My wife and I have had a long term dream of being foster parents. This dream was born from the desire to provide a home for children who are in a hard place, to help those children through whatever situation they're in, to heal them, and to help heal their families.
Following is the process we went through to become foster parents and how we received our first foster child. I realize that this post stops at a point in time about a year ago, but I wanted to get it out there. I've got a further post (or posts) in the works about what it was like having a foster child, about receiving a sibling, and about seeing them go home that I'll share when they're done.
Process of Becoming a Foster Parent
We started the process of becoming foster parents by looking into the differences between going through a foster agency and going through the county. The Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS or "the county") is the governmental organization in LA that handles all of the cases for foster children. They are the first line of defense when dealing with these children. Stereotypically, the social workers working for DCFS are burdened with too many cases, are overworked, and because of these things can't give each case the full attention that it needs. (Please note that I don't say this to bash county social workers at all. This is simply the stereotype that I've heard propagated and, to some level, experienced.)
Foster agencies exist to help extend the support, services, and attention these children This is a wonderful thing, but in order to be able to operate on a day to day basis they take a significant cut of the monthly stipend given to foster parents from DCFS. We decided that we want to be able to provide the best care possible for the children regardless of how much or little money we'd be getting (it would never be enough to provide fully for the kids anyway). Because of this we decided to go with a foster agency so that we'd have access to the extra support that they can provide.
Once we had decided on working with an agency, it came down to choosing an agency to work with. We received several recommendations for Five Acres. Given how long they've been running as an organization and that their mission aligns with our goals of providing care for the whole person (emotional as well as physical) and permanency (reunifying with the biological family if it makes sense, otherwise finding a good fitting permanent home asap), we decided to go through them. In addition they've got a group home and offices in close proximity to our home which provide meeting space for family and therapy visits.
There were things that we expected to have to do to prepare ourselves to be foster parents. Things like going through some sort of training and child proofing the house. Five Acres requires that parents get a certain number of hours of training per year to become and to maintain their status as foster parents. They provided a Sat/Sun course over several weekends that allowed us to meet the requirement. From there, although there were a couple items that caught us by surprise with our house, we were able to get it setup and approved rather quickly. (By quickly I mean 3 months from when we "officially" started going through the process. We had finished up a lot of stuff beforehand since we'd heard how stringent some of the house rules could be.)
The thing that I personally did not expect was the interview with the social worker. Going into foster care, I knew that the children that we'd be dealing would have been through experiences that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. The social worker reminded me of this and said that we needed to explore in detail any traumas that I had personally been through in my life. When I asked why, she gave me a response I'll never forget:
These kids will have triggers around the issues stemming from their traumas. As foster parents, you MUST know what your traumas and triggers are so that, when a child reacts out of place of hurt, you won't allow yourselves to be triggered and respond in a way that will further hurt the child. If we can avoid placing a child in your home that has the same triggers you do, we will.
This conversation lasted for quite a while with my wife and I individually, moving through all of the parts of our lives. After these discussions and fixing a last few items at our house, we were certified as foster parents!
Once we had decided on working with an agency, it came down to choosing an agency to work with. We received several recommendations for Five Acres. Given how long they've been running as an organization and that their mission aligns with our goals of providing care for the whole person (emotional as well as physical) and permanency (reunifying with the biological family if it makes sense, otherwise finding a good fitting permanent home asap), we decided to go through them. In addition they've got a group home and offices in close proximity to our home which provide meeting space for family and therapy visits.
There were things that we expected to have to do to prepare ourselves to be foster parents. Things like going through some sort of training and child proofing the house. Five Acres requires that parents get a certain number of hours of training per year to become and to maintain their status as foster parents. They provided a Sat/Sun course over several weekends that allowed us to meet the requirement. From there, although there were a couple items that caught us by surprise with our house, we were able to get it setup and approved rather quickly. (By quickly I mean 3 months from when we "officially" started going through the process. We had finished up a lot of stuff beforehand since we'd heard how stringent some of the house rules could be.)
The thing that I personally did not expect was the interview with the social worker. Going into foster care, I knew that the children that we'd be dealing would have been through experiences that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. The social worker reminded me of this and said that we needed to explore in detail any traumas that I had personally been through in my life. When I asked why, she gave me a response I'll never forget:
These kids will have triggers around the issues stemming from their traumas. As foster parents, you MUST know what your traumas and triggers are so that, when a child reacts out of place of hurt, you won't allow yourselves to be triggered and respond in a way that will further hurt the child. If we can avoid placing a child in your home that has the same triggers you do, we will.
This conversation lasted for quite a while with my wife and I individually, moving through all of the parts of our lives. After these discussions and fixing a last few items at our house, we were certified as foster parents!
Meeting the Need We Expected
While we were preparing our hearts and home, we discussed whether we'd prefer to take care of a child in any specific age group. As is typical, my wife had more experience with children than I. Because my experience was lacking a bit, we decided that starting where every other new parent starts would be a good idea. We found out after finishing our training that there was, at that time, a great need for families to take in infants. By the time we were actually certified, we'd been told this so many times we were convinced that we would get a call that very day. While it wasn't that day, it didn't take long for us to get the call that the was a baby boy who needed a home.
Later that night, the county social worker knocked on our door and then walked in to our living room with a handsome baby boy in his car seat. We went through the paperwork and, while we were doing so, the little guy stared up at our dining room lamp from his car seat enamored by all of the colors. Then she asked us to pull him out of the car seat.
I imagine that the nervousness I felt was similar in nature to what first time fathers feel when taking their baby home for the first time. Plus a little, maybe, since he wasn't my child but was mine to take care of. My wife pulled him out of his car seat and held him for a bit .... then handed him to me. What a feeling to have such a small life in your arms!
Later that night, the county social worker knocked on our door and then walked in to our living room with a handsome baby boy in his car seat. We went through the paperwork and, while we were doing so, the little guy stared up at our dining room lamp from his car seat enamored by all of the colors. Then she asked us to pull him out of the car seat.
I imagine that the nervousness I felt was similar in nature to what first time fathers feel when taking their baby home for the first time. Plus a little, maybe, since he wasn't my child but was mine to take care of. My wife pulled him out of his car seat and held him for a bit .... then handed him to me. What a feeling to have such a small life in your arms!
