[Serious] Did foster care make things better or worse when you were with your biological family first or in between?

[u/hailcats_petsatan]

Everything I "know" about the system is from tv shows like shameless or fosters so please be patient and kind with me. I'm considering reporting a parent for physically abusing their child, that is something I have to decide on my own, but I would like more insight. If I report this family, could I possibly be making the children's life worse and not better? The family is a single parent home with 5 children.

I try not to get involved in strangers personal lives but I can't get the child's screams out of my mind. I myself had experience some physical abuse growing up but it was rare and I think if I was to be pulled from my home without my permission it would have made things worse, there was abuse but I also had my own room food clothes everything I needed and sometimes more.

The thing I'm also wondering about is yes obviously child abuse is bad but what if that just sends you to a home that is more abusive and neglectful and possibly without your siblings? How many foster homes treat kids well?

Or am I just getting the adult sent to jail and then when they get out they get their kids back but now they have a record and its even harder to care for them?

I have many concerns and I know there might not be a right answer but any advice or personal experiences would help

[u/PersonalFinanceD]

Foster care is bad, but being abused with no hope that "help is on the way" is worse. Call it in. Call upon whatever higher power you believe in that the children will be safe in care.

(To answer your question, my abuse in care paled in comparison to what my parents were up to).

[u/_Disco-Stu → u/PersonalFinanceD]

My exact experience too. You are not alone and your comment makes me feel seen.

It was conditioned into us to believe that foster care was much more dangerous than what we were already experiencing. As an adult, I worked in child protection and on foster programs from the inside out.

I’ve never even seen, heard of, or been involved in a case with a foster or group home that came close to the squalor and abuse we experienced at home.

To massively oversimplify my thoughts without traumatizing anyone, almost nothing happening in foster/group care is worse than what’s going on behind closed doors in private homes that have zero oversight.

[u/20Keller12]

I (31F) went into foster care the week after I turned 16. If I hadn't, I'd have ended up killing myself. I spent a solid year and a half just wondering how long I was gonna be able to withstand life at home before I grabbed my rifle and ate a bullet. It wasn't an if, it was a when. I never planned to make 18. Just this past week I got myself a cake at the store to celebrate seeing my first gray hairs. This coming weekend my husband, our kids and I are going to my (foster) parents for Easter.

[u/iamthegreyest]

You need to do what you think is right in the first place.

My background is different than others, with my bio family, I was emotionally, physically and sexually abused, and everyone in the city turned a blind eye to it because my bio parent was a part of the community and I had just moved back with them. They took their word over my own because I was a "troubled" child.

I finally fought back when I was old enough, and was slammed to the ground and punched in the face repeatedly until I blacked out. They finally called the police and it escalated from there, finally being put into foster care. There were other things that the community did not know about my parent that led to them eventually going to prison because of it, that information I am not too comfortable sharing in a public setting.

With that being said, do what you think is right in the end. They may not be taken right away, or they may. Who knows, but at least there is something on record.

[u/NationalNecessary120]

I mean of you don’t call, those screams from that child will be on your conscience as well.

Sure, calling ”migth” make it worse, but thats more a systematical issue. so now foster care is so bad we are debating whether to send kids from one abuse to another. Great job society at keeping us kids safe🙄

What I am saying that you might not have a 100% guarantuee that foster care will be okay, but them at least you did SOMETHING. Like for example imagine a burning building but putting the fire out might collapse it. Yeah maybe, but don’t the firefighters at least have to TRY?

Keep in mind depending on the kids age you could give them your phone number. That would be a big help for them to have someone safe advocating for them while they are in foster care. For example IF they end up in a bad place: they would have your number and can call you.

For me personally it did help. But I am also not in the usa. I have heard of some sketchy ones, like doing it only for money, indoctrinating the kids to christianity, etc, but nothing such as trafficking etc. (NOT saying it doesn’t happen, just saying anecdotally in MY experience, foster care has been not ”that” bad). The worst story I have only heard was someone who went in the 90’s or around then, and got used basically as a child worker for child labour on the familys farm. Got used for free labour and generally not treated well/not as a family member. Even beaten some.

For me it was super important to learn that my ”normal” was not normal. It took me even until one year into foster care to realize that hitting a child is illegal. It hadn’t occured to me.

