Beginnings

Growing up, I knew a family that always had 3-5 teens around and yet people would say that the couple had only one daughter. It confused me, I didn't understand what I was missing. Eventually I got old enough to have friends who were growing up in foster care and I figured it out.

I had always respected those foster parents, even before I understood that that was what they were. So, I had a desire to "be like them" in the way that children decide things.

As a teen, I had 2 classmates in long term foster care. In one case, her mother was just unable to care for her and in the other her entire family died in an accident which she survived. The experience cemented my desire to someday be able to provide the family that they had so desperately needed.

As an adult, I've discovered that a surprising number of the people around me spent some time in foster care. It seems to be a taboo subject and something that people are ashamed of mentioning--it's like a hidden part of their history. But, when you mention that you are thinking of fostering the information is suddenly there.

The combination of emotions that they describe run the gamut and few are terribly happy about the families they gained during their fostering experiences. But, most seem to be aware (in retrospect) that there was some new degree of safety at the beginnings of their experiences as foster kids.

So, as an adult now, I come to the spot where I plan to foster. We're talking about taking teens--which is apparently rare--and we're hoping we're not too naive to be successful.