I'm a foster parent - Ask me Anything

[Anonymous]

Do you work full time?

Are your kids older or younger than the foster kids?

How do you handle childcare (e.g. if you and your partner want a night out)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have you ever felt threatened by any of your foster children? I've thought about fostering, but we have small children and I worry that some children coming from a very disturbed environment could act out in a violent way.

We only take kids younger than our own, and only began after our kids could talk. I have definitely slept with one eye open with some kids. There are three times when I get very nervous with foster children - one is right when they're about to arrive, one is when whoever has brought them has left and one is right before I open the bedroom door in the morning. DH and I are pretty good at hustling the kids along throughout the day, asking closed-choice questions, and keeping control. We don't have 17 year old 6 foot angry man-boys raging here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you work full time?

Are your kids older or younger than the foster kids?

How do you handle childcare (e.g. if you and your partner want a night out)?

I work part time from home. My kids are older. DH's parents live close by, as do my brother and his wife, so we have options for people who have been cleared to watch the kids. There's also a respite option, but I don't like to use that because I think it's not good for foster kids to change homes and caregivers.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for doing this.

What is your race? My friend said most foster parents in MD are black, which surprised me somewhat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not clear about how the money given to foster parents to help with costs works. I've heard about children staying just one or two nights with one foster parent before going on to another. How does that work?

I'm also not sure if the amounts in the link you provided are monthly or annually?

And have you ever had foster children who stayed just a few nights?

Yes, we have, for various reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for doing this.

What is your race? My friend said most foster parents in MD are black, which surprised me somewhat.

DH and I are white.

[Anonymous]

No questions OP, just wanted to say thank you. My best friend from college grew up in the foster care system. She was in some pretty bad situations, but the last one (and the longest) really turned her life around and made her into the person she is today.

I hope DH and I are in the position some day to be foster parents.

[Anonymous]

Not sure the question, but I'm wondering if your children have had any say in this and do you anticipate any long term consequences to your children? My cousin fostered a lot of children as her two biological children turned around 4 and 6. They are now in college, and I'll just say they are beyond messed up. They have a ton of lingering issues with their parents for needing to "supplement" their family, like they weren't enough. Not saying this is how it is for everyone obviously, but just wondering if this has come up for you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not sure the question, but I'm wondering if your children have had any say in this and do you anticipate any long term consequences to your children? My cousin fostered a lot of children as her two biological children turned around 4 and 6. They are now in college, and I'll just say they are beyond messed up. They have a ton of lingering issues with their parents for needing to "supplement" their family, like they weren't enough. Not saying this is how it is for everyone obviously, but just wondering if this has come up for you?

We always ask our kids before accepting another foster child into our home. There have been times when we've had a particularly trying experience with a child, and one of our kids has said they're not ready yet for another one.

DH and I hope that our kids will view this as having been a good experience that opened their eyes to all the different ways people parent.

[Anonymous]

Have you ever felt like you were losing your cool with any of the kids? I would love to do this once mine are older, but there have definitely been days when the positive, constructive mask slips and I become the harpy in the kitchen, screaming that these Legos on the floor are making me crazy and if you don't clean them up right this instant young man you are going to be in big trouble don't you roll your eyes at me...

My own kids don't deserve a mom like this. But that goes three times over for a kid who's had a particularly rough time finding protective, trustworthy adults.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I call BD on you, OP. you're focused on kids eating veggies and breaking toys. Anyone who's been in foster care or fostered kids knows how heavy this is emotionally. Most kids in foster care have experienced a lot of abuse. You're not dealing with those everyday parenting issues

Simmer down. I gave examples that the majority of people here would understand. Dh and I focus on many different things with foster kids - from yes, eating vegetables, to anger management, to self-care, to learning how to behave at a birthday party where none of the adults get drunk or threaten people with guns.

Not all kids in foster care have experienced a ton of abuse, btw. We've had several children who have come from single-parent homes where the parent has died or disappeared, but before that the child was showing up in school daily, eating decently, and going about a mostly normal childhood. Not all foster kids have been beaten and abused and come from poverty.

Yeah...sure. Cause kids in foster care have only been to birthday parties in the hood

Yea... Kids ripped from their home in the middle of the night and placed in emergency care have never seen drugs, drunks or a gun pointed at them for needing something (like food). You are clueless. Do some emergency foster care if you think they come to you from good situations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have you ever felt like you were losing your cool with any of the kids? I would love to do this once mine are older, but there have definitely been days when the positive, constructive mask slips and I become the harpy in the kitchen, screaming that these Legos on the floor are making me crazy and if you don't clean them up right this instant young man you are going to be in big trouble don't you roll your eyes at me...

My own kids don't deserve a mom like this. But that goes three times over for a kid who's had a particularly rough time finding protective, trustworthy adults.

Sure I have. That's the time to go for a walk around the block, go call my mom or a friend, bitch to DH, pet the dog, whatever. It's okay for a foster kid see an adult get upset and then employ non-damaging strategies to pull themselves together and calm down. It's okay for them to see an adult get angry and then apologize and "make up" with someone they've yelled at.

[Anonymous]

What was the main reason you decided to foster? Do you want to eventually adopt? Can you give an example where you had to call the caseworker and tell them the child could not stay with you any more? In other words, what kind of needs did the child have that you felt you could not serve, and how did those needs manifest? Do you ever keep in touch with the kids after they leave?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have you ever felt like you were losing your cool with any of the kids? I would love to do this once mine are older, but there have definitely been days when the positive, constructive mask slips and I become the harpy in the kitchen, screaming that these Legos on the floor are making me crazy and if you don't clean them up right this instant young man you are going to be in big trouble don't you roll your eyes at me...

My own kids don't deserve a mom like this. But that goes three times over for a kid who's had a particularly rough time finding protective, trustworthy adults.

Believe me. This would probably be a blip in the radar compares to what they've been through.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What was the main reason you decided to foster? Do you want to eventually adopt? Can you give an example where you had to call the caseworker and tell them the child could not stay with you any more? In other words, what kind of needs did the child have that you felt you could not serve, and how did those needs manifest? Do you ever keep in touch with the kids after they leave?

DH lived near a woman who fostered when he was a kid, it made a big impression on him, and it was something he talked to me about before we got engaged. I like that we can be a soft place to land during chaos for a child. Right now our official party line is that we are not looking to adopt. We had one child that basically needed two full-time adults at all times, and it was too much at the time (each person in our home was getting the flu, one foster child had a broken leg, one had ADHD and we hadn't found a good medical combo yet). Unfortunately we don't get to keep in touch once the kids move on. We have stressed that the kids are always welcome back to our house if they have to go back into care though.