WHY I foster - My story. What's yours?

[brina1823]

Thanks for sharing your story

[luvbeingmomma]

Thank you so much for sharing!

[becca jean]

Thanks for sharing your story. It's so inspirational.

[reneaumommy]

Awesome story.

Here's our journey:

I have wanted to be a foster mother since I was a little girl. I used to beg my mother to foster. I got a job as a foster care caseworker after college. My DH and I got married in Feb 2007. We accepted our first foster placement in Sept 2007. I was 8 months 33 week pregnant with our honeymoon baby. Out placement was a sibling set of two girls ages 4 and 6. 10 days after they arrived I gave birth to DS1 at 35 weeks. He was healthy at birth but had to be admitted to the hospital 3 times in the first 3 months due to illness. The girls were eventually moved to their grandparents home. We took a break due to our sons illnesses.

We decided to open our home again when DS1 was almost one. We accepted placement of a 3 year old girl and found out the same day we were pregnant with DS2. She stayed 3 months and moved to a relatives home. We took another break because I was having preterm labor and in and out of the hospital.

When DS2 was 7 months we opened our home to foster again but then decided to pursue adoption of a little girl from Korea. We invested thousands of dollars into adopting from Korea and were "waiting" for a referral. The Korean process changed and the wait went for 12 months for referral to years for a referral. The fees were increased. We decided to go back to fostering in December 2011. During this time we tried on and off for well over a year to have another bio baby. We conceived the first two children without any trouble (DS1 was the first month trying on our honeymoon, DS2 took 4 cycles of trying). I found out after about a year of trying I have endometriosis and DS1 is now in the process of being diagnosed with Aspergers. We have decided against having another bio (if that is even possible) because if you have a child on the Autism spectrum there is a 1/4 chance of additional children also having some form of Autism and a 1/3 chance of additional boys having some form of Autism.

We contacted a local agency (we had moved since we were previously licensed to foster) in Dec 2011 and they said it would take 2 weeks to transfer our license. In April 2012 we were asked to take a one day old baby that was likely to go to adoption. They placed the baby in a temporary home while they got our license figured out. That went on for 7 weeks and the temporary home gave notice and the baby was placed in another adoptive home since we still did not have a license. There were mistakes made and our original licensing lady was fired and 3 workers and 11 months later we were licensed in Nov. 2012. We wanted a girl younger than our youngest son (age 3.5).

There was talk of a newborn due the end of 2012 that they wanted to place with us. A week after we got our license they called to see if we would take a sibling set of a 3.5 year old boy and a 4.5 year old girl (twinning both our boys). It was a short term placement and they were supposed to return to their mother this Spring. We agreed if they would get a waiver so we could still have the baby placed with us because in our state you can only have 4 children under 6 in the home unless you get a waiver. We were also only licensed for 2 so they came out and licensed us for 3 so we could still take the baby.

We would never have accepted this placement as a long term/ adoption placement. For several reasons. We only wanted girls since we have 2 boys and they are very close in age to our bios. Everything happens for a reason.

We found out the week of Christmas that family came forward for to take the baby.

These "short-term" kids are going to be staying longer (maybe even forever, who knows). We have fallen in love with them and can't imagine them leaving now.

Despite the long challenging road we feel blessed and know the right child/children will someday be ours.

[~*~Sunflower~*~]

Thanks for sharing!

[bethdrews]

Thanks for taking the time to put your story out there for others to read. My husband and I have been praying about adoption - specifically international and possibly special needs. We have 3 biological children...11, 6, & 7mo. I had never really considered fostering, but your story has given me something to pray about. Don't you love it when you say "I'll never..." but God has different plans!?!

[me_just_me]

Thank you so much for sharing your story. You are an amazing person and mother. So inspiring to read.

[dalynn1997]

Thanks so much for all the kind words and the stories that have been shared. I think that I needed to go through the process of writing it out. Fostering is a pretty tough road especially when your building your family through it. Feel free to share my story if it will help those around you undertand or encourage someone to become a fosterparent.

Be blessed and be a blessing,
Angie

[Amandamama]

Thanks for sharing your story

We have two bio kids, 12 & 10. We started fostering 4 years ago with a couple of respites. Our first long term placement was a little boy with severe disabilities & medical needs. We adopted him & although his condition has continued to deteriorate (we knew it would), I would never change our choices. We took a few years off after his adoption to get a handle on his medical needs and started fostering again last summer. We has a two yr old girl all summer, then picked up a newborn from the hospital in the fall... It looked like he would stay forever, BUT a previously unknown relative came forward & he left at 4 months. We are still in the heart broken stage, but are going to continue to foster.
Good luck to everyone. It's not an easy journey, but I'm glad we're doing it

[Campbellchik]

Thank you. You are an inspiration to me. God doesn't refine silver that he doesn't intend to use for something beautiful.