Foster Parents Online

Any foster parent will tell you that planning a meal for a large family can be daunting. We are a family that has a large meal every Sunday, and each week it’s a new ordeal. Lately, we have taken to respite care which means that each weekend we have a new set of kids sitting down to the table, rejoicing in family and enjoying a good meal. Or not.

Last Sunday, we had J and E in addition to our own brood of 6. J is 8, E is 6. I planned a typical Sunday dinner: barbecued chicken, macaroni and cheese, cabbage with corned beef, cornbread, rice, potato salad, and apple pie. After church the meal was started. I cooked while doing laundry, refereeing arguments, dusting, and entertaining family from out of town. I was exhausted by the time the serving platters hit the table and I was none-too-pleased to hear the barrage of “I don’t like” “Please don’t give me” “That’s yucky!” and “Eewwww! WHAT is THAT?!” Most of those pleas came from our weekend guests, J and E, who hadn’t been with us long enough to know or appreciate our etiquette rules of the table. In the end, J ended up with a plate full of potato salad and a tablespoon of everything else (just to try) and E, following suit, feasted on a meal of chicken and rice. Yummy.

Foster parents are in a unique position when the holidays come around. Inevitably, our traditions are pressed on our foster kids as if ours were theirs, our meal tastes and ideas imposed upon them seemingly without thought as to what their preferences or traditions are. I know that in this house, and in the homes of the majority of foster parents I network with, this is just not true.

When a big holiday comes around and we do all that we can to incorporate our new family member’s traditions into our own, but often that proves fruitless as we can not, and often should not attempt to reproduce what the children had at home. Holidays are often difficult for foster children because they may have bad memories or experiences surrounding these days that mean so much to us.

Providing respite care poses a whole new challenge because, of course, it wouldn’t make sense for us to rearrange our whole holiday for people who are only passing through. So what to do? With Thanksgiving only a week away it’s time to start shopping for our meal and planning our spreads. How will you handle the different tastes of Thanksgiving if you provide foster care or respite on this day of Thanks? This foster family shares their experience from last year…what are your ideas for this year?

My mother says this constantly, and it annoys me to no end.

“Randi - I’ve got too much on my plate right now. I can’t handle anything else.”

This is her excuse for everything. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love my mother with every breath in my body. I simply don’t understand how she has so much on her plate that she can’t spend more time with us and with her grandchildren. I told her the other day that I am now the treasurer for the Parent’s Club for my son’s school.

“Don’t you have enough to do?”

Let’s see, I work from home, I take care of my two children, and I do the day-to-day things that everyone else has to do. No, I don’t think I’m adding too much to my schedule.

She tends to stress out about things that she really doesn’t need to, such as getting the garden weeded or painting the front steps. So you’re a day late getting the weeds out of your garden - so what? You need to strike a balance between enjoying life and fulfilling your obligations.

This is something that all foster parents, and regular parents for that matter, have to do. You have to find a way to balance everything, which can’t be easy. Don’t feel bad to let your hair down for a night and plop in front of the TV with the kids watching movies with McDonalds for supper and ice cream for dessert - sometimes we all need to relax, and how much nicer when you can relax with your kids?

We had a call yesterday for a 17 year old girl - according to her case manager, she’s a habitual liar.

Ummmm…no.

I say this for a reason. If we were to take her in and I had to leave for the evening, for whatever reason, she could say that Scott molested her, and our own children would be taken away while we waited for a formal investigation.

Helping children is great - including your own. Sometimes you have to say “no” in order to protect your kids. Your kids come first, or else you could end up having them be in foster care.

Sorry - I’m trying to figure out what’s going on with my new internet provider - see - we live in a small town and our only option was satellite. Now I’m discovering that if you’re looking at YouTube videos, its considered downloading. Once you download 200 MB worth of stuff (which you can get to quickly), you get substandard dial-up speeds.

Does anyone have any power over ComCast or Verizon because I’d REALLY like them here right now….

I am so sorry that I haven’t been here in a week - things have been nuts. My job has been nuts, my kids and family has been nuts - argh LOL. Summer is definitely upon us.

Toad has one more week of school (because up in VT we like to torture our children by making them attend school longer than any other state in the US) and he’s SUPER.EXCITED for school to end. That may have SOMETHING to do with the promised Friday Night Partay, but probably not. We told Toad that on Friday night, because he’s had such a good first year of school, we’d rent a game and let him stay up really, really late. I’m guessing he’s down for the count before 10 p.m. And I promised to buy that spray cheese in a can - because I’m wild and crazy like dat.

Living in a small community can be difficult when you’re a foster parent. We saw FS’s therapist at the Memorial day parade last week. She said that FS was doing great - but biomom was having issues.

“They had nothing to do with FS. I looked at her and said, ‘get over it’.”

The hard part is that sometimes there’s only so much you can do to help somebody before they have to help themselves. In our part, I know we made the best decision for FS. He is loving his new foster home and they are absolutely insane about him. And now we wait for the next call…

To all the Biological/Foster/Adoptive mothers out there -

You’re doing a hell of a job - even if you don’t think you are.

