Taking Extra Care

Among Ruth and Ron DeVries’ 196 foster kids were Sandra, alive despite all the broken bones; Maria, left for dead in her mother’s bedroom; and Brannon, abandoned in a patch of prickly bushes.

Now there is Victor.

The couple first saw him when he was no more than a 2-pound, 10-ounce drug baby lying in a tiny glass-enclosed hospital crib. They have worked hard to turn him into a 2-year-old who can throw a toy, fidget and jump like any other.

The couple, who have taken in more foster kids than almost anyone in Southern California, expect Victor will be among the last. The DeVrieses plan to retire soon, capping three decades of nurturing children short on love.

Their story reflects the way foster care has changed and why the need for foster parents is growing. When the DeVrieses began, pretty much all that their children needed was a hug, guidance and a hearty meal. Now, many of the children who pass through their home require the attention of doctors, psychologists, physical therapists, lawyers and judges.

Then there is the hardest job: saying goodbye.

With Victor, the DeVrieses wonder how they will do it one last time. Even though they will continue to take some children in, it will only be temporary, a few weeks or months. Victor will be the last to stay a full two years.

“This time, it seems like it’s harder than the others,” Ruth said. “It’s definitely something we’ve thought a lot about. We know we can’t be foster-parenting forever.”

When Victor graduated to a bassinet and then to a crib, the DeVrieses took him in a soft blue blanket to their tidy Brea mobile home filled with toys, stuffed animals, a closet of diapers in every size and framed photos of 20 of their most recent foster kids.

Even at five months, Victor’s little body was stiff and hard to hold. His cry was like a lonely kitten’s on a cold night--nothing new for a couple who had tended to dozens of drug babies.

When Victor arrived, the couple also cared for a mentally retarded 2-year-old foster girl and their two bubbly adopted daughters, Jennifer, now 13, and Natalie, now 7. Natalie stops breathing every hour or so when she sleeps because of a permanent brain injury. Even though the couple’s four biological children grew up long ago, piercing baby cries, buzzing monitors, and wheezing still punctuate almost every night.

Ruth and Ron are so used to sleepless nights that three years ago, when there were no foster children one weekend and their two adopted daughters miraculously slept through the night, they just sat up until dawn, staring at each other in uncomfortable black silence.

Ruth, a soft-spoken 60-year-old woman, learned about foster care from her mother, who took in 74 foster children before she died at age 54. Ron, 62, a school maintenance man, has come to love the foster parent way of life.

Orange County officials don’t keep records, but it’s clear that the DeVrieses are at the top of the list of those with the most foster kids. They have cared for as many as eight children at a time, beginning when Lyndon Johnson was president.

“A family like Ruth and Ron is a hard find,” said Frank Spurney, a senior county social worker. “They bring [the children] up to normal standards. They give of themselves, their time, their money.”

Need for Foster Parents in County Is Growing

Michael Riley, the county’s director of children and family services, hopes to add 200 more foster homes to the county’s roll of 627 homes to accommodate an expected increase of foster care children.

In Orange County, officials expect the number of foster children, 4,000, to jump as much as 50% by 2010. Experts attribute the jump to a growing population and a lack of social services for poor mothers. In the United States, the number of children in foster care rose 20,000 over the last year, to 520,000.

Riley said it’s better for the kids to land in private homes like the DeVrieses’ rather than in emergency shelters, a less comforting environment where kids’ personal problems tend to mount and costs to taxpayers are higher.

Finding--and retaining--foster parents has traditionally been a struggle. County officials haven’t done studies to figure out why foster parents drop out or what they need. But they know that foster parenting is harder because kids have physical and emotional problems related to their parents’ abuse or drug use.

This year, the county set aside about $700,000 to help foster parents pay for transportation and day care.

But county officials know the region’s cost of living makes fostering unprofitable, so officials are lobbying lawmakers to increase monthly reimbursements of $375 to $500 per child. The Children’s Advocacy Institute estimates that only half of foster parents’ costs are paid for by the government.

The DeVrieses say they are always running in the red. A family friend once calculated the family needed $200 more per child than what the county provided. The family’s total subsidy from the county varies, because they receive money for each child, and each subsidy depends on the child’s medical problems and age.

County officials try to touch on these themes in periodic sessions for prospective parents, gently mentioning drug babies, developmentally delayed elementary-age kids and problematic teens.

The sessions only give a clue of the hectic foster parent schedule that the DeVrieses maintain year after year.

Days Are Full of Activities, Cares

Each day is filled with a never-ending stream of activities, from cooking meals and cleaning house to administering medication and going over homework assignments.

A recent afternoon, starting with picking up Jennifer and Natalie from their schools at 2:20 p.m. and 2:55 p.m., was typical. Natalie is dropped off with Ruth, Victor and the latest drug baby, 8-month-old Avia. Ron then shuttles Jennifer to the orthodontist at 3 p.m.

