New Chapter

So I mentioned in this post that we had a secret to share.

Sarah thought maybe it was my sister getting engaged, which is super exciting and I'll write on that later, but not it.

The news is that in a few weeks we will officially be licensed foster parents.

Yikes. I almost threw up just typing that.

To back up:

After we first adopted Tariku, Zach and I started talking about how foster care will happen for us one day. We always kind of thought we'd start it when the kids were older and then we'd be able to do some older children fostering.

But after about a year home with Tomas and Binyam we both realized we still had some room in our hearts for more children. So we thought we'd go to a foster care informational meeting and see what they had to say.

We left feeling like it was definitely doable and that now sounded like a good time. They said at the meeting that we'd start the 10 week classes in a few months and then go from there.

The next day we got a phone call, "Hey we saw on your sheet that you've adopted before so we were hoping you would start classes tomorrow."

The classes were every Tuesday for 3 hours each night, for 10 weeks straight. We needed babysitters and I needed a sub for one of my classes. Obviously without hesitation I responded

Sure!

And as is with most things like this, it ended up working itself out. Only one night did we have to leave early because Tariku fell off his skateboard and wanted to see a doctor (he was fine). Everything else fell into place.

The classes were long and sometimes really painfully boring. Because we had done so much education before our adoptions we knew a lot about what they were discussing.

We were disappointed to find they didn't do any attachment talk and very little education on privacy.

We were pleased to learn more about the birth family relationship and how it pertains to the foster family.

So in the end we will be dually licensed as foster and adoptive parents for a child 0-5yrs old. Any gender. If we are fostering a child who has parental rights terminated and they are a good fit for our family we will choose to proceed with an adoption. If not, we will do our best to love 'em while we got 'em.

If we get a placement and we can see that any of our kids are struggling in the least bit we will take time off from fostering and refocus as a family. With all things, our family is our priority and we are entering this new chapter with that in mind.

Of course I'm nervous and excited and want to throw up a little bit. Undoubtedly the thing I'm most nervous about is falling in love with a child/ren and then having to release them. After the classes, though, my mind has shifted and I feel better about that.

Because the thing of it is I really do believe Zach and I are good parents. I think God gives us all these places where our strengths can meet some of the world's greatest needs and this happens to be it for us. Parenting. We make mistakes, of course we do, but I think in some respects this is the thing I'm best at.

And so we go forward. Scared, excited, nervous, anxious, all of that. But we have each other, and our kids who are more excited than we are and we have a God who we really do believe is stringing this all together.

So for better or worse.

Onward.