OH wants custody of baby niece?

[milkshakess]

So OH's younger sister has recently had a baby and there is possibility that the baby may end up in care.

She already has an 18 year olds on who has lived with their mum since he was 8.

She dips in and out of his life, she even forgot his last birthday, she hasn't really been a mum to him at all. Despite this he has turned out to be a lovely, smart and hard working lad.

Everyone was so surprised by the pregnancy.

From what we understand she was kept in hospital for 2 weeks whilst some kind of team were getting stuff ready for the baby.

I think the hospital staff were monitoring and observing her interact with the baby and something must of been flagged?

Her mum has sold her house and was due to move abroad in September but she had been visiting her and the baby at the hospital daily and helping.

OH isn't really close to his sister but he is close to her son, he calls OH the "best uncle" as him and the other uncles have all chipped into help raise him.
OH would sometimes not see his sister for years and she was always changing her number and would have to talk to her though her son.

Anyway the family don't want the baby to end up in care but everyone has young kids themselves ( we have toddlers and are trying for a 3rd).

OH wants to go for custody but the care would really fall on me and I work from home and have a very flexible job.

Just wanted input on the situation as OH and the family don't want the baby to go into care

Ignore her, @ThePieceHall. She’s trying to make you seem unreasonable so that people won’t question her bizarre rant.

if that's referring to me then I'm a bit confused, what exactly have I said that you would consider a bizarre rant?

Literally your entire post.

So when I said that it wasn't denigrating anyone to say that not every child not living with their birth mum will have special needs?

What is it that you want?

No, I'm simply pointing out the potential reality that too many people don't see. Care is a lottery, and too many children are shunted from foster home to foster home, an experience few survive intact.

If you are going to adopt, you need to be very aware of any damage that can have happened to babies who are available for adoption. Most adoption organisations are better that this now, but my step daughter and her husband adopted a child just before her second birthday who came from a background of neglect and had severe attachment disorder. It has been very, very difficult; and they have found out, by joining support groups that they are not alone.

The potential seriousness of the problems you can face were at one time glossed over and may still be. There is no support other than groups desperate parents have set up. Radio 4 - File on 4, I think - did a programme about it.

Know what you are getting into - if you do that, then you have a much better chance of things working out well.

Of course it’s important to understand a child’s background and be aware of the challenges ahead and the support network needed. I just think describing a child as ‘damaged’ - rather than a tiny human who has experienced neglect, trauma or abuse - is pretty grim.

Surely the sooner a child is placed in their permanent home the better.

A lot of issues come from kids who don't quite meet the threshold to be permanently removed. So end up growing up with foster carers and getting moved around.

Few children are adopted in the UK beyond the age of 4. Prospective parents want babies and toddlers.

If you had engaged with the points I was actually making, rather than the ideas you seem to have projected onto me, I am not sure if our points of view would even be so dramatically different.
I did actually experience two of the things you mention, although i don't think that is especially relevant to the primal wound idea that I was responding to.
That theory essentially argues that separation from the birth mother itself, regardless of any other factors, causes lifelong trauma in every single person with that experience. It makes sweeping universal claims without strong evidence for them, which is why it's controversial.
It isn't denigrating or denying the experiences of any adopted people to point that out.
Adverse childhood experiences are a different concept, and one that does have a much stronger evidence base for significantly increasing the risk of a range of difficulties. But even so, increased risk does not equal certainty, and I would still think it is unhelpful to treat it as though it does.
I still think it is better be as prepared as possible for every eventuality, to be aware of potential risk factors, and to be ready to support children’s individual needs and individual strengths as they become apparent, without making definitive declarations and assumptions that every child who has experienced any adversity will have high needs or develop problems in the future. That idea could risk things like having too low expectations of children, making them feel like their family circumstances must forever define them, or missing what they may be feeling and experiencing if it doesn't fit a pre determined idea.
None of that takes anything away from, or dismisses, the needs of children who do have high needs, nor do I think overgeneralising benefits those children either.

Well quite. It's not a bloody rescue greyhound we're talking about here!

Op have you managed to find out what that actual situation is?

This is key here, isn't it? It might well be that the OP's DP and sibilings have made assumptions about being able to pass the child around between them that will not even be allowed (much less good for the poor child). It seems likely that ther child's mother wants to retain parental "rights" (I'm using that rather than 'responsibility' because I don't think for a second this woman would be at all responsible but thinks she has "rights") but wants others to do all the hard rearing work - it's unlikely the situation envisaged by all concerned could possible happen.

