Why moving a toddler from a (healthy) foster home back to their biological family is incredibly dangerous

A serious failing of the judicial system and child protective services, one that is completely unaddressed as far as I can tell, is the transition of a toddler from a (hopefully) supervised, functional family environment to a completely unsupervised, potentially dysfunctional family environment.

A child who has grown up in the dysfunctional family environment has a better chance, in my experience, of making it through alive than a child who is coming from a functional one to a dysfunctional one.

The child growing up in the dysfunctional or abusive family structure has already begun to learn maladaptive coping mechanisms, already begun to learn the danger signs, already learned to shut down, disengage, stand still.

This child is learning what they need to survive in their environment.

The child coming from the functional family is going to be coming from a completely different family experience

…has been treated in a completely different way, one that is respectful and honors their intrinsic self as their own person. This child has learned that assertive communication of their needs will result in those needs being met. This child has learned that their caregivers will coach them through their upsets and freak-out loops. This child is relatively free to explore their autonomy, Erikson’s second stage of child development. This child also experiences clear and consistent boundaries, where expectations are objective instead of subjectively depending on the emotional state of the caregiver.

This child is wholly and completely unprepared for the dysfunctional and proto-abusive family environment.

Dysfunctional parents experience these behaviors as dysrespectful; the dysfunctional parent in this scenario is reminded, over and over, of their shame, of having their child taken away when ‘their’ child doesn’t understand what the biological parent wants, what they are ‘supposed’ to do because there is no history and no corrective language or practices in common from the one family to the other; the dysfunctional parent may feel rage when ‘their’ child doesn’t love them, as they have not bonded, because many dysfunctional people have children for the sole purpose of feeling loved.

Not to mention that toddlerhood is full of abusive parenting triggers such as eating, potty training, and sleeping.

The child coming from the functional environment is coming from a completely different family structure and culture during a time when routine is paramount. Their attempts to maintain or re-establish that routine will be met harshly and, likely, physically.

A toddler can safely be moved from a dysfunctional family to a functional one, but it is incredibly dangerous for the toddler being moved from the functional to the dysfunctional.

The key here is that there is no transition, no ability for the toddler to learn the routine and expectations of the new environment before oversight and supervision is withdrawn.

The family court system has prioritized family unification but has not put any mechanisms in place to ensure the successful transition of the toddler from the functional environment to the dysfunctional one.

Because of their developmental stage, a toddler is uniquely endangered in a way that a baby or older child is not. The failure of the judiciary and child protective services in recognizing this, and acting appropriately and protectively, is why this happens.

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