Generations in Care

When you grow up in foster care and become a mother, your greatest hope is that you’ll get to be your child’s Mommy. Yet parents who grew up in foster care are at high risk of having their own children removed. Rise’s “My Story, My Life” writing workshops are for young mothers who grew up in care. Stories here describe the painful relationship between child welfare systems and the mothers they helped raise — and what it takes to keep children safe at home.

‘I Was Denied the Right to Keep My Family Intact’ – Black families like mine have been separated for generations

Black Lives Matter! A rallying cry to address the unjustifiable killing of people of color and the public’s disregard and avoidance of the reasons this issue remains rooted in our society. Media outlets are primarily reporting on police brutality, as they should; however systemic racism is pervasive in all American institutions, including child welfare. Every institutional encounter places the Black family at risk of separation. From public school teachers, medical staff, public housing, social services and the police, Black families cannot avoid scrutiny nor find relief or justice.

My niece has been in foster care in Erie County, NY for five years and will now be adopted by non-relatives. In violation of our family’s rights, I was never notified by the child welfare system that she was in care. 

My niece’s removal to foster care was a direct outcome of the ramifications of slavery and institutional racism. This statement may sound alarmist; however, my niece is only six generations removed from slavery, two generations removed from Jim Crow, and is a third generation experiencing the disruption of our family by the child welfare system.

Triggered – It’s hard to protect my daughter when I’m just learning to protect myself

In my family, chemical dependency and physical abuse were the tools we used to survive. That way of coping has been going strong in my family for decades. The result for my siblings and me was that we were removed and placed in foster care twice—first when I was 5 years old, and then for good when I was 8.

I grew up in the system with a powerful force inside of me: a burning desire … Read More

The Fear Stays With Me – Living my life right hasn’t made me feel safe from an investigation

It seems like I’ve been afraid of child protective services all of my life.

Growing up in the projects, we called CPS the “Parent Police,” and it was normal for the girls I knew to lose custody of their children because they were smoking weed, drinking or hanging out late. Many of my friends still don’t have custody of their children.

I grew up in foster care, and I lost my own son, … Read More

Still “Mommy” – I’m signing over guardianship but I’m not giving up on my kids

I lost my kids 6 years ago. On April 8th 2008 I went to court for a removal of the kids. My kids were 7, 6 and 2. That was basically the worst day of my life.

When I first had my kids I was living with my mother. Then, when my youngest was born, I went to the shelter with her father. We got an apartment together. But then he went to jail.

It was hard … Read More

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