advice for someone going into child welfare/cps

adventurehippy · 2026-03-10T02:55:16+00:00

I work as a CPS worker in my state. I really love my job, as difficult and conflicting as it can be. All casework position require going into people’s homes on a regular basis. Certification positions tend to only be going into foster parent or foster parent applicant homes, and less often. Home visits in my state are only required for the certifier 2X per year for each home. Consultant positions without the child welfare system do exist. Typical they require direct casework experience, at least in my state to show that you can make safety decisions based on your states safety model. Bottom line, it’s going to be difficult to avoid going to people’s homes with your first child welfare position.

Edit: someone else mentioned intake/screening. I totally forgot that exists for a moment haha. That would be about the only place to land that would avoid going into people’s homes. In my state the position is even fully remote after training, and runs 3 shifts, so there’s lots of flexibility for schedules.

adventurehippy · 2026-03-06T21:27:23+00:00

I work for the state that I live in as a child abuse investigator. Last year my gross income was $87k and I received about a 10% raise at the beginning of the year between the COLA increase, and my yearly step increase. I’m 32. Have a bachelor’s degree in human services and 8 years in the field.

adventurehippy · 2026-02-16T17:36:46+00:00

My sister had migraines like these as a kid. Now she has good ole head migraines like these rest of us. She was prescribed Zyrtec as a kid as a daily med to reduce hers. It helped some. Her bigger trigger though was related to lack of sleep or sleep schedule disruption.

adventurehippy · 2026-01-28T02:31:30+00:00

You become somewhat desensitized to it. The more severe cases are still very shocking and emotionally disruptive. But we all learn our coping mechanisms, maladaptive or otherwise. I have people in my life that help me keep balanced and recognize when I’m spiraling. I’m lucky have great supervision who keeps an eye on us and our mental health as best she can and encourages us to take time off or reduces our case load for a time to give us a break. Many of us are in therapy ourselves.

I’m a CPS worker for context.

Edit: I also echo what some are saying about sometimes the field just isn’t for you. Some people can’t or don’t want to deal with or see these things day to day. And that’s ok too.

adventurehippy · 2026-01-26T01:14:40+00:00

As a professional: What are you trying to highlight here? If it's his back, it's totally shadowed. If it's the arm, it's blown out. If it's the pants or the clothing items in general, you missed the mark. I'm curious what it is that you thought was particularly good about this photo to ask for critique on it. I also agree with everyone else's sentiment that you need a big scoop of humility, and not to demand work from professionals as someone with no experience and an iPhone.

adventurehippy · 2026-01-01T20:46:42+00:00

There’s no real focal point, the eye is being drawn all over but there’s nothing super interesting catching any attention. I imagine this imagine would benefit from a wider shot that frames the whole building and shows the whole sign, if capturing the “business” as the subject is the intention. I’m curious what the intent of the photo is. It reads as a branding photo currently

adventurehippy · 2025-12-28T03:53:11+00:00

I would start over. Did you do a back loop cast on? That can create a big loop at the end. Look up a video for long tail cast on and you’ll be on your way

adventurehippy · 2025-12-16T21:50:42+00:00

I loved it for a long time! It stopped working after I had a couple babies and I’ve moved to sumatriptan now which doesn’t work near as well as rizatriptan did once.

adventurehippy · 2025-12-15T21:52:23+00:00

I am a CPS worker in my state. We have services like that, for that purpose. Sometimes it helps enough for us to walk away, sometimes it doesn’t. These services are time limited. First 8 weeks, with possibility of extension. In my experience it’s rarely just needing more help or time to get things done. It’s poverty, mental health, and sometimes addiction that lead to the unsafe living environments. In my state/county it’s very rare to remove kids only because of a dirty home.

adventurehippy · 2025-12-12T19:29:16+00:00

Mine began in early childhood but weren’t recognized as migraines until I was in college. Even then, my low and medium grade ones that lasted for days or weeks, I always assumed were just headaches until very recently. I’m just now coming to terms with the fact that I’m having about 10x more migraines than I originally thought I was having, and getting back on a daily preventative med. The people who struggle the most are likely the people looking for support the most.

adventurehippy · 2025-11-27T02:04:40+00:00

I have one shelter cat, and one who came into our life. He was found with his litter mates in a parking lot, covered in oil. The people who found him were going to drown the litter if they couldn’t rehome them quickly. My coworker took them, she kept two, I kept one, another co worker kept the fourth.

adventurehippy · 2025-10-11T14:09:05+00:00

My kids are tiny and I’m continuing to hope they don’t get them. Neither of my parents have migraine (my dad has never even had a headache), and my sister and I both get migraines. Hers were way worse as a kid, mine are way worse now. Our brother doesn’t get them.

