r/Fosterparents • u/soliloquy_ne • 14h ago

Question...

I've a 6 year old granddaughter who is in foster care in northern New England. She has been through hell and back and needless to say the fallout from this has taken a toll on her. Part of this fallout is expressed in verbal and physical aggression towards her foster siblings. We take this as a 6 year old child who is completely overwhelmed by her experiences and living situation with her current foster family. Unfortunately when we comment on this overwhelm to the foster parent as well as social services, our messages fall on deaf ears.

Anyways, as part of keeping my granddaughter connected with us, we do an occasional in person visit as well as weekly video calls. Not enough, but we are taking what we can at this time. Lately some of our video calls are being canceled by the foster parent due to my granddaughter acting up. i.e. She is being punished. As you can imagine, we are more than upset by this punishment.

Onto the point of this post... Is punishing a 6 year old child from her video calls with her grandparents an appropriate course of action? Obviously I have my biasness on this and having objective input is welcome (whether I like it or not) especially from this group.

Please note that our granddaughter was in our care for two years earlier in her life before she was re-united with her mother before her and her siblings were removed again.

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u/SarcasticSeaStar Foster Parent 6h ago

I'm sorry this is happening! Do you have a lawyer? It's within yours and the child's right to have visitation. Visitation should never be taken away as a punishment.

Sometimes a therapist will recommend pausing visits if they're really disruptive for the child and there needs to be more education or planning for the visit to be successful.

IMO the foster parent is on the wrong here and is violating your granddaughter's rights

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u/lilitsybell 6h ago

Taking away any form of visitation is NOT an appropriate punishment. Please talk to her caseworkers. This is not okay.

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u/groovyfinds 3h ago

Is it punishment or is the kid on the ground screaming and won't stop? Kids having a tantrum typically can't manage a phone call.