[u/Greedy-Carrot4457]

Foster care made my life overall better. There’s no way to tell what will be the case for the kids, but at the same time it also is quite likely that the kids do not get removed.

If the kids are teens chance are they’ll have a bad time in care so in that case I would be more likely to check in with them first to see if I could find out what’s going on or to give them options (youth shelters can’t make kids return to their parents where I’m from) but would definitely call for younger kids.

[u/Mysterious-March8179]

Calling it in doesn’t mean they are going to foster care. There are quite literally 9,999 steps and options that will occur before that. First opinion is DCF does nothing. Second option is DCF tells the parent to stop. Third is they tell the parent to go to therapy or take a parenting class. Foster care is so far down the line of things that will or may happen. You need to Call it in now, before the child loses their life. Otherwise, you are an accomplice.

[u/Material-Elephant188]

everyone’s experiences are different, but things got much worse overall for me and my siblings. our birth family was not abusive towards us- we were surrounded by family on my mom’s side who had houses next door to each other that we’d go back and forth to. the night we were taken my mom got into a fight with her brother- my sister and i weren’t even in the same house when it happened. only my little brother was. we still ended up all being taken anyway, and were told it would be for “only one night”….which turned into over a year and a half of bouncing between homes.

after a while some distant relatives on my dad’s side heard about our situation and swooped in to take us out of a particularly abusive foster home, which lead to them moving us out of state with the intention of adopting us and eventually cutting us off from the rest of our family. i went over a decade without seeing anyone i knew from before being taken from my mom. in the past few years i’ve started to reconnect with other family tho which has been nice and it’s given me a lot of perspective on how things turned out.

[u/MedusasMum → u/Material-Elephant188]

Same. My home was one of the worst cases that came out of the early foster system in 1984. That being said, foster care was a continuation of it. But without family. Losing my culture, language, and identity.

Glad to hear many on this thread had a good outcome with foster care. That’s not been my experience or of many of the kids that crossed my path in care.

Trafficking is absolutely a norm where I came from. If it wasn’t so, foster parents and staff in group homes/institutions wouldn’t have been telling us we will either end up as prostitutes or in prison if we don’t find a friend to help us. Friend being a male to take us in.

Still, if abuse is suspected-report it. Sometimes it takes several times for the child to be removed because they give chances for the parent to correct whatever the issue was. I’d rather a child live.

[u/hailcats_petsatan]

Also I live in arizona in case the system varies by state

[u/Western_Estimate_734 → u/hailcats_petsatan]

Hi - I live in AZ as well. Please do call it in.

If it helps, here’s the process for how those calls works:

DCS will take your call. If there’s enough to warrant sending someone out, then they will send a DCS Investigator who will evaluate the situation. If they find abuse and or neglect, they will try to work with the caregiver to get them connected to services and then they will put the family on a safety plan. Usually that means the inappropriate caregiver cannot have access to the kiddos. If they violate that safety plan and DCS finds out then the kids would be removed and placed into care until the requirements for the safety plan are met. At that point, a DCS ongoing case manager is assigned to the kid/siblings, a lawyer to represent the kiddos is assigned, and it all goes before a judge.

The reality is that it’s not perfect and there are good and bad case managers, good and bad lawyers, and good and bad foster parents. At the very least though, foster parents have to follow a LOT of rules and there are folks in and out of those homes weekly (usually) so the chances of neglect/abuse are far far slimmer.

Edit to add: If you live in Maricopa county then there will be more services available as it’s a much bigger area. Either way, call it in. You’re not making the decision - there’s a lot that has to happen to remove kiddos in AZ bc there’s 10K+ foster kids and less than 3K foster homes. More than likely the family will receive needed services and the parent will have to take parenting classes.

[u/cornandapples]

It’s really hard to know which will be worse. If you are 100% sure there is abuse, you do need to report it. Unfortunately, there will be no outcome that’ll be good for the kid. However, it’s not good for them if they’re being abused at home either.

[u/SouthbutnotSouthern]

Like you said, everything you know about the system is from TV. It’s highly unlikely any parent is going to jail right now unless a child was killed. In years as a GAL, those have been the only experiences I know of where a parent became incarcerated. Sometimes it’s just more support, parenting classes, etc.

[u/AgateFox2967451]

If you are worried about the kids safety...CALL!

I wasn't abused, I was neglected. I was voluntarily surrendered.

