This month marks eight months since our foster kids, Little Guy and Little Sister, came into our home.
Legally I'm not allowed to show their faces on the internet or write their names or really talk about their situation at all, so it makes it really difficult to share anything about that part of our lives. One thing I can say, however, is that it's definitely the most difficult and challenging thing that Johnny and I have ever done.
I started doing a little reflecting after reading this article on fostering/adoption from the New York Times that my friend Anna posted on my wall.
My favorite part of the article went something like this:
“When I first went into this, I had this idea that everyone should be doing this,” Maureen told me, referring to foster-care adoption. “But if you are going to do it, you better be darn well sure you can handle it.”
I couldn't agree with this sentiment more. When we believe in something, I think we have a tendency to feel that everybody should be doing it, especially in the Christian community. I remember feeling guilty at Wheaton every time I went to a speech or fundraiser or whatever for different causes throughout the world. I think by Christmas of my freshman year I had opportunities to "adopt" world vision children, buy cows for farmers in third world countries, tutor underprivileged children in Chicago, give money and wear red to support AIDS research, and so on and so on. I'm not saying any of those things were bad; I just didn't need to do all of them...or any of them.
That being said, I do think that Johnny and I have been called, at least for now, to be foster parents and possibly adoptive parents. If that's something you are interested in and you have a good support system and you don't mind if you get crayon on your walls or that all your hair will turn grey by the time you're 27 or that you just might unexpectedly see your kid's biological family at the library or that everywhere you go people will either ask you if "all those children" are yours or glare at you for having children of different races, then go for it. It's an understatement to say that there are tons of kids who need help. Just while writing this I got an email from my case worker asking for an adoptive family for a sibling set of three precious boys. Our agency's website has literally pages and pages of children needing families.
So before I start rambling, here's the gist: fostering is hard, hardest thing we've ever done, don't do it if it's not for you, jump in head first if it is.
Legally I'm not allowed to show their faces on the internet or write their names or really talk about their situation at all, so it makes it really difficult to share anything about that part of our lives. One thing I can say, however, is that it's definitely the most difficult and challenging thing that Johnny and I have ever done.
I started doing a little reflecting after reading this article on fostering/adoption from the New York Times that my friend Anna posted on my wall.
My favorite part of the article went something like this:
“When I first went into this, I had this idea that everyone should be doing this,” Maureen told me, referring to foster-care adoption. “But if you are going to do it, you better be darn well sure you can handle it.”
I couldn't agree with this sentiment more. When we believe in something, I think we have a tendency to feel that everybody should be doing it, especially in the Christian community. I remember feeling guilty at Wheaton every time I went to a speech or fundraiser or whatever for different causes throughout the world. I think by Christmas of my freshman year I had opportunities to "adopt" world vision children, buy cows for farmers in third world countries, tutor underprivileged children in Chicago, give money and wear red to support AIDS research, and so on and so on. I'm not saying any of those things were bad; I just didn't need to do all of them...or any of them.
That being said, I do think that Johnny and I have been called, at least for now, to be foster parents and possibly adoptive parents. If that's something you are interested in and you have a good support system and you don't mind if you get crayon on your walls or that all your hair will turn grey by the time you're 27 or that you just might unexpectedly see your kid's biological family at the library or that everywhere you go people will either ask you if "all those children" are yours or glare at you for having children of different races, then go for it. It's an understatement to say that there are tons of kids who need help. Just while writing this I got an email from my case worker asking for an adoptive family for a sibling set of three precious boys. Our agency's website has literally pages and pages of children needing families.
So before I start rambling, here's the gist: fostering is hard, hardest thing we've ever done, don't do it if it's not for you, jump in head first if it is.
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