The final visit

Being foster parents, you know in the back of your head, that every child placed into care may possibly be up for adoption.  The likelihood of that happening is very slim, but it still gives you hope.

Our journey has been far from easy, and these precious boys of ours (ages 8,6,3) have been through so much in their short life.  On Thursday May 4th, my boys had to say goodbye to the only parents they knew–their birth Mom and Dad.

Throughout the past year and half, they have looked forward to the visits with them every other week (even if the parents tested positive, CPS still let the visits happen) unless the parents cancelled, or didn’t show up.  They have gotten to know them in a supervised setting, and felt safe and secure knowing that nothing could happen during their hour visits.

On the day of the final visit, I told my boys I would be the one taking them and picking them up.  I let them know that since they were aware that their parents cancelled this “goodbye visit” twice already during the week, that if they cancelled this last and final chance, they would not get to say goodbye (per CPS rules/regulations).

I felt SUCH a relief when their birth parents showed up to the visit, because each one of my kids wanted to buy them gifts and give them things as well for them to remember them by.  Each one of my kids picked their own picture frames, with one of their favorite pictures that I printed for them to place inside the frames. My oldest foster son (8) also picked out a nice Jordan hat for his Dad, and some really nice earrings that he thought his Mom would like as well.

There were no tears shed before/during/after the visit from any of my kids at the final visit. My conclusion is that God protect them that day.  I prayed hard that God protect their precious hearts and cover them with His goodness during these hard times, and that prayer was more than answered.  I feel like they had cried all they could before the visit took place, that when it actually happened, they were okay.

If the biological parents don’t appeal the termination of rights, then we get to move forward with adoptions and that would start the process in July.

Thank you for just having the rights words to say to us during this time, and for always being so uplifting and encouraging.

©2017 Sheridan Johnson @Journey with the Johnsons. All Rights Reserved.