So, let's bring us up to date! Whew! The woman who took my children is no longer involved in the case. I found out that she is actually the children's father's Aunt, but I don't know if that has anything much to do with my case. I don't know if he somehow asked her to take the children so he could gain custody. Maybe, but probably not. She asked a lot of questions about where he was when she was coming out. I told her for his safety I couldn't tell her (long story there) She got very mad at me for not telling her and said a bunch of stuff about how he needed to help out with his children and I should force him to help me. She didn't really understand that we were together and the fact was he was being held under duress himself (like I said, long story)

I've been jumping thru so many hoops lately. I had to go for one evaluation already, where I was practically accused of being addicted to Rum, but anyone that knows me knows I'm not a drinker. I drink on occasion, but not enough to talk about. I have a parenting evaluation to go to next. Should be interesting!

I get to visit my children 4 hours a week. My son is one place and I visit him on one day for 3 hours (because the foster parents get off work at 4 and he has to be in bed by 7) and then my daughters are with my grandma and she is very finicky, so I see the girls 2 days a week... 2 hours each day. One day I should up 15 minutes early and she made me wait outside in the cold until exactly 4:30 and threatoned to take away my rights to see the children at all! Needless to say, I'm going to call my case manager about that one. I don't think the state will see 15 minutes early as being a problem.

But, I'm working very hard to see the day that my children can come home to our new house. We will gather around our brand new fireplace in the winter and place on our new swingset in the summer. It will be a great time! And I just seriously can't wait!

So, after the children were taken I showed up at a Family Support Team meeting (from here on out I'll just call that an FST meeting, and they happen a lot!) The children's father was there, with his cousin who swore up and down she was his fiance and didn't understand why I had the legal right to kick her out of the room. He didn't say a dang thing the entire time. I flipped thru my papers and explained that I was lied about on numourous occasions. Everyone else there acted like they were against the woman who took my children, but then again, they weren't racing to send my children back home either.

The next day was my first day in court. The judge looked thru his papers and told me that I had to clean my house. I was really puzzled. I knew that I was a clutter maniac and had some issues, but 'dirty house'? I went home and my family and friends helped me make my house uber clean. Then I went to see my court appointed lawyer.

When I went to see her she was really scatterbrained and not really with it. She left the room a lot. One of the times she was gone I noticed a pile of papers with a picture of my daughter on the top. My picked them up and was filled with horror! Pictures of my home over the past 2 years were on these pages! I messy corner here... a day we left our dirty lunch on the table to run off to an appointment quickly there. SOMEONE was coming into my home while I was gone and snapping pictures of the worst of times. Then had compiled them all together and made it look like they were an all one day occurance! When the lawyer came back I showed them to her and began to cry. She told me that there was nothing I could do about it and that it would be best if I just left the matter to rest and signed anything the state wanted me to so that I could get my children back quicker. I was very upset.

I'm going to try to remain totally subjective here and not let my personal feelings and views get in the way of this. But, I feel that it is important for my readers to know how all of this got started.

First of all I had a massive flooding in my home. My OD had a friend spend the night and someone got up in the middle of the night and turned the bathroom sink on and left it running all night long. This child also got to playing with the toilet paper and plugged up the overflow drainage hole. So, the result was, by morning, I was walking in squishiness and half of what I owned downstairs was ruined! So, I went to my landlady and told her my problem and she agreed to come and assess the damage. The damage was frightful! I couldn't even let my children down on the floor to play in this mess. But, anyhow the landlady walked in and told me that the mess was so bad she would be calling DFS on me. So, I buckled down to begin cleaning the mess. My best friend took my children for the day and my dad and brother came to give me a hand. It was awful! But, we got it taken care of, and the next day the social worker showed up. She acted really nice, until she discussed my case with the landlady, and then her attitude towards me changed. She started showing up to my house a lot after that, dropping by to mention that it smelled like a dead body in my home, saying I had too many clothes for my children, too few... just stuff like that.

Then my Nurses for Newborns lady came out and we were chatting about an accident my 2 year old had just went through. My 2 year old doesn't really understand a lot of basic commands because she is developmentally delayed. I can't just tell her 'No' because she doesn't understand that. I have to physically remove her from dangerous situations. And, well, she was climbing on the counter next to the stove and I was taking her down. When I went to get her again, she flipped out of my arms and hit the stove top anyways and got burnned on her arms. I was really upset, but she didn't really do it anymore, and the damage wasn't really that bad. So, I didn't think anymore of it, except to ask my Nurse if there are safety items available for a stovetop to make it safer for if a child climbs next to the stove. She went back to her main office and gave DFS a call. The social worker brought out the police and they took pictures and measured the stove rings and the burn marks and all that. I didn't get what they were doing, but oh well... right? Then she sent me for a drug test. I was shocked. As a neighbor quoted to me, I've probably got the cleanest 'piss' in the world, so I wasn't worried. My only problem was that they were making me late for my OD girl scout meeting and I was co leader, I NEEDED to be there!

The following day I decided to take a little break, I fed my kids and my DS fell asleep in his highchair so I decided to let him sleep and sat in my front doorway where I could see and hear him if he woke up. My daughters were playing outside with their friends (This was in September of 200 and my friends were chit chatting with me. Then up drives the social worker and 2 police cars! They stepped out, threw a package of papers at me and told me that I'd had to many calls on me for that month and they were taking my children! I was in shock. My OD started to wail and scream and cry. My neighbors all came out for the entertainment this was providing them. I felt so degraded... I was ashamed for my poor children.

That pretty much sums up how they were taken. I want people to know, you don't have to be a 'bad' parent for this to happen to you. Please ask you family to help you when you fall on rough times, don't count on anyone that you can't trust to help you through the hard spots, because you can always do your best. But, sometimes that's not good enough. Please take a lesson from my story. I'd hate to see this happen to you.