We all know that adoption (all those imploring the OP to take the "beautiful little baby" and "She'll be your third" are doing so with zero knowledge of what's actually possible) is more than likely not going to transpire in this situation.

As others have suggested, the OP is likely - if she agrees to any sort of kinship caring - to be a nanny with zero "rights" herself.

I certainly don't think the family will be allowed by SW to pass the baby around.
That can't be in the child's best interests.

But SW must have some plan or ideas over the last 5 weeks.

Any update, @milkshakess ?
Thinking of you 💐

But they are damaged. If the brain can't form the right connections in those first crucial months - and this is the case for many children suffering from neglect - then the brain is damaged and that damage cannot be undone. It isn't a case of placing a child with compassionate parents who will undo this - it can't be undone. Parents can work to compensate, but the damage is there. 'Damage' was the word used by a very compassionate child psychologist for one of my granddaughters whose violent, destructive behaviour became almost impossible to manage. Well, impossible, tbh, but there was no alternative because believe me, there is no support out there. There are very few support networks.

I hate the word ‘damaged’ to describe traumatised children who have been left permanently harmed by their prenatal and early experiences. Our children are not computers with malfunctioning hard drives. They are living, breathing people who are not less than. Professionals don’t always understand the effect that their use of language has. Our children are not damaged goods. Sometimes, it’s okay to challenge the professionals who don’t live with our children 24/7, on their attitudes. They are not the experts in our children; we are. ‘Damage’ is such a damning, limiting, harmful and offensive term.

This isn’t quite true, there’s evidence that the cognitive development impact of neglect can be reversed if a child is placed with appropriate caregivers before they are 2 years old.

I take your point that there are real impacts on the brain and its development, and these aren’t always reversible, but they’re not always given either. I just think damaged implies a negative on the part of the child rather than the failure of the caregiver.

ETA I agree about the lack of support.

Just to point out that not all children are removed from their birth parents due to ‘neglect’. Very many are removed due to their exposure to drugs, alcohol and domestic violence in utero. The effects of drugs and alcohol on a growing foetus are irreversible. Similarly, babies in the womb respond with enhanced cortisol levels to chaos, dysfunction and domestic violence. Foetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) and neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) are not conditions that can be cured by loving parents. They are lifelong, disabling conditions of the brain that can have catastrophic effects on a person’s ability to function well in society. There is no building neural pathways through loving and therapeutic parenting that can ever cure FASD or NAS.

No, but we’re not talking about that for this baby.

FASD is irreversible but most babies with NAS do recover.

No, they don’t. My teen has NAS. She is blind as a result. It depends what you mean by ‘recover’.

ETA to add a link on outcomes for NAS/NOWS pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31653310/ Essentially, it’s complicated! Whereas FASD is more straightforward. Yet another example of how, if alcohol were discovered now, it would be immediately banned.

I’m sorry to hear that. It’s not the case that every baby will recover no. But most do get through withdrawal and some remain at risk of cognitive and developmental delays. It’s hard to definitely evidence though, as there are lots of confounding variables given the population who most experience NAS and NOWS, and the varied impact of different substances.

Have you swallowed ChatGPT? Honestly, you really don’t know what you are talking about. I could Google as well. NAS and FASD cause irreversible, lifelong brain damage. I don’t know why you want to keep arguing that all conditions can be loved away. They can’t. You are actually spreading a lot of disinformation that is harmful to adoptive families and prospective adoptive families.

This is so hard. Your husbands family do sound supportive and have rallied round child 1. There’s every right to assume they’ll help out again. This is where I think the biggest question lies (you where planning baby 3 so was already prepared to adjust anyway). Is do you take in this baby and sacrifice the 3rd child you where planning on. 38 is very close to your fertile window shutting if it hasn’t already. The decision not to take in this little girl may be one you deeply regret especially since you want a girl. I know it’s not the same as having your own but can I just say how lovely you sound. You’re very complimentary to child 1 and I can tell you have deep love and pride in how he’s turned out. You don’t sound bitter, resentful or angry this has happened. I think you’ve expressed very normal and genuine feelings about what it means if you did. I would have a frank talk with hubby and express the sorrow you feel if this means you won’t be having baby 3 & exactly what ground rules for SIL when it comes to dipping in and out her life