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To adhere to CPS visitation guidelines, you will receive detailed instructions on reaching the designated CPS visitation location. These instructions will include contact information for whom to notify upon arrival and a phone number to use in case of tardiness or navigation issues. Planning ahead is essential to anticipate and mitigate potential challenges, ensuring a smoother experience with custody visitation schedules. Attendance at each scheduled visitation session is mandatory and critical for maintaining consistency and fulfilling your responsibilities during this process.
The setting that you will be in will be comfortable and as private as possible. There will be chairs, couches, and other areas available for you and your child to relax in together. Parents will bring things like clothing, toys, family photos, and other familiar items to their children. You may do the same. If you have questions about items you plan to bring, be sure to call your caseworker ahead of time.
How will your child respond to you during these visitation sessions?
This is an important question that I am sure you have been asking yourself. No one, including your child, will know the answer until the session begins. Many children are dealing with the same emotions you are as you head into the initial visits with your child.
You can begin by understanding that whatever you are going through as far as emotions surrounding the CPS case, your child is going through even more heightened emotions. If you are having problems with your child’s separation and the stress of your case, imagine how your child feels. Your child doesn’t have nearly as much understanding of the issues or any experience living with another family. Be aware of these issues as you head into visitation.
If your child approaches you unsure how to react to you, this should not surprise you. Assure your child of your love and efforts to bring them home soon. Problems with discipline should be dealt with by you. You are being observed in these difficult circumstances to determine how you deal with adversity in your family. If you struggle to manage your emotions, CPS may doubt your ability to support your child emotionally.
Do not make promises to your child about when he or she can come home.
It would be natural for you to want to tell your child words of encouragement about their ability to come home and see the rest of your family by a certain date. However, you do not have the unilateral power to do so. The length of the case depends on several factors- many of which are outside of your control. The best you can do is reassure your child that you love your child and that these times in visitation are important to take advantage of.
Use the visitation time periods as opportunities to build your child’s self-confidence. Talk about subjects that make your child feel good. Is your child playing sports? Are they in a class in school that they particularly like? What about activities involving friends or other people in the family? These are great subjects to bring up that can take their mind off of the CPS case.
Do not tell your child anything about their foster family regarding your concerns about them or complaints about how CPS works in their investigations. Again, these are factors that you cannot control, and your child definitely cannot control. Any concerns that you develop regarding the foster family can be dealt with by directly addressing the CPS caseworker. Reassuring your child that the foster family will take good care of him or her is probably the best you can do.
What factors guide how much visitation you will be provided in a CPS case?
The process of determining visitation in a CPS case is ongoing, with CPS regularly assessing your suitability for increased and longer visits with your child. While it may feel unnatural to have visitation regulated by the government while your child is not at home, this is the reality of the situation. You must demonstrate to CPS that you can safely care for and engage with your child. If abuse or neglect allegations are substantiated, CPS may recommend parenting classes to help you prepare for future parenting responsibilities.
Addressing issues like anger or stress during this process can be an opportunity for personal growth and support. Your service plan, developed with CPS, may include specific goals or conditions that must be met before more extensive visitation is granted. Whether your child was removed due to being left alone or abuse allegations, addressing these concerns directly and demonstrating progress is crucial. CPS works to prevent further incidents of abuse or neglect while your child is under their care.
The bottom line is that visits with your child are not to be used as a punishment or as a reward for you. The more or fewer visitation periods you are awarded should be related to the assessment we talked about before regarding your child’s ability to care for your child safely. This is a pretty simple standard by which you will be judged when it comes to visitation. If you are provided more hours or days of visitation, will those visits be beneficial for your relationship with your child? Can you keep your child safe? Think about these questions as you begin to earn the trust of CPS and your child when you first visit him or her at a CPS-supervised visitation site.
What is the purpose of supervised visitation?
Initially, after an initial court status hearing, you’ll likely be required to attend supervised visitation to ensure your child’s safety needs are met and to strengthen your relationship with them. During these sessions, you’ll have the chance to practice skills from your CPS service plan, focusing on keeping your child safe, identifying personal issues that could impact them, and fostering a strong parent-child bond.
