My heart is broken and has fallen in multiple different directions. On September 2,2020 Peyton and I received the call to come pick up four children who are my niece and nephews, to put in our care so that they don’t enter the system. It was the hardest thing Peyton and I have ever had to encounter. But we fell in love with the journey, with the time we were creating memories and just our everyday task.

On October 16,2020 Peyton and I left town with our daughters for a surprise anniversary trip. Just moments before the kids got onto the bus they were planning their weekend plans with my mom. They planned on going to cicis pizza, going to play at the park like usual and to find a new movie to watch. No one ever expected and prepared us for the next chapter of events in our life.

On October 16,2020 at 1:30 pm my niece and nephews were stormed by police officers at their elementary school with a court order from the grandma who lives in Tennessee. The court order had said “to remove the body” with any type of force necessary. Could you imagine going to 2nd, 4th or even 5th grade and have police officers storm your school saying you have to leave with a lady you don’t even remember. Just to make matters more heartbreaking my niece and nephews had asked to CALL ME! When Peyton and I talked to the principal of the school my niece and nephews attended she had told us that when she walked them to their Grandmothers rental car the oldest had stated Can we call our aunt to say goodbye? The grandma replied back with yes as soon as we get on the road. Just to let the world know that I NEVER received a call from my nieces and nephews.

To make the story even more heart jerking, I was not informed of the removal of my niece and nephews from school. Which means my husband and I never got to say Goodbye or even explain to them that we didn’t just give up on them. As Peyton and I were now three hours away from Katy my mom didn’t want to inform us of the situation at hand so that our anniversary trip wasn’t ruined. Since the kids get off the same bus stop as my little brother my mom and I always picked them up together. On this day it was a little different because only Aiden got off the bus. My mom had asked Aiden where they were and Aiden had said “someone had picked them up early”. Could you imagine the fear going through her head as she had no idea who picked them up early when Peyton and I were out of town.

Within those few minutes my mom called they elementary and had asked where the kids were. Our nightmare began when she replied with the story. My questions were why didn’t they tell us? Why didn’t they say the grandma picked them up (who wasn’t even on the list to take them) and took them back to Tennessee when it happened. Fast forward to Sunday when we were about to head to eat breakfast in the small town we were in I got a phone call from my dad. He explained that the kids were no longer in Texas and that the grandmother on the dads side had taken the kids in her custody. My heart broke as the tears rolled down my freshly made up face. Our hearts were broken this wasn’t how we wanted to end our anniversary trip. This wasn’t how we wanted to end this journey with them and in fact this wasn’t how we wanted them to leave. We wanted closure I think we deserved it to be able to give them a hug and let them know we loved them. The kids didn’t deserve to see police officers enter their school in a force of nature to remove their “body”. Could you imagine how scared they must of been when they haven’t seen this grandma in over three years? Let alone the twins who are only seven don’t even remember who she was? My niece and nephews wanted me, they wanted to call me, to tell me goodbye because they just knew they were leaving. They left their memories here, along with their clothes, shoes and the activities we never got to do that we planned on doing. A few days later I finally got the number of the grandma who took my niece and nephews in the most awful way possible. I called her four times till she finally answered and my niece and nephews answered the phone on FaceTime! To see their face was amazing, and just to see them and hear how much they miss us was hard. However I did notice that they weren’t acting themselves as anytime I would ask them how they were they would look up from the camera as if someone was standing their listening to all the words they were about to say. When the kids were with me and they were on the phone with their mom I would suggest that they went in their room and shut the door to be able to have privacy with their mom and tell her anything they wanted in comfort. These kids didn’t have that!!!!!!!! As I was on the phone with them they did show me their new rooms and the “man cave” the boys called it. They seemed excited for the materialistic items they had. When I got on the phone with hunter I had asked him how he was doing and his response was “I’m fine I guess”. I did have the chance to tell the kids that I had no idea that this was gonna happen. And that we miss them and love them so much. I tried to ask hunter when I thought I got him by himself if he was happy to be their and he once again looked up from the phone as if someone was standing up in front of him monitoring the phone call. Once he said I guess I told him he has a voice to tell me if he wanted to come back with me, if so I would fight for them to come back to Texas.

The grandmother snatched the phone from hunter and sternly explained to me that I was not allowed to ask any of the kids questions and that the phone call had to be strictly “positive, as they were living in h*ll for the past month”. I replied back with yes ma’am I understand she than told me that I could call anytime and talk to the kids. From my records the kids were with me for the past month and I took exceptional care of them. I got them into school, made sure they did their homework. I took them all to the doctors office to make sure that they were healthy. They all got nice new clothing, along with their own beds. This lady had no idea that they were under my care. I had told the kids that I would call everyday to check up on them and just to let them know that I loved them.

The next day I called like I said I would and the call went straight to voicemail. Peyton said for me not to get too worried as her phone might of been dead. So of course I waited a hour just Incase that was the truth. A hour went by and I had called again, the same exact thing happened. All of the calls went straight to voicemail with out a singe ring. I than grabbed Peytons phone and tried calling her and his phone rang multiple times till it went to voice mail. I than tried to message her and my text messages went from blue to green. She really BLOCKED ME!

My heart hurts to think I’ll never be able to speak to them again. I Absolutely put my heart and soul into these kids to be able to provide and give them a stable place to live. This situation should of never happened especially for the kids. Please pray over their safety. And that one day they will reunite with Peyton and I even if it’s just a phone call! The grandma filed for a writ of attachment and that’s how he’s was able to gain custody of the children, if you are a lawyer and would love to help or know of any more information about a situation like this that would help us get our niece and nephews back please let us know!