Unfortunately there must be a TPR (Termination of Parental Rights) before a child can be placed up for adoption and be placed in the perfect family to provide he or she with TLC (Tender Love and Care).

For hundreds of reasons children enter the Foster system daily. It can be from simple neglect, accusations of abuse right down to a number of typical reasons.

It is in how the parents of the child work with the Case Worker and attend visitations that will determine if custody will be given back to the parents.

It is in these cases that Foster Parents are needed. Good Foster homes to keep children safe during transition from bio home to foster care are needed more and more as the growing number of children placed into the system grows larger.

I remember walking down the hall for the court hearing of my foster children's TPA. The kids were requested to be present but not allowed to stay in the court room. My husband and I sat quietly and listened to the Social workers and therapists as they told of the neglect the children had suffered.

We looked around the room and there were no sign of the birth parents. They didn't even show up. Our children sat quietly out side the court room and played. Watching and waiting for someone they might know from their birth family to show up.

After the hearing was over and the judge relinquished all rights and awarded full custody to the state. We left the court room. Our children sat quietly as their attorney explained that mom and dad didn't show up so the judge said they would be up for adoption into another family.

When the attorney left the slaps and teasing began and we could see that the children were going to act out their feelings upon each other if we did not intervene.

We have had the children for almost a year at this point and we pretty much were your full crowded, run of the mill family. The kids called us mom and dad. We kidded them and told them we were going to keep them forever and ever. On this day we seemed to hit the forever button in time.

We found ourselves sitting there watching and feeling for our children. When they hurt we hurt also. We could feel them that day. Our own hearts were breaking for them.

With our obviously goofy since of humor we looked at the kids and said "So now that this is done. Do you kids think maybe you would like to adopt us"? For a moment the kids looked back and forth at each other and then broke out in giggles and we heard at least three of them chant "Yes".

There were seven children all biological siblings taken into custody on that same day. All except these three went into other foster homes. Two other girls were lucky and got placed in the same home together. There was one young boy we had fostered for a little while and we thought about him. How angry he was and how he would scold the kids for just calling us mom or dad.

He was so dedicated to his birth parents that he just could not let it go. We at first talked as a family and decided to try and foster the other boy again and have him placed in our home also as a Pre Adopt Child.

It wasn't long before we found out that this boy in no shape or form wanted anything to do with anyone adopting him.

He told us "If you adopt me I will wait e till you are all sleeping and cut all your throats". Well most of the time you can just ignore some of the things a child will say when angry but this child was not angry. And we had already been exposed to what his temper can do to a home and family.

So with a sad heart we let the agency know that the child did not want to be adopted by us. It took about six months and we were the proud parents of two daughters 11 and 5 and a son 10.

The agency had removed the boy from our home and we could not contact him. That made us very sad as a family because we had always included him in all the holidays and weekends when he had been on good behavior and could have a family visit.

We spent the next few months being a family. No more Birth parent visits, no more agency except for counseling. We settled into a fun, hectic life style.

Even with the kids all settled in our home and the accumulations of toys and books, we still had a transition period. Our oldest daughter was the "Child too good to believe" and our other two decided they were going to make us sorry we had ever met them. (giggles) We will leave that for another blog.

With all else said We had to go through the TPR before we could get down to some good TLC and bond as a new family. Adoption is the best thing to happen to us as a couple. It's been a long journey but we would sign up for the trip again if ever given the chance.