Ruth begins to bathe the children. Then she prepares dinner, served at 5 p.m. She usually cooks, but on pizza nights, she assembles a salad and drinks. Jennifer follows her through the kitchen talking about “a big ol’ [school] project we’re doing on World War II.” She carries three-by-five cards with handwritten questions like, “When did World War II end?” Ruth tells her she remembers that very day.

Pizza!

Natalie says grace.

A chorus echoes her prayer.

Ruth and Jennifer take turns spooning Gerber baby food into Victor’s mouth. His teeth have just come in and he’s not quite up to table food yet.

Avia practices rolling over, her yellow and lace dress suddenly disappearing between a big toy and the couch. Jennifer, who is watching “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” on television, moves Avia back to the middle of the living room. Victor is grabbing everything he can from the kitchen counter tops.

The neighbors arrive with pastries.

Jennifer later returns to her homework: “Who started World War II? When did it start?”

Avia lies under an activity gym. Victor plays with plastic cups. Then he throws them. Ruth ducks.

Then she rocks Avia to sleep and puts her in the special crib for drug babies, the one that simulates the motions of a mother’s womb. Everyone is asleep by 9 p.m. The night is just beginning.

Natalie--who suffers from sleep apnea--has to be awakened four times to resume her breathing, which is far fewer times than the night before, when she stopped breathing every 45 minutes. The baby, who usually sleeps only for an hour or two at a time because of her drug addiction, sleeps until 4 a.m.

Ruth laughs the next morning: “It was a really easy night. We’re wondering if something is wrong.”

The Hardest Part Is Saying Goodbye

She and Ron love all the children, but some touch their hearts more. Victor, a half-Latino, half-white toddler with a mop of ink-black hair and caramel skin, is among those.

With Victor, every step was a milestone. He learned to roll over with the help of physical therapists who still work with him twice a week.

“We were always working with him, trying to get him to sit up, stand up. It’s just been a real challenge. It’s so rewarding to see him progress,” said Ruth.

Years ago, the DeVrieses longed for more support with the youngest victims of drugs. So they formed a foster parent association and invited doctors to talk to them.

For nearly a decade, they begged local government for formal training. Only a state law five years ago got them what they wanted: a required eight hours of training annually for foster parents. Even that, the couple said, falls short.

Ron and Ruth said they can’t imagine a life without a house full of foster kids. The children bring the couple together and give each a sense of accomplishment.

They know that many of the kids they help are so young that they may not remember them after they leave the DeVrieses and grow older. But to the couple, that’s beside the point. The intangible gift the children take with them is worth all the effort.

“What you have done for that child can never be taken away,” Ruth said.

*

If the children these days were like Nicky Joe, the DeVrieses’ first foster child, probably no one would need special assistance. The boy came to the DeVrieses in 1964 “a beautiful, normal child,” said Ron.

Ruth focused on getting Nicky Joe’s hair to curl. With Victor, the 2-year-old now in their home, she worked on getting his mother off drugs.

She practically adopted the 17-year-old mother, providing her as many how-tos about children as she could. The lessons seemed to rub off.

Victor’s mother was given permission to take him to a group home. She studied to be a nursing assistant. But five months later, Ruth said, she was asked to come and get Victor, who had been neglected.

The DeVrieses had dedicated their adult lives to helping children because they saw themselves as people who could help.

No wonder it was painful to admit they would not make the best parents for Victor. By the time he is 20, they will be about 80.

“If we were just 10 years younger, we would keep him. But we can’t,” said Ruth.

Even in years past, the DeVrieses ached watching the children go to adoptive parents, biological parents or relatives. Twin 5-year-old boys who stayed with the DeVrieses for 20 months ending in 1996 still talk to them.

“They call them Mama Ruth and Daddy Ron,” said the twins’ adoptive mother, Margie Carlin. “They still remember them and they want to go visit them. We keep in touch with them because we think they did an amazing job.”

Darlene Young of Compton adopted a preemie the DeVrieses cared for 17 years ago. Young still talks to the DeVrieses every so often, although they have not seen the boy in 10 years. They reminisce about the little boy who fit in a shoe box, “who went through so much they didn’t expect him to live,” Young said.

Young said she and her son kept in touch with the DeVrieses because “she has a special connection with him. There’s a love they have for him.”

It’s as if she were talking about the DeVrieses’ relationship with Victor. At 24 months, Victor’s development is about that of a normal 16- to 18-month child, Ruth said. Ruth is already dreaming of his first day of kindergarten.

“He’ll be up to speed by then. I know he will,” she says, forgetting she will likely not be with him on that special day.

The realization that their foster son will soon leave their home hangs over the family, as it has so many times before. But for Victor, the ending might be different.

For the first time, the DeVrieses will ask for a special nonbinding clause in Victor’s adoption agreement. They hope to be honorary grandparents.

“We’ve had so many children, but something about this one--he just touched me,” Ron said. “This will keep him in our lives if [the adoptive] parents allow.”