Thoughts on Fostering

I was looking at my calendar this morning and realized that it was one year ago today that Narasimha and I attended an informational meeting about foster care. We knew at the time that having biological children could take a while for us, and we were not yet ready (and still really aren't) to start looking into adoption very seriously. We were, and are, waiting to see if God has biological children in our future. So we did some thinking, and foster care came up.

We know that foster care wouldn't be easy - many have warned us that it's not exactly a cakewalk. The kids often come from less than loving and nurturing situations, and often still have unwavering allegiance to the people they are being taken from. We have heard (from people who know first-hand) that this can be very frustrating. Also, many of the kids come from all kinds of abusive situations, which just adds to the baggage.

So...why bother with this? Our first thought was: why does it have to be about us? Why does it have to be easy or fun for us? Why can't it be about us giving of ourselves - our time, love, resources, etc., to someone who can't or won't give back? Who's to say that any biological children we would have, or children we would adopt, wouldn't tax us in some ways. I know there were times when I certainly gave my parents a run for their money.

We also feel like we have so much to give. We want to share what we have and help those in need. We both have backgrounds (work and education) that make us probably more qualified and ready than most people who are successful foster parents to be able to do this well - very little surprises us anymore. Not that we would be perfect by any means, but we could be stable and loving. From what I have heard, these two things are more than most kids in the system can count on.

Plus, sometimes we just think it would be fun to get kids in our home. Borrow someone else's while we wait, and hopefully help a family in the process. People who foster have the opportunity to work with the child(ren) and family to help figure out what works to get everyone living safely under the same roof again. With my own personal interest in eventually counseling, that work with "integration" sounds like something I would enjoy.

So, back to the meeting. We showed up, and our first question was if we would even be able to, with Narasimha not being a citizen. We sat through the meeting, and were still interested, and talked to the woman at the end about our concern. She said she didn't know about citizenship issues, but she thought (and I had already thought) that maybe I could be a foster parent, and Narasimha could get certified as another adult living in the home. Kinda like if people are foster parents, and like one of the foster parent's parents lives with them, they still have to do a background check, and a sex offender check on that person. They have to do checks on any adult living in the home. So we thought maybe that would work. The only thing the woman said was that Narasimha wouldn't be able to keep the kids for the overnights by himself. He could watch them for a few hours at a time by himself, like for a few hours in an evening, but not for a whole night. That didn't bother us, because we almost never spend the nights separately - especially where I would be the one to leave. Sometimes he leaves when he is on call, but that wouldn't be against the rule. So we thought it would maybe work.

We went home and sent in the paperwork. A lady called us back and I told her about our situation with the citizenship. She said she would look into it. In a few days she called back, and said that no, we wouldn't be able to do foster care until Narasimha had his green card (which is still several years off, in our situation). Narasimha is currently, and always has been, here legally. I asked her if she had looked into the scenario we thought - me be the official "parent" and him be another adult living in the home. She said that since we were married, that can't work. If a couple is married, they both have to be certified foster parents. Our scenario, she said, would work if we were living together and not married. Then both people don't have to be certified foster parents (and maybe can't be certified as a couple, who knows). I also know that same-sex couples (who obviously aren't married) are allowed to foster.

So we basically had to forget about that. It's ok - it's obviously not God's plan for our family right now. At the same time, I felt really frustrated. I felt like (once again) our society is attacking the Biblically-defined institution of marriage. Basically, we want to and are able to give of ourselves in this way, but the government won't let us because we are married, where if we were unmarried (or homosexual) and living together, we would be rewarded.

I have heard that there might be ways for us to do foster care in this county - when we moved, we changed counties, and I heard that the county we came from might be more strict. I haven't looked into that. I have also heard that there are independent foster care opportunities. I don't know anything about that, but when things slow down a bit, we might check into that route.

So, today I am remembering foster children in my prayers. Their struggles, situations, and the families they are coming from. And, with the above criteria, even the families they are placed into. I have known many foster kids from my previous job, and my heart goes out to those displaced children - now during the holiday season and everyday they live their lives essentially in limbo.