CPS knocked on our door.
For someone who worked in the system, meeting traumatized children who had been ripped away from their homes by CPS, this was a rather scary experience.
After all, we aren't foster parents any more. We're the parents of a 14-month-old girl, and our first thought was that CPS was coming for her.
It was terrifying. We tried to play it cool, but inside we were shaking.
The guy seemed confused. He was looking for foster parents, and we said we weren't anymore. He told us he was here with an allegation regarding "another foster child, not her," pointed to our daughter. I wanted to snatch her up and say, "Oh no, she's not a foster child!" (Subtext: so you can't take her!)
Except, of course, they can. Did we as a society really intend to give that power to the government?
Of course we had nothing to fear. The allegation regarded Sophia, from "about a year ago." (They last lived here 16 months ago.)
The allegation was that my wife took a photo of Sophia naked, in Sophia's bedroom. And she hadn't, so that was that. The investigator said he was puzzled to be here at all - even if we had taken a photo, he said, "parents take naked pictures of their children all the time."
We told him we were sure foster parents couldn't do that. He shrugged and said, "There's no allegation of misconduct, no sexual abuse or anything. Just the photo."
This led us to make some calls. Our foster agency didn't call us back, but I'm not a reporter for nothing. I found out the children are no longer with our foster agency. So they've been moved again. My heart breaks for them.
Someone is going to interview Sophia at DSS, and then the investigator will come back. I wanted, urgently, to say to him, "Does she remember us??"
But that door is closed.
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