What makes a family?

Most of my life I have found myself in places and communities where this question comes up. In fact, I've so often been in environments with different definitions of family that I get startled by the people who believe that "family" means "mother, father, 2.4 kids, and matching biological extended family members."

I grew up in a single parent family long before divorce became common. I gained and lost siblings through re-marriage and a 2nd divorce, I was excluded from the family formed by another remarriage, I found my "family" in my friends, I "ran away" as a young adult and spent close to a decade living abroad. In the last decade, I've returned to "sort-of" home, come to terms with how to deal with my legal/biological family and continued to grow family in other ways. Ironically, in the midst of all this I got married to a person with a very stable and "normal" family. It's interesting to see the differences in how we approach things, yet, we both come to a place of defining family in terms of intention and love, rather than nuclear and biological.

I really hope that we will be able to extend this belief in family to others as foster parents. But, I also don't want to pressure a child who isn't ready. It's likely to be a challenging balance.