The Waiting Game

So the very next day, I packed up the boys, and they went to their respective new homes.

Nope.  

Not even close.  

That's not how it works in the ol' family court biz.

W's father, while still doing "very well," was still testing dirty on his weekly drug tests.  "I'm doing much better," he told me when I was dropping W off for a visit that the father didn't cancel for once, "I'm only smoking pot now."

Oh, I feel much better now.

The "grandmother" was planning on adopting the oldest and Baby O, but first she had to be made a foster parent (kinship, sorta... or at least that is what they were calling it).  And before she could be made a foster parent, her house had to be certified and opened and all that.

This, too, took a long time, but I didn't understand why.

It was now two months that we had had the boys.  School was going to start soon for me, and I needed to think about daycare, at least for W during the day. After trying to call for Baby O, I was unceremoniously told that there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell of me getting even part-time daycare for an infant (Baby O was 11 months old now).  W, on the other hand, was easier.  He was three-and-a-half and I found an opening very quickly.

I filled out the paperwork for the county, sent them to the case planner, and waited to hear back.

And waited.  And waited.

Eventually, it was suggested by my friend, a veteran foster mom, to call the county directly to find out what the hold up was because the paperwork shouldn't have taken more than a week or two.

When I called, they said they had no paperwork.  The case planner hadn't submitted it.

I called her, but I was told she was on vacation (again).  I explained what was happening, and I was put on hold for a long, long time.  The secretary was literally going through the case planner's desk, looking for the paperwork.

After thirty minutes, she came back, saying she found it on her desk and would submit it.  

When the case planner got back from vacation, she told me she never bothered to submit it because she didn't think the boys would be staying that long.  Um, yeah, thanks.

Eventually, we got W into daycare.  He loved it.  It allowed Tiernen to focus on Baby O during the day and it gave us both a break. When he got home, he was happy from a day of playing and wasn't as needy.  He did, however, start to have horrible tantrums where he would hit and kick both me and Tiernen.

We loved them, but we were so very tired.

August became September.  I took the boys out shopping and bought them long pants and shirts and jackets for the fall since they had spent the summer with me in shorts and t-shirts.  

Two weeks after W started daycare, the case planner called.  She said that even though the plan was for W to go to his dad, all three boys were going to grandma for the time being.  She gave me a date:  September 10.

After nine weeks, the waiting game was over.

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.