Intake

I don’t even know where to start in catching you up on our journey in fostering. Every time I sit down to write, someone needs me and off I go. Typical mom life, really. Except now, there’s a little boy who needs me in addition to my girls.

Gosh, I never anticipated being a boy mom. It’s so funny how one day you’re saying, “I’ll never do that,” and the next day God is saying, “I want you to do that.” But when God asks, it doesn’t seem as impossible anymore.

Friday was a long, long day. Our intake meeting was scheduled for 1:00 in the afternoon and I felt like time was dragging, but at the same time, I didn’t want it to pass at all because I knew things were about to change forever. Marching into the unknown isn’t easy.

For us, the intake meeting looked like this: We sat down at two long folding tables pushed together forming a square.  (It was the closest they could get to a large round table, I assume.) In the middle there were puzzles, construction paper, markers, fun pens with fuzzy tops, and other items to keep a child entertained, as well as stacks of paperwork. Seated at the table were Little Man, his caseworker, his adoption worker, the lead therapist from our fostering agency, Little Man’s new therapist, an intern from the agency, our care coordinator, and me. 

Little Man’s therapist lead most of the meeting, with the lead therapist chiming in and passing paperwork around for us to sign. Many forms were filled out. The caseworker shared information about LM’s preferences and behaviors. The adoption worker added her observations as well. The therapist asked LM a LOT of questions — many of them about his triggers, responses, and coping skills. 

After an hour or so of that, Little Man followed the agency’s director of foster care to another room so the adults could talk about the “hard stuff.” We talked about his trauma, how it has affected him, how he acts out, why he acts out, and more. It was intense and it was long.

Now, take a step back and think about this. Imagine you are nine years old. You have been in foster care for most of your life and you have bounced from placement to placement for as long as you can remember. You have been in some homes for 6 months and others for just a few days. You have been in group homes and shelters. You remember your mom but don’t know when you last saw her. It’s time to move in with another new family. And this is how it is done - at a table full of strangers who talk about you for almost two hours before you go home with these new people and try to start over. Again.

When we got home, we helped him carry his things up to his bedroom and let him get settled. I don’t know how he didn’t just curl up in a ball under the covers and ask everyone to leave him alone. But he didn’t. He asked for pizza and went shoe shopping and called us mom and dad and asked if we could be his forever family.

The thing is, people are always saying how resilient kids are. And in a way they are. The fact that Little Man still has a smile and still has hope shows that. But they aren’t as resilient as we like to think they are. This little guy’s heart has been broken over and over and his mind and body will always carry that. 

Our goal for his time with us is to help him begin healing, trusting, and loving. I hope you’ll pray for us as we take this journey with him. I can’t wait to see what God will do in his life!