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!

I had a great question from Brenda the other day.

Do you have to be married to be a foster parent?

Excellent question!

The quick answer? No.

The long answer? It’s always difficult to be a single parent, and being a parent to a foster child is always stressful. So, when you pile both of these stresses on top of each other, you have one really, really stressful situation.

It is totally possible to be a single foster parent, it just takes a huge amount of patience, love and understanding. Good scheduling abilities don’t hurt either. While I give kudos to anybody that raises foster children, I have a special appreciation for single parents who raise foster children.

One of the trickier aspects to manage when you are a foster parent is how you deal with family.

Today we are heading up to my Aunt and Uncle’s house - my Uncle is actually my husband’s age, and their children are my children’s age. We have been visiting them since our children have been born, but we have not gone up since our foster son arrived in January.

Our foster son gets extremely excited when other kids are around and people/things tend to get broken. This will be a real chance to see if he is improving or not in this area, and will help us know if he still needs some help or if he’s “getting it”.

Foster Parenting, Foster Children

Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund

April 16, 2007, will be remembered as one of the darkest days in the history of the Virginia Tech community and the world beyond.

To remember and honor the victims of those tragic events, the university has established the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund to aid in the healing process and generate financial support.

The fund will be used to cover expenses including but not limited to:

• Grief counseling
• Memorials
• Communication expenses
• Comfort expenses
• Incidental needs

If you plan to give, please click the link below:

Our FS’s infant/toddler teacher came today. It’s been a few weeks due to my grandmother’s death and an illness that swept through her family. Of course, FS decided that he was going to act up.

During his one hour visit he:

-Had to be told to sit on his behind instead of his knees (because they’re wearing raw) no less than 40 times

-Refused to concentrate on ANYTHING

-Climbed all over the infant/toddler teacher constantly

-Put the fake baby on the bookshelf (as a means of going ‘ni-ni’)

-Had to be told to settle down about a half a dozen times

-Whacked Toad in the face with a wooden toy because he WOULD NOT settle down

-Had to sit in the chair for 2 minutes

-Stepped on all the toys because he “wanted to”

So, yeah, it was a WONDERFUL visit. I admitted to his teacher that both my husband and my patience is wearing thin. Not that we don’t care for our foster son - we do. He’s extremely demanding in that he is a year delayed and extremely hyper. I honestly, now, don’t know how parents who have children who are diagnosed with ADHD do it. I don’t think he has ADHD, but he can NOT sit still and he’s got more energy in his pinkie than I’ve had since I was 10!

The teacher asked if, when/if FS left, that we would still like to do foster care. The answer was, easily, YES. However, if, at his six month review, DCF decides that they want to terminate parental rights permanently, we do not believe that we want to adopt him.

Of course I feel like a heel saying that, because I do love all children. But you have to recognize what is a good fit for your family and what is not. FS brings the stress level up in the house about 150%, which, in turn, makes us have less patience with all of the children. What he really needs is a home with either much older children or, ideally, NO other children.

We do know that there are people on a waiting list for adoption that really want toddlers and infants, so I have no doubt that they will be able to find a good home for him very quickly should he come up for adoption. I do not, however, believe that he will come up for adoption - the winds at DCF seem to be shifting towards reconnection, which is always the goal.

What I’m trying to say (in my long-winded way) is that it’s okay to know and say that a child is not a good fit for a permanent place in your family. Being able to love and give them the best while they’re with you is really what being a foster parent is all about - it’s meant to be a stepping stone and not necessarily a mountain.

Foster Parenting, Foster children, Family/Infant Toddler Program

My thoughts, today, are with the thirty-three people whose lives were taken in the Virginia Tech Shootings yesterday. My thoughts and prayers are with the grieving family as well…to have your son/daughter/sister/brother/grandchild ripped from your life in such a way is the most horrible thing that can happen to any family. May God bless you all.

If you look around on foster parenting websites you will see some abbreviations that may look funny and be hard to understand. Here are some of the most commonly seen acronyms.

FS - Foster son
FD - Foster daughter
BS - Biological Son
BD - Biological Daughter
AS - Adopted Son
AD - Adopted Daughter
CW - Case Worker
GAL - Guardian Ad Litem
BM (or BioM) - The foster child’s biological mother
BD (or BioD) - The foster child’s biological father

There are definitely more out there, but these are the ones that you’ll see pretty much anywhere!

We went to a large local gathering yesterday. Kids of all ages were there playing with different activities and having a blast.

One month ago we would not have been about to bring our foster son to this event. He would have been wild - running around, knocking things over, and if we did not hold his hand the entire time we were there he would have disappeared. It would have been no fun for any of us.

Now we were all able to go and enjoy the activities. He got to socialize with other kids and I’ll never forget the smile that lit up his face when he realized that he was actually able to play in the water table.

All I could think of is, “THIS is why we do this.”