Reply to Fostering - give it to me straight

Forum Index » Parenting -- Special Concerns

Reply to "Fostering - give it to me straight"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Please don't let ignorant people who have little experience fostering but many opinions about what it must be like sway your decision. There are so very many children with a vast array of needs who need adults committed to caring for and loving them for however long they may need, which includes until an adoptive family (if you are not hoping to adopt) can be found should reunification not happen. We both work big jobs full time. We have two bio kids in elementary school. We've been fostering for two and a half years. We're currently on kids 10, 11, and 12. We have an infant, a toddler and an elementary schooler who is (ghasp) not in birth order. It's fine. Is it a lot of juggling? Absolutely. There are many more initial appointments when a kid first moves in but that then stabilizes. There are often therapy and/or early intervention appointments and some kids need educational supports. But, you know, you can work it out. There are Saturday and early morning and early evening appointments. There are options for calling in to some stuff. You can toggle with your spouse. You can squeeze parent only appointments during your lunch hour. The thing is that you do need a flexible job or two and a commitment to staying engaged and motivated. Good foster parents are not perfect at all. But, they do need to be able to handle setbacks, lots of red tape and hurting children. Good luck. If you can handle two careers and three kids under six, you can handle this. The first six months post placement are tough then things can get much better. Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought I would be parenting five kids but here we are, treading water most days and sometimes swimming! There's just such a need.[/quote]

Thank you for this. We are starting the home study thru our county. Both of us work, but have decent flexibility. We have two school-aged kids. Our hearts are all in for this but I worry about managing the logistics. Your post is real but reassuring![/quote]

I am so glad! Good luck on your journey :)[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics