Which AP/APs have taken steps...?

During foster care, you pretty much HAVE to do that. You know the goal is to have the child go back with their parents, and you have to support and encourage that.

I bent over backwards for our daughters mother... missed work when she changed visits (and most of the time didn't even show up anyway), wrote notes ALL DAY LONG of what exactly the baby and I did (ex: sat down and played with books, shape blocks, practiced clapping etc) so she would learn how to interact with her child on visits. I also did the same thing wiht what she ate (2 slices of apple, 1/4 cup of juice etc). The list goes on and on.

I think I did everything I could as a foster parent. The rest was in the parents hands.

Also, my friend (who was raped and had a baby at 15) started a teen mom support group- I have helped her with that group from afar. I haven't been able to actually attend the meetings but I have assisted her with a lot of the 'prep work'.

I think it is VERY inportant to help the women who WANT it. If they don't want to give their baby up for adoption, we should all be there to help guide them.

We did. We did foster care and offered the mother time and time again to come live with us so she could build the relationship with her daughter. She Did not take us up on the offer but she did attend the classes that we mandated by the state and we helped her have visits many times in the week. The returned her daughter to her, And she ended back in our care a month later. This time the mother did not come to the visits we tried to facilitate, she again completed her classes and got her daughter back. She mother and the child moved out of state after this I keep in touch with her sometimes by e mail she says things are okay, so we continue to hope for the best for them both.

I am a firm believer in adoption, with that said I also am a firm believer that if a parent weather mother or father wants to parent their child and they are really willing to do so and may need a little bit of help then the child should most definitely be with the parents and help should be provided. Some people just need a little bit of guidance.

I agree with her. Parents who want the help should be helped. I have encouraged plenty of women to keep their babies and root for them, that they COULD do it but they have to want it. I was a single mother (I have a biological child, then got married and adopted from DSS) and I know that it's hard but I wanted him so bad, i didn't care what I had to do to keep him and love him. He has never wanted for anything. But the parent has to want the help. I have a cousin who does drugs and her kids are in kinship care with an aunt. She is not willing to change her ways, not yet, and maybe not ever. I would love to help her but I know where the bounderies are. I know that I would be wasting my time, losing my stuff (she's a drug addict and she would steal from me for drug money), she's lazy (never worked a day in her life), and frankly, my kids would be miserable trying to help me "support" her (in all aspects of the word). If she ever hits rock bottom (and I don't know how she hasn't yet when your kids are taken away), I will help her but she has got to want the help.

I worked with this one particular child's mother on a variety of issues to better her llife and assist her in getting her child back. Adoption was not the plan--return home was the goal. I had this child 3 yrs in foster care---half of her life at that point. I took mom to doctors visits, we hosted visits in our home at her will--whenever she wished, took her to school programs, helped her find food from agencies, whatever she needed I was there. The child went home 8 yrs ago and now is back in care----after being neglected and worse. She has been abused in the worst of ways--not once but many times. Mom still calls but she has more problems---child is not in my care.