The Story of Audrie

I'm still rankled by the criticisms of my choices.  Or non-choices as the case may be.  I own my choices.  I don't hide behind blaming someone else for them.  So here is the story of Audrie and how she came to be our responsibility.
Mike and Cassie became pregnant early in 2009.  They went back and forth for awhile on what they would do with this baby.  They decided to step up to the plate and keep her.  Cassie went to her dr. appts. and ate right. My understanding after the fact is that there still was some drug use, but nothing like there was with the little man.
Audrie was born Oct 2009 in the middle of the swine flu thing and only two visitors could see her at the hospital.  That was Mike and me.  So I bonded right from the get go.  She came home and we started the process of finding a routine.  That didn't go so well, but she was fed, diapered and loved.  Mike and Cassie tried their best and I believe that.  It was just not enough.
Then Mike became incarcerated and Cassie decided she wanted to be free to play and still called herself a kid.  At this point we needed to do something.  So we proposed that we take over the legal responsibility of raising her.  Afterall she had been with us all her life except for the month Mike and Cassie tried to live at the drug house and even that month she was with us more than them.  Any other option was not a good one. They agreed.
And so we started the legal paperwork, paid the money, jumped through the hoops and waited for the judge signature.  And so it came to be.  We have third party custody of Audrie.
We created a routine that works.  And so she lives with us.  We accepted the responsibility after her parents could not.  They tried and I am so glad that they did.  I wish they could have done the job, but it just could not be.  And we have a smart, funny, loving little girl who lives with us.  And that is how it came to be.
This family has already been through the grief process of grandchildren being given up for adoption.  That was the parents' choice when that happened.  Doesn't have anything to do with grandparents.  Grandparents just get to go through the grief process without choice.  But that certainly played a part in the decision on our part to not let Audrie go into the system and eventually to another permanent home.  In this instance we had a choice and we made it.  And we own it.  And we are happy with it.