The rest of Chey's story

Well - it's been a while. I'm determined to finish this. It's been a year since I've posted but I'm going to try to do my best. Mel's Haven is a huge inspiration to me to do this. So . . .where did I leave off? Oh yes, the Termination of Parental Rights.
Cheyenne has an older brother. Parental Rights were terminated for him. But not for Cheyenne. We were devastated. The judge didn't order her back to her biological parents. (Thank goodness becuase at this time, her biological mother was in jail! And if I rember right, so was her biological father.) We didn't know what was going to happen. There was not enough evidence in the case on Cheyenne's behalf to terminate rights. Cheyenne's biological mother told DFCS that she wanted to sign over her rights to Cheyenne. She said that she knew it would be the only way that Cheyenne and her brother would ever be able to know each other. So the case worker went to the jail where she was housed to have her sign the papers. That was it on her behalf. Once she signed, it was over with as far as she was concerned. Well. . . during this time, since rights were not terminated by the judge, we learned that the case was going to be moved to another county because the bio parents had moved. So we were going through the process of what it would be like to have even more hands involved in the case until we could file for another termination. We would have to take Cheyenne to the other county for visits that would not be as closely supervised. Her bio father had agreed to sign over rights as well. He was also in jail. When the case worker went to see him he was with the judge, therefore could not sign the papers. His lawyer was very adamant that DFCS not speak with him unless she was present with him. (He was not an educated man and could barely read.) We finally had another hearing. (I'll have to check with John to get details on this - I can't remember everything that went on.) Bio Dad was tranported to Forsyth County from jail. This is when he signed over his rights. It was so hard to believe. It was finally over. It was a nightmare that I would go through all over again. I don't remember the exact date the bio dad signed over his rights. I believe it was August. I would have to get out all of my notes and read over them. (Again, John would know this - I'll check with him.) Our adoption hearing was set for February 26, 2007. It was so hard to belive. And by this time, we felt like it was truly only a formality. Chey had been "ours" since the day she stepped foot in our home. We made the best decisions for her that we could. Just like we would have for our very own biological child.
Did I mention during any of this that we had other children come through our home? Oh, yes. we had 3 more children that we took care of. One was meant to stay forever. You'll hear his story next.
Check back on this blog becuase when I get a chance for John to read over it, I know there will be changes. My mind can't handle the retention of all the details. (That's why I have 2 binders full of information!!!) I was too concerned to care for the little princess that had been given to us by an act of God. I remember the nights that I set up and held her and rocked her. I remember the surgery on her tear duct that was clogged - carrying her in the OR room with her looking at me as if I were giving her away to someone else - having her eye stitched up after splitting it open on the coffee table. Those are the things I remember - not the court dates. But they were the worse. I want to be accurate. I want to pass along all the information I can. I don't know who out there may read this that it could be a help to. If you happen to be going through an adoption situation or are working with foster kids, you are our hero. I hope that you can read my blog and realize that things can come out for the best. God may tempt you and try you in ways that you never imagined. But always remember that He is in control and He has the master plan.

Our Little Princess

Could we do it again? Were we willing to wear our heart on our sleeve one more time? Sure. That’s why we decided to do it. We knew that we had to support of our family and friends to do this. Remember that lady that I spoke to at my school that had the precious little girl? Well, they had found out that the little girl was going to be in long term custody and they had another foster child with special needs that they were already committed to. She called me and asked if we wanted to meet the little girl and see how it went. So we agreed that Cheyenne would come to our house on Saturday, September 4, 2004 to spend the night and go to church with us. She never went back home. Lisa had told us the following information: she was 17 months old, she was not very friendly with men, she still took a bottle at night, and she would bang her head on her crib during the night. Well, when Lisa got her out of the car, she went straight to John and has had him wrapped around her little pinky ever since. She spent the night, did very well, and never went back to her previous foster home. We all agreed that she had adjusted so well that we not have a transition period of going back and forth between foster homes to adjust. So Lisa brought her clothes to her Sunday night and she was a part of us from then on. Everyone accepted her as part of the family. She was loved beyond belief. Lisa told us that out of the 6 months that she was in their home, she had only had a handful of visits with her biological parents. But very shortly after coming to our house, visits started back up with her biological parents. I could go on forever about that but I will save you the pain. It was horrible. She was terrified of her biological father and didn’t really acknowledge her biological mother. She was wake us up in the night crying, not able to go back to sleep. I have pages and pages and pages of notes just from visits and the behaviors she had as after affects. It was so sad to make her go to these each week, knowing what kind of effect it was going to have on her. We went through countless court dates, Citizen Panel Reviews, phone calls and emails concerning our little girl. Our local DFCS office was going through huge turnovers. We went through 6 case workers. DFCS forgot to file one piece of paper and it almost let Cheyenne go back to her biological parents. Thankfully, the Guardian ad-Litem was keen enough to get that situation under control. Long story short, we went through what seemed like hell on earth until we finally got down to the termination of parental rights hearing.

