mickeysaver]

We basically got legal power of attorney over the baby. Parental rights were not terminated. The judge kept being distracted by incoming cell phone calls and actually left the courtroom at one point to talk on his phone. We did not get to make our case in total. We barely scratched the surface of our concerns. Like the fact that since we turned the baby over to F after she got out of jail until 9 AM this morning, we had the baby 76% of the time, if you look at the hours the baby spent in her care. Yes, I geeked out and did the math.

We were put off until July 18th for another hearing, more or less, like this one, and if we are still at an impass, the case will go to mediation. We thought we were going to mediation to start with, but that was not the case. So we wait.

F has bought her way off of probation, so no more mandatory random drug screens. F is not in counseling, not going to NA/AA meetings, not employed, still living with her mother, and on & on & on. Not the best situation to feel like the baby will be safe in for sure.

Baby Daddy showed up today. The judge actually seemed to be treating him with a boys will be boys attitude about the fact that he physically abused F while she was holding the baby. I don't get it.

We feel like the only way this is going to be sorted out is through mediation. There are just too many things about the history that can not be handled in a 15 minute meeting before the judge. We are not sure if we should continue to push this, but at the same time, if we don't and something happens to the baby, we would feel so incredibly bad because we didn't continue to try to protect her. We both are just sort of numb right now.

The baby went home with F.

 

[DOPEYLUVER]

We are not sure if we should continue to push this, but at the same time, if we don't and something happens to the baby, we would feel so incredibly bad because we didn't continue to try to protect her.

I think you have your answer on this.

 

[C&G'sMama]

Keep pushing it!! That's all I can say. I've heard too many stories of kids going back to bio-parents because "it's in the best interest of the child" according to a judge who knows nothing. And the child has been further damaged

so keep on. I'm sure it's not easy, I'm sure you're tired. But it sounds like you two are the only ones that baby has that really has her interests at heart.

 

[TuckandStuiesMom]

Here's hoping and praying that things work out.

 

[mickeysaver]

Well, now F's phone is turned off or else we are being sent straight to voicemail. B would not tell Gabby's mom where the baby was last night. We have no idea where the baby is, which scares the crap out of us being that the judge approved baby daddy's mom to watch the baby for F, which is not good because we have heard about there being molestation issues within that house. We have as yet to get any response from our DCF lady on the emails we have sent to her since we went to court. It's just maddening.

On the semi bright side, we have a family friend who works in labor and delivery looking for a baby for us. She says that every so often someone will come in who just wants to sign away their rights without ever having gone through an agency, so we are hopeful that will come through at some point. I am not looking for a baby to make this all go away or to replace baby M. We have been wanting one of our own for many months now and having that little bit of good news that we have another potential source is really kind of nice.

Prayers for baby M very much appreciated, because she really needs all the protective help she can get.

 

[Celidh]

After too many months of walking around with a huge acid lump in our stomaches worried to death about the future of our great niece, we have been given the window that we have prayed for in order to file for custody. While we wish the window had not opened in such a manner, it's open now and we are filling out the paperwork and have Child and Family Services on our side.

Currently, her mother is in jail for violating her probation by using drugs again. Her father is not allowed to see her mother due to his abusive and violent behavior. Her grandmother aka Gabby's sister is in the hospital ICU recovering from a series of seizures that caused her to have a huge open laceration to her head when she fell out on the sidewalk in the neighborhood. None of them will be eligible to fight for custody of the little angel that we have been caring for for so long.

I am so looking forward to our family status being legal, where we have control over her future. This can't get settled soon enough. I am on the fast track to officially being called "Mama", without the guilt.

My "baby girl" calls me Mama. Not all the time, just sometimes. It just melts my heart to hear it, even though she is almost 8 now.

I work in a law firm which deals with child protection cases. It is hard to see what some of these kids go through and how little the parents seem to care. They are given all sorts of supports and services, all sorts of help and counselling and still don't seem to want to pull their socks up. I feel sorry for the children who just want to be loved and taken care of. I hope all works out well for you and the little one.