CPS conducts a safety assessment to determine if supervised visitation is necessary, addressing any concerns about unsupervised contact. The visitation plan should address legitimate safety worries from both your perspective and CPS’s, prompting reflection on your parental capabilities. Addressing these challenges openly can expedite the reunification process with your child.
Higher risks to your child mean more and longer supervised visitation periods. This is only for the safety of your child. CPS will assume that you want to do better as a parent. It is not assumed, necessarily, that you will go through the steps needed to improve your parenting. Many parents in your shoes have chosen not to take those steps. They have instead found themselves facing termination of their parental rights.
Keep your personal goals at the forefront of your visitation opportunities with your child.
What goals do you have in place for yourself in conjunction with this CPS investigation? Talk to CPS about them when you have an opportunity to do so. If you have an attorney, you need to clearly communicate those goals to him or her, as well. You will be allowed to work with CPS in creating a visitation schedule, safety plan, and service plan. It would help if you were prepared to go into these meetings with your goals ready to be discussed.
CPS workers are usually very overworked. You will be given as much attention as the next family and no more. Keep this in mind when you are working with a caseworker and/or supervisor. Strike while the iron is hot when you have their attention and are in their presence.
What will the CPS caseworker be looking at when judging your ability to visit with your child?
The CPS employee assigned to work on your case will be judging you by several different factors when it comes to parenting your child and visiting with him or her during your CPS case.
What sort of abuse or neglect have you been alleged to have engaged in?
If there is a serious concern about your ability to parent your child safely and responsibly, then you will most likely have supervised visitation for a long while during the CPS case. Repeated instances of abuse, significant sexual trauma, and things like this are what I am thinking about.
Furthermore, do you take responsibility for these actions? If you are found to have committed these acts, you need to show responsibility for them. It is only when you show responsibility that you can make amends and improve your relationship with your child.
Taking the safety risks as they are presented to you, and working to improve them by learning about controlling your own emotions and those of your child are the keys to working past this supervised visitation stage and into a more self-policing visitation period towards the end of the CPS case.
Conclusion
Following CPS visitation guidelines maintains structure for parents and children in CPS cases. Adhering to instructions ensures smooth custody visitation schedules with timely communication. Planning ahead minimizes disruptions and promotes a positive experience. Consistent attendance at scheduled visitations is not only a requirement. This demonstrates a commitment to the well-being and stability of the child during what can be a challenging time.
More on visitation phases during a CPS case will be discussed in tomorrow’s blog post.
If you are interested in this topic, we encourage you to join us tomorrow as we continue to discuss CPS assessments as they relate to your visitation during a case. We will then move on to the different phases of visitation in a CPS case.
In the meantime, if you have any questions about the material that we presented today, please do not hesitate to contact the Law Office of Bryan Fagan. Our licensed family law attorneys offer free of charge consultations six days a week with one of our licensed family law attorneys. These consultations are a great opportunity to meet with a lawyer to discuss your case, receive answers to important questions, and learn how our office can help you and your family. Thank you for your time and consideration, and we hope you will join us again tomorrow as we pick up where we left off today by discussing CPS cases.
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Other Articles you may be interested in:
- What factors are relevant for visitation with your children during a CPS case in Texas?
- How Can You Take Advantage of Visitation With Your Child During a CPS Case if You Are Incarcerated?
- What Will CPS Be Keeping an Eye on Regarding Your Parent-Child Visitation Sessions?
- How to stand up for yourself during a Texas CPS case
- How to prevent a second CPS investigation after your first concludes
- Family Law Cases in Texas: The final stages of a CPS case
- When can CPS remove your child from your home in Texas and what can you do about it?
- What to do if you no longer like your CPS service plan?
- In what circumstances could your child end up living with your relative during a CPS case?
- What can a CPS investigation into your family mean now and in the future?
- What to do if your spouse is being investigated by CPS in Texas for abuse or neglect of your child?
- Can CPS photograph your house and request your child’s medical records in Texas?
Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC | Houston, Texas CPS Defense Lawyers
The Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC routinely handles matters that affect children and families. If you have questions regarding CPS, it’s important to speak with one of our Houston, TX CPS defense Lawyers right away to protect your rights.
Our CPS defense lawyers in Houston TX are skilled at listening to your goals during this trying process and developing a strategy to meet those goals. Contact the Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC by calling (281) 810-9760 or submit your contact information in our online form.
