As I said in my first post, Baby Girl had a big court date on August 7th. It was an MBI or Manifest Best Interest, decision. This was to determine if they would TPR bio mom. (TPR = termination of parental rights)
We were required to be there with Baby Girl. Our state has recently passed a law that the children have to be at the court hearings. I have mixed feelings about this, but that is for a later post. Baby Girls case manager told us that the judge would probably have questions for us as well. As Baby Girls bio mom has been in New York since December 2011, and hasn't responded to any of the court summons, she is considered to be in default. Which means the TPR was pretty much a sure thing.
As we waited for 45 minutes for our case to be called, Baby Girl did not want anything to do with her case manager, GAL or anyone who wasn't me or my husband. She didn't want to play or talk to anyone. Our case was finally called, and of course as the proceedings progressed, Baby Girl found her voice. "Mama, juice" "Mama, baby" (her doll)......and running up and down the bench where we were seated. There was a small gap between the end of the bench and the wall, and I could just see her falling through it in front of the judge and the whole court. I gave her "THE LOOK" but she just gave me a look of her own that said "I know you aren't going to fuss at me here"
After a short hearing where our total contribution was saying "yes sir" to the judge twice, the TPR was granted!!! She is now free for adoption!!! We are just waiting for the paperwork to go through its channels and then we should be assigned an adoption worker in about 3-4 weeks. If all things go smoothly it should be final by the end of the year. It was wonderful to hear the judge say that he would be seeing us again in a few months.
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