In divorces, we see malicious parenting from time to time, where one parent tries to turn the kids against the other parent. It's more competitive parenting than cooperative parenting, and there has been some controversy over what to do about it. Most birth parents have som eawareness that it's not good to try to use the kids against the other parent, but when it comes to foster parents, this is not necessarily so clear. Too often, I find myself having to talk a foster parent out of working against the birth parent and their reunification plan.
The foster parents in this situation think they have an exception to the general rule that children should not be made to believe that their DNA comes from flawed stock. A basic understanding of heredity is practically instinctive in our society, as we start from babyhood in telling a child that they have their mother's nose, their father's hair, and their grandpa's artistic ability. The best childhood is one where the child has an idyllic belief that their parents are perfect. Bursting the bubble that Mom and Dad are not perfect is best left as long as possible, in most circumstances.
However, in many foster situations, the child has come into foster care by virtue of a situation where it is inescapeable that their parent has a flaw. Everyone knows the child's birth parent's flaws, and it's demeaning, embarassing and frightening for the children. If the foster parents want to view themselves as better than the birth parents, they don't mind pointing out the birth parent's flaws and actively opposing reunification. Hopefully they are doing this out of earshot of the kids, but being kids, they will be eavesdropping about anything that involves themselves and their family. And even if they don't say it out loud, if the foster parents believe that the children's parents are fatally flawed and incapable of improvement, it comes through in how they handle their fostering.
So many foster parents want to adopt. A few are doing it for other reasons, but in every situation where I've been consulted where the foster parent is certain that they are the best influence on the child and the parent should be withheld from the child at all costs, it has been one of the situations where the foster parent is hoping for a long term relationship with the child, a hope that is contrary to letting the birth parent improve thier situation and reunify with teh child. The foster parents in this situation are certain that it is a bad thing for the foster agency to get counseling and treatment for the birth parent, encourage visits between the birth parents and the children, and create a reunification plan.
Unfortunately, this is a mistaken belief. if the birth parents can be rehabilitated and have the motivation to do the work to get there, then even if it disrupts a happy foster family environment, even if it puts the kids back in a very low income situation, it is best for the children to know that the people who provided the heredity to them, are not fatally flawed. A foster parent who undermines birth parents is engaging in a variation on the divorce wars with an evil custody battle. Trashing birth parents in a foster situation is easier than in a divorce sitaution because in a foster sitaution, there is a government agency has stepped in to remove the child from the parent and given it to the foster parent. Some people take this as proof that the foster parent has superior parenting ability, and therefore that if they want to interfere with the foster agency's plan to reunify the kids with the birth parents, that this is their right. It is now.
But how do I advise a foster parent who is smugly claiming to me that the foster agency is wrong and must be prevented from letting the child visit with the birth parent? It helps to acknowledge that the foster parent clearly has more skills that the child needs right now, but that the job of fostering requires them to support the child's needs, and the need for the possibility that their birth parent is salvageable, is important. The child needs some things from the birth parent, and it is the foster parent's job to let the professionals, the social workers, judges, therapists, determine how much the birth parent is able to provide those things. I explain that the foster parent must encourage this, and to do otherwise is to show that they lack the one most basic parenting instinct, the instinct to protect the child from harm... in this case, the harm of believing that their DNA, their heritage, is flawed. I explain that if their goal is to adopt, the way to make it happen is not to oppose the foster agency and judges who will be making the decisions on termination of parental rights.
Finally, I explain that it is not a matter of letting the government choose what is best, but rather of keeping the government out of our personal lives, and therefore only removing children from the custody of people who will cause harm. I explain that it's a matter of figuring out whether the birth parents are capable of raising children without damaging them, but otherwise allowing those birth parents to make the decisons on how to raise thier own children.
It is a fine line that a person has to walk, who takes care of someone else's children while that someone else is having problems. You want to be the best possible parent, and yet, that role is not clear. By the time you get to know the kids as a foster parent, you are too close to be an objective evaluator of the birth parents. You may collect and supply information to the experts who make the decisions, but otherwise, you must defer to the experts. And if you cooperate and work together as a team, rather than fighting them and disagreeing with every move they make, it is much more likely that the RIGHT thing will happen for this specific child in this specific situation.
If you are the right person for this child's life, it will happen, but only if you let it, not if you force it, and certainly not if you harm the child by treating the child's birth parents like they are flawed, incompetent, and not good providers of DNA. The foster parent becomes a true parent when they are willing to do what's best for the child, even if that means letting the child go. What it all boils down to is that the foster parent will be enough of a parent to adopt only after they conclude that they are not perfect and that someone else can and should make the decision of which parents the child should have. It's one of those situations where letting go of control is the thing that ultimately gets you what you want.
Isn't that the way it always is when love is involved?
No comments:
Post a Comment