[heartfilledmom]

Hello. I am new to this board and live in Washington State. I have a total heart for children and have two of my own- age 8 and 11. My husband and I are considering fostering infants primarily because we are unable to have any more children.

I homeschool also and have a very active, well balanced life at present. I wonder how drastic it would be to our family to foster an infant or toddler?

I read about abuse issues etc on this board, and question whether I have the energy or emotional capacity to cope with these problems from a child that is not my own.

I am also 33 yrs old and often I find foster parents being more often in their 40's and "settled". What age are parents on this board (if you don't mind me asking such a rude question)

I guess I wonder the most if an infant would alter too drastically the life of my family and myself?

I love children and taught Pre-school for seven years. My heart aches 80% of the time every time that I see a little child. My husbands heart also is incredibly caring and tender. Yet, with my parents unsupportive and fostering being socially (atleast in some circles) well, looked down on....I find it hard to know if my desire to foster since childhood would/should outweigh the stability I find in my presently "safe" world.

Thanks for all / any input.

[tlc4kidz]

Sounds like you have the main requirement...a heart for children. Our bios are 9 and 12. My family was at first unsupportive and yes there are people out there that still believe that people foster for the money...LOL!!

I would never tell anyone it was easy, but definately one of the most rewarding things I've ever done. My parents were won over when they saw how good it was for our bios and how well they handled being big brothers to babies who came and went, and now to the 2 that are their siblings forever.

I personally love the challenge of educating people about fostering and showing them there are people whose motives are pure. I'm not naive enough to believe that there aren't people out there doing it for the wrong reasons, but they are so outnumbered by the good folks.

I think by fostering infants it has been easier for our bios to adjust, but that is just our family dynamics and what we had to look at when deciding what placements we could take. I'm sure there are other families whose children would handle having a toddler or even older child. You know your situation better than anyone. Best of luck in your decision.

[yanknrebel]

I am 38 years YOUNG. My husband and I got into fostering as a necessity to adopt the baby boy that we had been preparing to adopt since the mother was in her 4th month of pregnancy. This mother chose to keep her child but lost that child to DCS in LA (we live in TN) just after 2 weeks of the baby's birth. Make a long story short, this baby was now in foster care. Our attorney told us we would have to take PATH classes and become foster parents if we still wanted this baby. Of course, we did. Well that did not work out. The cw in LA blocked our every attempt to visit the baby or get the child moved to TN or become the foster parents for this baby. When we got into foster care, we explained to our cw why we were getting into this. Because of this one baby. SHe convinced us that the best thing to do was to become foster /foster to adopt parents. SO that way, if at a later date ,another baby or child came into system, we could shoose to adopt, and not just foster this baby. I did not want to get a baby into our house and then have that baby sent to another home because the child could now be adopted and we were not licensed for that.

So, after being licensed in Oct. 2, 2001, had our first placement of a legal risk, healthy caucasian 2 day old baby girl straight from the hospital, we are FINALLY going to be adopting this child (now 34 months old) on Dec. 28th of this year. We are SO excited. We also have a set of 10 Month old twins (10 months on Christmas Eve) that we have had since Aug. 2. Boy/girl twins. We are hopeful that we may be able to adopt them as well. We have had teens come and go, 11 and 12 year old girls, an adoptive sibling group of ,ages 2, 4 and 6 year old girls that did not work out. We would not have changed this experience for the world. SO far, we have been very lucky. Maybe GOD is being good to us since we have tried unsuccessfully for 11 years to add to our family. I think GOD knew that these children happened to need us more than the babies he took from us before they were born. WHatever his reasons, they are his. We know we are blessed. We count our blessings every day and night.

As for family that doesn't support you, we have had that as well. Luckily, they support us now. My family as well as DH were just scared that we would be hurt once again by having a child with us and then sent home. Well that could still happen with the twins. Whatever happens, we will cherish the time we have with them and never look back.

As for fostering, I tell my bio children all the time, that I hope that when they get married and start families of their own, that they adopt at least ONE foster child into their families. This has been one of the most positive, heart string pulling and blessed events of our lives.

YOu and your family have to do what is best for you. As for the money, NOONE gets rich doing this. The stipend is less than what I would pay for a sitter per child per week. So am I getting rich? NO. Am I rich in love and experience and joy and fulfillment? YOU BETCHA!!!


God luck to you and yours.

Merry CHristmas and HAppy New YEar.