Oxygen Mask

Erin and I talked about Bram going home constantly.  As far as I was concerned, we could continue with this co-parenting, weird foster set up forever.  She and Ibro were working hard on there recovery, attending daily counseling meetings, setting up new support networks for others in the community, and working their steps.  Her mantra was that we needed to take care of Bram during this time so she could work on herself so she could be there for all her children.  If that sounds selfish:  it's not.  She was doing the hard work she needed to battle her addiction. She was following the advice you hear on every airplane flight:  

"In case of a loss of cabin pressure, oxygen masks above your seat will deploy; 

please place the mask first and then assist your child or other passengers”

Why?  It's a pretty powerful metaphor for life, really.  If you don't take care of yourself, you are INCAPABLE of taking care of others.  If Erin didn't use the time that Bram was in foster care to learn the tools to deal with her recovery while raising three boys, she undoubtedly would have relapsed.  It is as simple as that.

On top of this, she was dealing with some serious health issues:  an impending surgery.  Her ex-husband (no Bram's dad) had broken her shoulder and she had gone through several surgeries to fix it (it was the opioids prescribed to her that caused her initial descent into addiction).  She had surgery scheduled in March and wanted to be able to manage the pain without the use of opioids at all.  Additionally, she would physically  not be able to lift Bram (who was getting to be a chubby boy!) for months while she was in recovery and physical therapy.  

It was her hope that he would be in foster care until she was cleared by the physical therapist by the end of the summer.  

It was NOT that she didn't want Bram home;  she did.  But she literally lived less than a ten minute walk from my house and saw him regularly.  The nature of our relationship allowed her to have access to him whenever her could.  Both the case planner and Bram's assigned DSS worker were on board with this (even though they both had no idea how close Erin and I were getting as friends or how often she was really coming over to see Bram).  They wanted to make sure she was 1) clean, and 2) healed physically.  

I figured since we were all on the same page, we'd have him for a while.