Foster Parenthood Is a Selfless Investment of Love in the Future

We’re not your typical Orange County family. I’m a registered nurse and single mother. My daughter Katie is a recent college graduate just starting her career. What makes us different is that we also share our home with Mariah, 3, and Shane, 8 months, our foster children.

My parents cared for foster children, so I knew what a good experience foster parenting could be. When Katie graduated, I cut my workload to part time. Meanwhile, Katie learned of Orange County’s foster care system through an affiliation with the Orangewood Children’s Foundation. Our foster parenthood seemed to fall into place. Now Katie and I share going to the park, taking Mariah to swimming lessons and cheering as Shane learns to crawl.

We also take our foster children to visit their birth parents. Like many in Orange County, our foster children will be reunited with their parents. While we care for the children, their parents learn parenting skills and learn to be responsible citizens.

Sometimes reunification with the birth family is not possible. For children whose families cannot or will not care for them, foster parents provide nurturing and protection. A big part of our job is to help these children make the transition to permanent homes. Unlike in the past, the foster family is often the first choice to be a child’s permanent home. Recent changes in foster parenting and adoptions have opened the foster care arena to many parents who want to adopt.

People often tell me they could never be a foster parent because they couldn’t give up a child they love. It’s not easy, but the satisfaction that Katie and I derive from helping our foster children far outweighs and outlasts the temporary pain of separation.

Foster families don’t face this or other difficulties alone or unprepared. Orange County Children’s Services provides extensive training and support to foster parents. As part of the licensing process, we attended classes to learn about the foster care system and the special needs of foster children. Now, as licensed foster parents, we attend continuing training to help us manage issues such as working with the birth parents and dealing with the pain of separation as foster children return to their parents.

Many organizations support foster families. For example, the nonprofit Orangewood Children’s Foundation provides some of the extras that can make a difference to a foster child, such as team uniforms or tickets to the prom. The foundation even paid for our foster child’s swimming lessons. In addition, the foundation provides support for special needs--braces, college tuition, clothes for a job interview, a job mentor, even help to open a checking account. For foster parents, a program called Time Out for Parents allows foster children to stay with another foster family if a vacation, serious illness in the family or just a well-deserved rest requires a backup plan.

Foster parents are part of a team working together to make life better for children and for a community. Orange County needs more foster homes. The Orangewood Children’s Home, our county’s shelter for abused, abandoned and neglected children, is severely overcrowded. Nearly 300 children fill a shelter originally built for 235. Some of the children sleep on the floor in makeshift beds. Another facility is planned. But for now, where can the children go?

Part of the solution may lie under your own roof. If you want to love and care for a child in need, you probably qualify as a foster parent. Foster parents may be married or single or, like Katie and me, a parent/adult-child team. They can be male or female, people who work or stay at home, homeowners or renters. They may have children already or might never have been parents.

Foster children are placed in homes with similar lifestyles and backgrounds with consideration to age, sex, religion and race. To make the transition as smooth as possible, each child has a trial visit with the family before a placement is made. Foster parents receive monthly financial support and 100% medical coverage for their foster children.

These systems help foster parents and foster children succeed. The ultimate success is when a foster child goes on to live a healthy, happy and productive life. Without the intervention of foster parenthood, an abused child may grow up to become an abuser. Statistics show that two-thirds of prison inmates suffered abuse or neglect as children.

Please call the foster and adoptive family development team at Orange County Children’s Services at (714) 704-8704 to learn about becoming a foster or adoptive family. If you think it takes someone special to be a foster parent, you’re right. It takes you.