On any given day more than 12,000 children in the State of Oklahoma are in OKDHS custody, and approximately over 2,000 of those children are waiting to be adopted.
Many children are in foster care because they were removed from their families due to abuse, neglect, or abandonment.
When a child is removed for his or her safety and protection, the State of Oklahoma will assist the child’s family and provide support in an effort to reunify the family. In some cases, despite everyone’s effort that is not a safe plan for the child.
While we are working with the family to correct the conditions that led to the child being removed, the child is placed with a “Resource Family.” The resource family is the “BRIDGE” that connects the child and the family while working toward reunification.
The resource family makes a commitment to be the permanent placement for the child and to help that child maintain connections to those important people in their life, if the conditions cannot be corrected for the child to be reunified with the family.
Sometimes it takes months and sometimes it takes years to determine if the family can be reunited. During this time, Bridge Families become great advocates and true supporters of the child and the child’s family.
If it is determined that reunification is not what is in the best interest of the child, the court can terminate parental rights or the family can relinquish their custody of the children. In more than half the cases where this occurs, Resource Parents eventually adopt the children they have supported through this journey.