Grandparents Raising Children Support Group
This community is dedicated to grandparents who are the primary caregivers of their grandchildren. In cases where the parents are not willing or able to provide adequate care for their children, grandparents may take on the role of primary caregivers. Join the support group to find support, share your experience, and get advice from other members.
today my daughters rights to her son that we have been raising under guardianship for 4 years have been terminated. The supposed bio-dad was terminated last spring. This was the 4th court appearance and she did not appear for 3 of them. This is a very difficult day for me as well as a day of relief that GS is ours to adopt. we are attempting to set a precidence in the State of Michigan to have him now placed in State jurisdiction in our custody. Our guardianship has been dissolved. It is a very scarey step, but one necessary for him to receive adoption subsidy. I have support of State Administrative foster supervisor and my probate judge will be asking her for guidance. I will surely keep all of you grands with guardianship informed.
deleted_user
I'm sorry..it hurts all the way around but there is a sense of relief. It is very confusing!! did they terminate because it has been so long? Keep us posted.
grandmagrandma
termination was based mainly on no support and inconsistent visits with long periods of absences. nomadic lifestyle substance abuse, failure to respond to summons, no appearing for 3 hearings, reporting false address to the court. and the fact that she failed to respond to the termination and adoption of her first child when her step mom adopted her last year. the judge entered many things into his judgement, but non-support and lack of contact and parenting were what we were able to file with. The statute used to terminate is abandonment under the neglect/abuse statute. she will carry that the rest of her life as a matter of record. all of this was explained to her in detail and I tried to convince her to voluntarily surrender. she chose to do nothing.
daisydduck
It surely is a day mixed with joy and sadness for you. What do you mean by State Jurisdiction? Do you mean he is a ward of the state?
grandmagrandma
Yes Daisy he is ( or will be when all logistics are worked out. Since the beginning of the termination/adoption he has been a ward of the court with us remaining as his guardians. Now that he is free to adopt, we are attempting to make him a ward of the State, placed with us as his foster parents until the appeal periods and adoption are complete. That way he will qualify for State subsidy. It involves risk, but I have my back covered and the judge is double checking.
deleted_user
We are guardians now of our grands. We have met with a state adoption specialist because our caseworker feels that it is likely we will be able to adopt at some point also. She explained that if that occurs there would be a short time that the children become wards of the state and that is difficult to accept but necessary for the state to provide assistance. I haven't learned much more about it because she indicated that we need to give the bios a few more years to get their act together before we move forward.
grandmagrandma
Paddle-what State are you in, because I had to do all this research myself. Even the Probte Judge was unaware of this. He has been a ward of the county/court since last November when we filed, but still could not access benefits unless he were made ward of the state, which we have to do under special judicial orders. Scarey isnt the word for it. I dreamed last night that SS cam in and took Grandson just because they could, even temporarily.
deleted_user
I'm in WI and I have to give credit to our caseworker. She has been very helpful.
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