About 2.5 years ago my former sister-in-law lost her 2 daughters to CPS due to her drug use and the resulting concerns for the kids. The older child had already spent 18 months in CPS care due to the same problems. Over the first 2 years of the process the girls mom made no effort to get things right for her and her girls. The courts had begun proceedings to terminate parental rights, and my husband and I had presented to the courts our willingness to give our nieces a stable forever home. We were told the process was pretty much a done deal. We had taken all the steps and had begun to turn our home and lives upside down. Then, without any warning, the whole process flipped and every thing became about giving the girls back to their mom.

My heart is so broken for our sweet nieces who are so broken after spending over half of their short lives in CPS care, who are now being returned to their mom. I’m fearful for their future. My struggle is in how to approach all of this. Their mom has now divorced my brother-in-law and is beginning to have her girls with her again. She claims to have given her life to Christ (same as she did the first time this happened). But my heart is so angry for what she did to those girls and so distrustful (we’ve been down this road already). But if she has truly given her heart to Christ, then as a fellow sister in Christ I should not have this in my heart toward her.

I ask prayers over my heart in this situation as well as over her and the girls.