 

[mickeysaver]

After leaving court, the baby went to stay at her paternal grandmother's house for almost a week. We have had her ever since, until tonight. Gabby goes to pick her up from F at 7:00 AM. So, the baby won't even be there 12 hours. We are taking her to the MK on Sunday. We asked F to give us the shot records and the SSN so that we can enroll the baby in daycare, but so far, she has given us nothing.

We are going back to court on the 18th. We are going to ask for mediation. We are going to ask that the court assign a Guardian ad Litem to her. The fact that her mother hasn't spent a full day with her since we left the courtroom is pretty telling of the fact that she has no desire to be the one who raises her. I just wish she would give us the paperwork so that we could move along. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be an option that she is going to embrace without the court saying so.

We have our chins up and are moving forward. The baby is talking up a storm. She is up to almost 70 words now. I swear, she gets more beautiful each day. I am so in love with this little girl that even when she is pushing my buttons, I have a hard time getting grumpy with her. That is not to say that I don't stand my ground, but it's just so hard to get upset with the little rascal. She's a charmer, God help us when she gets old enough to date!

 

[kaffinito]

My thoughts and prayers are with you!

 

[mickeysaver]

I just got back from dropping the baby off at her mother's house. Her mother doesn't really know that the baby calls me "Mama", but does know that the baby calls Gabby "Dada". I kissed the baby and told her that I would see her in the morning. As F was taking her into the house, she kept calling out "Mama, Mama, Mama" and doing the come here wave thing towards me and I could do nothing but walk to the car to drive back home. I was in tears before I could even get out of the driveway. I feel like my heart has been torn out and stomped on because I wasn't able to go to her.

This has got to come to some sort of resolution soon.

 

[hematite153]

Is today still your court date? If so, good luck and I pray that M gets a stable home out of it.

 

[mickeysaver]

We go to mediation in a couple of weeks, since much of nothing has been accomplished in the past month. We are hopeful that this will get us to the point where the court will rule for us to be her caregivers full time with all other interested parties with visitation, some of them with supervision only. We go back to court after that in mid-September.

Basically, the paternal grandmother, who is in a 15 year committed lesbian relationship, wants to see her more, which I understand, but, she smokes, there have been child molestation concerns due to some of the relatives that are in and out of that home. I am ok with visitation as long as there is no smoking and there is no risk of her being molested.

As for the Baby Daddy, um, no unsupervised visitation. The guy has anger management issues and I will not let him harm this child! I saw him smile for the first time ever today. It was outside of the courthouse when he was saying goodbye to the baby.

As for F, yes, I want her to see the baby. She sees her about 25% of the time. We are ok with that continuing. However, no smoking, she needs to get a job, and she needs to get out of B's house! She also needs a laundry list of things to do in order to get/stay drug free.

As for B, no unsupervised visits. I can't imagine having her pass out with the baby there with no one else there to care for her.

We want to be given primary custody to do the day to day raising of the child. The baby has been with us the majority of the year now. It's time to quit fooling around and give this baby some stability. She is at that age where routine is super important. She really doesn't need more chaos.

We came home with the baby.

 

[mickeysaver]

Finally!!!!!!! ​

Through mediation, we were able to reach an agreement that Gabby should have an equal say as a parental unit in the life of the baby. The mother and father both retain custodial rights unless they mess up and then they are pretty much out of the loop as far as rights go. The father is going to get to see the baby more, which worries me, but I am attempting to keep a positive attitude about it. The baby is big enough now to tell us that something is wrong, if something happens to her at one of the other houses. All parental decisions need to be mutually agreed upon, which is going to be messy at some points, but we will deal with that. At the very least, we can try to steer them towards giving the baby the best possible life path. While this is not the outcome that we went in wanting, it is an agreement that we can live with for now.

So, as of today, Gabby is officially Dada and I no longer feel guilty being called Mama! Overall, this made for a great pre-12th Anniversary present for both of us. It just took 18 or so months to arrive.

I can never thank you folks enough for listening, holding my hand, and praying/pixie dusting/positive energying us over the past 18 months or so. Believe it or not, some of the postings that I made here on the DIS were used in the case. They certainly helped me to compile a timeline of what happened when to show to the court.

Seriously to one and all, Thank you!