Foster Parenting & Adoption

We hear everyday of the need for more foster parenting. Families for children who have been removed from their homes for neglect and abuse. For many, adoption is their only chance to make a new start and succeed in life.

Becoming a foster parent will change your life-style. Maybe not at first, but as months and years pass you will be affected. Foster care will affect you and your family in many areas (extended family, community involvement, your personal activities, and those of your children.) The changes, like life around us, range from very good to very negative.

As you enter the world of foster parenting you will find that you become very visible to the community and can add additional pressures whether real or imaginary. As the adult of the foster family, you will constantly find yourself surrounded by people and yet very much alone. It is then you need to find your support groups, those who are like you.

You will become counselor, taxi driver, referee, and sometime you will have to stand up for the child against those who are "in the system" who have the responsibility of the child's best interests.

Yes, real people become families everyday. These are not saints nor are they "in it for the money"!! So MANY people are disgusted by the acts of a few that put a bad name on the many. Foster care "income" barely covers the expenses of a child. In fact, many states need to increase their reimbursement amounts to cover the costs incurred by the foster families.

The majority of the parents are in the business of parenting because they care for and LOVE their children. We are analyzed and watched by social services and, paperwork is plenty but its all for the sake of the children. It is because of the many loving adults that hundreds of thousands of foster children grow up to be loving, stable people who make a difference in their own community.

Get to know some of these families and then ask yourself... excerpts from an article at the National Foster Parent Association

Foster Parenting Blogs

Could I love and let go?