The First Call

When you are finally certified, you wait for the phone call. You are always told from the beginning that you can say no to any child at any time. You do not have to feel obligated to take every child they called you about. We received our first call in August of 2004. It was a baby boy who was 10 days old. He was in another foster home and the foster mother that had him couldn’t keep him anymore. We agreed to take him. He was a tiny, beautiful Hispanic child named Robert. His mother left him at the hospital and at the time, the father couldn’t pass a drug screen. I was at work when they called me about him. I told them I would call John, make sure he agreed and I would call them back. I called my mom and she came home from work to go with me to get him. The first time I saw him, he was still in his car seat. I remember thinking how tiny he was. I was scared to death I would hurt him. The case worker finally told me that it was OK to get him out of his car seat and hold him. I did and instantly I was in love. He was so sweet. We were told that we would have him for at least 6 months because of the dad’s drug screen. Let me give you a little background of our lives at this point. John’s mom had a massive heart attack in June of 2004. She literally died – John gave her CPR and she was life flighted to North East Georgia where they put in 2 stints. When the doctor came out to talk to the family, he was unsure of what kind of brain damage she would have due to the length of time that she went without oxygen. She was showing some signs of brain damage but until she became fully awake, it was unknown. She spent 12 days in the hospital, mostly in ICU. But she was OK. She was very weak and her life would change tremendously but she was OK. The only “brain damage” she had was short term memory loss. She would be saying something and then she would forget. She also lost a certain period of memory. She can’t remember anything approximately 2 months prior to the heart attack. In order for her to be closer to doctors, John’s parents moved in with us. They moved in with us the end of June. Everyone knew that we had made the commitment to foster parenting and we all agreed that we would deal with it as the time came. Talk about a stressful situation. We had so many ups and downs during the month of June. And we were awaiting our first call. So – back to the story.
We had John’s parents living with us and we were taking care of a newborn baby. I took off 1 week from work, my mom was going to take off 1 week, my cousin was going to take off 1 week, and my aunt was going to take off 1 week to keep Robert. He was too young to go to daycare at that point. The church gave us a baby shower for Robert and also gave him his first Bible. Everyone fell in love with him. His biological father was supposed to have a visit with him one afternoon. We took him to DFCS and waited for 15 minutes. He never showed up. We were called 10 days later and told that the drug screen on dad was a false reading and Robert would be released to him that day. We were devastated. This was our worst fear. It was like a funeral at our house. We had to decide what we wanted him to take home with him, how many outfits, bottles, pacifiers, stuffed animals, etc. People had been so generous but yet so understanding. We sat and cried all day before having to take him back. We met Robert’s biological dad at DFCS. We gave him all the information, signed the appropriate paper work, and said our goodbyes. John gave him the Bible and told him that he had highlighted some verses in it for Robert. Even though our hearts were broken, we felt OK with the situation. We got back home and within a few minutes our phone rung. It was the actual director of DFCS. Robert’s biological Dad had been pulled over by the police and his license showed that he was wanted in Texas. Would we take Robert back if he had to be taken back into DFCS custody? We waited and waited for another phone call. Finally the caseworker called back around 9:00 and said that it had all been a mistake. Robert’s biological father was cleared. We still wonder to this day about Robert; where he is now, what he looks like, has or will he ever be told that we took care of him for 10 days of his very young life, etc. In order to survive foster parenting, you have to let it go. You have to believe in your heart of hearts that you have done the very best for the child while they are in your home. You give them love and then let them go.