You will be given notice regarding the directions on how to get to any CPS location that is hosting your visitation session. Instructions will also be provided to you on who to contact when you arrive at the visitation location, as well as a phone number to contact if you are arriving late or have gotten lost. Plan ahead of time for any problems that you could encounter to minimize the number of surprises that occur on the day of your visitation. You must attend each visitation session that you are provided with.
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 plan to bring anything that you have a question about, be sure to call ahead to your caseworker about anything you plan to bring in.
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. The trouble is that nobody will know the answer to this question-including your child- until you actually get into the session. 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 near 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. Reassure your child that you love him or her and that you are doing everything possible to make sure that they come home as quickly as possible. 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 cannot control your own emotions, it will be difficult to convince CPS that you are prepared to help control your child’s emotions.
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 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 she is probably the best you can do.
What factors guide how much visitation you will be provided in a CPS case?
The process of planning how much visitation you will be provided in a CPS case is ongoing. You are being assessed regularly by CPS as to your suitability to be granted more frequent and longer-lasting periods of visitation with your child. It likely seems to you to be more than a little unnatural to be “gifted” time with your child by the government, but as long as your child remains outside of your home, this is the reality of your case.
You will need to show CPS that you can safely care for your child and interact with him or her. If the allegations of abuse or neglect against you are substantiated, you may need to take parenting classes recommended by CPS. These classes can help you prepare for the remaining years of parenting that you may have. Do you have problems with anger? What about stress? If you have ever felt like you need more help than your family and immediate surroundings may offer, then this interaction with CPS may be a blessing in disguise.
Your service plan, developed by you and CPS in cooperation, may require that you meet certain goals or conditions before being granted more than a basic amount of visitation with your child. For instance, was your child removed from your house because you left him or her home alone? Or could the removal have been related to the abuse of your child? Whatever the case, maybe you have to directly address those issues and show CPS that you are doing that. CPS will do things to prevent additional episodes of abuse/neglect while they are in the primary care of your child.
The bottom line is that visits with your child are not 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?
You will likely be ordered to attend supervised visitation at the outset of your case (after an initial status hearing with the court) to ensure that your child’s physical and emotional needs for safety are met. Part of that will contact their family members (namely, you) and strengthen your relationship with your child.
As the mother or father to this child, you will then have an opportunity in this visitation session to practice the skills that you have developed in working your service plan with CPS. Keeping your child safe, identifying problems in your own life that may lead to harm for your child, and promoting a strong bond between the two of you are the overarching goals of visitation sessions.
Whether or not you need to have supervised visitation sessions will be determined by a safety assessment performed in your case by CPS. The safety assessment will help CPS identify any concerns regarding your having unsupervised contact with your child.
What concerns exist for you and your child when you are together? Is the basis for the CPS investigation some action that you took against your child that was inappropriate? The visitation plan in place for your case should take into account any legitimate safety concerns that you have in yourself and that the agency has. This is a time for you to do some soul searching in terms of your own limitations as a parent. Remember that admitting problems you have now can go a long way towards achieving reunification with your child sooner rather than later.
The greater the risks to your child’s safety, the more and the longer you will likely have supervised visitation with him or her. This is only for the safety of your child. CPS will assume that you are 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 and 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, 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.
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.
Ebook
If you want to know more about what you can do, CLICK the button below to get your FREE E-book: “Child Protective Services E-Book”
Other Articles you may be interested in:
- What to Do When CPS Asks for a Drug Test in Texas
- CPS and how The Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC can help
- Take control of your child’s CPS case by following these tips
- 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 Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC by calling (281) 810-9760 or submit your contact information in our online form. The Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC handles CPS defense cases in Houston, Texas, Cypress, Klein, Humble, Kingwood, Tomball, The Woodlands, the FM 1960 area, or surrounding areas, including Harris County, Montgomery County, Liberty County, Chambers County, Galveston County, Brazoria County, Fort Bend County and Waller County.
Bryan Fagan, a native of Atascocita, Texas, is a dedicated family law attorney inspired by John Grisham’s “The Pelican Brief.” He is the first lawyer in his family, which includes two adopted brothers. Bryan’s commitment to family is personal and professional; he cared for his grandmother with Alzheimer’s while completing his degree and attended the South Texas College of Law at night.
Married with three children, Bryan’s personal experiences enrich his understanding of family dynamics, which is central to his legal practice. He specializes in family law, offering innovative and efficient legal services. A certified member of the College of the State Bar of Texas, Bryan is part of an elite group of legal professionals committed to ongoing education and high-level expertise.
His legal practice covers divorce, custody disputes, property disputes, adoption, paternity, and mediation. Bryan is also experienced in drafting marital property agreements. He leads a team dedicated to complex family law cases and protecting families from false CPS allegations.
Based in Houston, Bryan is active in the Houston Family Law Sector of the Houston Bar Association and various family law groups in Texas. His deep understanding of family values and his professional dedication make him a compassionate advocate for families navigating Texas family law.