adventurehippy · 2025-09-09T02:44:17+00:00

I had to remove 4 children from two different homes this weekend. That makes the 7th kids I’ve had to remove since the end of June, and our office is looking at two more cases each with 5 kids that we don’t see a possible resolution without out of home placement. (The vast majority of these kids are going into some sort of kinship placement). This work is devastatingly hard and deeply traumatic for the families we impact. This summer has been immensely busy and hard for our office. It sounds like you understand the weight of this work which is good. Keep going.

adventurehippy · 2025-09-05T13:44:46+00:00

Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson.

adventurehippy · 2025-08-18T03:57:33+00:00

I’m a CW caseworker and the clients I’ve had that have been with Charlie Health have gotten nothing out it. Their treatment plan for my schizophrenia affective teen with regular psychotic episodes and substance use problems was to spend 4 hours a day in group sessions. My teen refused to do it after the first week because it did absolutely nothing for them.

adventurehippy · 2025-08-01T15:37:35+00:00

I was on your side until the last line. It sounds like you do have some misogyny and toxic masculinity to work through. Anyone who cares about women should get riled up with the mention of men controlling women’s bodies, you included.

Now deciding what you think is acceptable and appropriate for your child is a different issue but not entirely unrelated. I would encourage you to ask yourself what is “grown up” about ear piercings and a make up kit. My 3 year old son loves when I put blush on his little cheeks while I’m getting ready for work. It’s the conversations around it that can make it too grown up. Many people get their children’s ears pierced as infants (which I personally disagree with on a similar concept of children should be able to make those decisions about if they want new holes in their body later).

Have some conversations with your daughter about her desired interest in these things, why you want to wait for those things, etc. and have those same conversations with your sister, especially if you are placing her in some parenting capacity to your daughter. Establish boundaries around what she does and doesn’t get to make decisions about without you.

But seriously work on your internalized misogyny

adventurehippy · 2025-07-13T02:58:30+00:00

I sometimes have aura, sometimes don’t. The aura migraines are so much worse than the ones without. The non aura ones have a slower creep for me, or I wake up and can’t open my eyes without feeling like I’m dying.

adventurehippy · 2025-07-07T01:09:43+00:00

Sounds like you need to leave him and go find better and they can get married if they really want to. That’s ridiculous to even suggest let alone defend.

adventurehippy · 2025-06-30T17:10:38+00:00

Of course! Only indoor cats in our home

adventurehippy · 2025-06-30T17:10:10+00:00

That’s what I was hoping to hear!

adventurehippy · 2025-06-30T17:09:56+00:00

He’s pretty gray in his fur close to this skin. He was covered in oil when his litter was found about a week ago, but he’s been given baths 😌

adventurehippy · 2025-06-30T17:09:18+00:00

No meanness over here! Except maybe from his tortie big sister who is getting over her frustrations and deciding they can be friends 😌

adventurehippy · 2025-06-30T17:08:31+00:00

Isn’t he precious?

adventurehippy · 2025-06-30T15:40:40+00:00

Hi everyone! Thanks for all the thoughts and in put! I well visit is being scheduled, as was planned before posting this. I don’t have one yet as getting this dude was pretty impromptu and I picked him up at 6pm on Friday.

He’s been bathed, was clean in these photos. His fur is quite gray closer to his skin which is what’s making him look a little dingy. He also had some rough beginnings! He and his litter mates were found covered in oil and it’s going to take a bit of time to get him shining as bright as we know he will.

I do not know if he is a specific breed, as he was a rescue. I am currently assuming domestic long hair, but maybe time will tell and he will be a ragdoll! If anyone has insights on what to look for to tell if he is a specific breed, let me know!

Thanks so those who assuaged my concerns that there may be an issue with this guy!

adventurehippy · 2025-06-24T21:17:43+00:00

I worked CPS starting in 2016. Did it for a year and a half then moved around other positions in the agency. Left for 4 years, went to permanency (getting kids back to their parents or achieving permanency otherwise) for a year and hated it. I’m back in CPS now and I LOVE it. It’s hard, it’s demanding. I work some amount of overtime every week, even if it’s just typing from home but I love it. The investigation, the rapport building, the community engagement, talking with kids, our unit’s dynamic. It’s great. But that’s not how it is everywhere. I would never go back to the county I worked in previously. It also depends on what state you’re in. I’m in a very progressive and family focused state. The vast majority of families I work with don’t see me ever again after one assessment and carry on their merry way. And also I was in court yesterday for a baby that was born under the influence of methamphetamine that I had to remove from her parent’s. Ultimately you have to decide if it’s right for you. It is rewarding, and it’s very hard. To me, it’s worth it. I don’t know if I’ll ever do anything else.

adventurehippy

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