1. The initial paperwork and the waiting feel like forever. I called the Department of Children and family services in August of 2013. A really nice guy came out the next week and had a very open and honest conversation with us about what foster care entailed. During this visit he measured all of our rooms and told us potentially we could have up to 2.5 children in addition to our four children in our house. I was a little freaked out by the .5...we prayed about it and filled out the application that I didn't send in. Cold feet. I called again in January and the same really nice guy came out again to bring us another application and we officially sent it in and started our P.R.I.D.E training in February. Then we had our home study in March and waited and waited for approval. Finally in August we were approved and placed. All that waiting felt like forever.
2. The day they call you with a placement you run out and buy everything because you have nothing. I remember getting the phone call on a hot summer day. I just picked Kaid up from junior life guards and were packed up and headed to the beach. A phone call from dccp while I was driving I pulled over to the side of the road got out of the truck and paced like a crazy woman up and down the sidewalk while the woman on the line said "We have two girls." "I know you want to adopt but would you be willing to ride the roller coaster?" Me.."yes..yes." and then tell the social worker stupidly "I'm excited!!!" And then hang up and feel stupid for saying such a stupid thing because the girls were going to expirience some serious loss (they called us before removal). Then realize you have no diapers, no toddler or baby clothes, and kind of have an oh crap moment. You then run to walmart and make your kids cry because they really wanted to go surfing and then you try to explain to them that their being selfish because these girls don't have a home because they were in a bad situation, and what would Jesus do? And you take all the kids into walmart crying and just start throwing random baby stuff in the cart because you're not really thinking.
3.The first night the kids might not like you. We waited all day for the social worker to arrive with the girls. They finally arrived at 8:00pm that night. I remember seeing the van pull up outside our house and the two most beautiful curly headed girls pop their heads out of the van. And I gushed how adorable!! And say "hi sweetie how are you" hold out my arms and expect her to jump into them like she knows me. And that moment was crushed with a yell and a glare. These girls were just hours before taken from everything they've ever known. Their little worlds were just turned upside down. And for me to expect them to like me at first hello. Nope...not going to happen. It's not a fairy tale moment.
4. The children may come with friends. I won't go into too many personal details here of the girls situation. We want to protect their story and them. But it is very common for children in foster care to bring "friends" with them that stick around for a bit and take a lot of doctor visits and treatments to completely clear. I will say we are friend free now.
5. There will be lots of meltdowns and crying..children and foster parents alike. Okay I'm not going to lie. Foster care is tough. You don't know what exactly these children have been through. What they have seen or experienced in their little lives. You're not given much info to protect the rights of the birth parents. All you know of right now is the kids are grieving their loss and to process this there are lots of meltdowns and tantrums and throwing things. You have no idea what comforts this child or what she is used to. She is scared and still learning to trust these complete strangers. At the same time you don't know what to do. So when little one has a melt down all you can do is try to talk them through it and when you get no where with that you cry too. And then you lay in bed and have a melt down because you wondered why you even go into this in the first place. All these emotions are very real and expected. Please let me clarify foster care is worth it. Being in these children's lives are worth it.
6. You may want to call it quits. I read a statistic that more then half of all foster parents call it quits in the first year. Wow. I will say that there were times I wanted to pick up the phone and say I can't do this..I can't. I then had to tell myself this is not about me. This is about these little girls. And we are going to see them through. I'm not going to quit on them because Jesus never quit on me.
7. It will be one of the best things you ever do. Yes indeed it will. My whole outlook on life has changed because of these two little ones.
8. You may start loving the birth mom even when you don't want to. I'm praying and hoping for redemption. When the girls were first placed with us I selfishly wanted them to be ours. I prayed and prayed and cried for God to bring them out of their "bad" situation forever because they would have such a different life with us. And I never hear God's voice but he clearly told me one day when I was talking to him I said, "God let these be our girls." He replied, "Brittany, these are MY girls." Yes God these are YOUR girls. Just like all of our children are YOURS. And in You we place our trust that you will take care of your girls and you know their story and their future. You have already walked this road before them. We will love them while we have them and if that's forever so be it. If that's for a few months and then they go back to a restored home then so be it. After I took off my selfish thinking I stopped wanting the girls birth mom to mess up. Instead I started cheering her on. Instead I started praying for her. Praying for healing and redemption and restoration. Instead of hating her I started to love her.
9. After weeks being in your family you will see a different kid then the one who showed up the first night. When Breezy first came to us and how she is now with us is like night and day. To a scared little girl to a little girl that is starting to trust and heal and feel a sense of belonging in our family. We are growing together.
10. Your kids will not "suffer." or feel replaced. A question often asked, "how do the boys feel about this?" They absolutely love these girls. They all try to "mother" the baby..which cracks me up. Even little Kai will come up and sweetly say, "Hi ----" to the baby. They also want to help change diapers and give her a bottle. No joke. They will be dashing helpful loving husbands and daddy's one day. I can promise you the boys do not feel miss placed or neglected one bit. In fact I even had a chat in the car one day with them about this and they gave very positive feedback. If anything it's teaching them to care more about others then just themselves. They know the girls situation and for a 9 and 7 year old to grasp that and lovingly come along side these girls and be brothers to them is amazing. They are amazing.
To be continued....
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