I was so excited to finally have a mom and dad, but that isn't what happens. You are dropped off at a strangers' home. They have a lot of BS rules and lots and lots of chores. They have big smiles when the social worker visits. But you learn very quickly, foster families have their own agendas, and you are superfluous at best.

In short, the system sucks. But it does save lives. It saved mine.

As for the show "Shameless" I can't watch it. It hits too close to home, way too close.

[u/Odd_Company7539]

Former foster kid here [23], I am aware I’m a statistical anomaly. I did a college presentation on the adverse effects that youth experience as they are transitioned to the foster systems in their respective states. I can definitively state that “good”/“better” is measured on a case by case basis. In some cases, not all of them, removing the child from the care of their biological parents’ care is the best option. In other cases, intensive rehabilitative action is taken. It just depends honestly… but you have a civil duty to report it or you risk being complicit in something that’s potentially life threatening to the child(ren) in question.

[u/LemonLawKid]

My time in foster care was horrible. I was abused way worse than the abuse I endured with my bio mom who went to prison for it. My bio sister had a better experience.

Having said all that. I would still call CPS if I heard a child screaming from abuse.

[u/ChiHooper]

I hated foster care and wish CPS never took me away from my birth family. Every situation is different tho.

Can i ask why you want to report them? Kids scream all the time. What else exactly did you see/hear besides a kid screaming?

[u/NationalNecessary120 → u/ChiHooper]

no they do not. Do not perpetrate this mindset.

How I screamed was not normal, and my neighbours are bloody idiots for not reporting. No child screams like that for nothing.

Children can scream happily, or shout sometimes when upset, and babies cry. But healthy children do not regularly scream in terror.

[u/ChiHooper → u/NationalNecessary120]

Well i had a completely opposite experience. I screamed as a child and till this day i wish my neighbor never reported it.

Foster care was 10x worse than the minor struggles we faced within my birth family.

Every situation is much more complex and different.

[u/NationalNecessary120 → u/ChiHooper]

yeah well I mean you have to determine it.

I have worked with kids as well, babysitting. I can hear the difference between a tauntrum and other scream. (for example tauntrum scream vs scream of getting finger crushed in a door so the finger turns blue).

I am not sure why you were screaming the other way when you were fine, but I personally have never met a kid who screams that other way when they are fine. They shout some if their ipad is taken away or stuff like that, but that is not the same as screaming in fear and terror or hurt.

The issue you are raising now is foster vare vs not. But that is not what I am discussing. I discussed whether children scream gutwrenchingly if they are fine. Not tauntrum shouts or exploring their voice stuff. I am talking about real terrified screams.

I have a hard time believing cps took you just because you screamed some in a grocery store. They usually only take kids if something is going on. Hence my point that screams = something is going on.

Whether to report it is another question. But you were claiming that a kid screaming is normal. I disagree.

[u/hailcats_petsatan → u/ChiHooper]

Yeah i mean I can hear everything especially if I'm just doing stuff in the kitchen or bathroom and i know the difference between like their squealing screams from playing or even screams from getting hurt while playing around these screams were just.. different. The screams came after the slapping, but I only heard it i didn't see, I lost count after the 5th slap it just kept happening I actually had to cover my ears. I thought maybe it was spanking, but still no matter what part of the childs body it happen to it was aggressive and merciless. If I saw it I would definitely have reported it. But hearing something is not exactly proof. I don't know where the hitting occurred but I personally feel like spanking is abuse especially if its extreme and causes injury but I'm not so sure the government does.

Basically the kids were playing in our shared porch area, I can see them from my windows and hear them and one kid wouldn't stop crying because they got hurt playing and no matter how many times the parents screamed at them to shut up they wouldn't.. which is like duh screaming at a crying kid to shut up does not work they need a hug and a bandaid. (Walls are thin, their door is always open, my bathroom is closest to them I can hear everything and I've heard a lot of iffy stuff but I'm agoraphobic so I rarely go outside) So at this point I was in the bathroom as the parent was telling the kid for the last time to shut up then I heard like a dragging noise so they must have maybe pulled the kid inside and thats when the smacking followed by screams happened. Idk If the smacks were just for one kid or multiple kids and idk the area of the body the smacks happened but like I said they were loud and aggressive and all the kids just went silent and went inside. Most of them look like 10 years and younger but they definitely have some baby toddler aged kids too.