Adoption and Foster Care Resources

Some of our children were born to us and some the LORD brought to us through adoption. I can't even tell the difference! They are all REAL! And I AM their REAL MOM-to ALL of them!
Sometimes well meaning people will ask if our adopted children know their "real mom", right in front of the children. I sometimes have a little fun with this, answering something like, " Of course they know me- I'm REAL-I'm not fake." or "Don't I look REAL?"
People need to realize that birthmother or biological mother doesn't necessarily mean REAL mom. Don't misunderstand, I want my children to have a healthy respect for the woman that God chose to give birth to them. She was part of God's plan to make them who they are and to bring me precious children. She's called a birthmother or biological mother.
God gave me the privilege of being their REAL MOM and I am really thankful that they are my OWN children!
I think it is a mindset or attitude that you have to choose to live
out. After all, I love many people who are not biologically related to
me- for example, my dear husband is the one I love MOST in the world.
I love his extended family also. Most of the world tends to think that
we should have a deeper love for biologically related people. I
actually heard a thoughtless comment about someone's adult child who did
something bad, "he's not really his child anyway, he was adopted".
Bloodline doesn't make anyone bad or good and it shouldn't be a
measure for love. SO, I like to make sure that other people and all of
my children KNOW that their bloodline is not the reason or the measure
of how much I love them. We have a bond of love.
I tell people, "I have four children, two were born to me and two were
brought to me. I can't tell the difference. There was a different kind of labor for each of my deliveries. They are all really mine."

When I was in high school I did a term paper on "Child Abuse And Neglect" and knew I wanted to be a foster parent and possibly adopt someday, to reach out and help hurting children. Thankfully, God gave me a willing husband, who along with me saw this as a ministry.
We started fostering almost 30 years ago and have had around 50 children come and go through the years. In 1978, having experienced multiple miscarriages and only having one son, we decided to do foster care with our County Department of Social Services and were licensed for three years. We waited a few years after our second son was born and a move to another city to get licensed again. In 1985 we decided to foster with a private Christian agency and were licensed with them until 2007 when we found we were at a new season of life (grandparents). We saw a lot of changes (some good and some disappointing) with the agency over the years. One nice thing is that they do handle adoptions now. Although we adopted a child we had been fostering and then fostered to adopt her biological sister who had been in another foster home for several years, our two adoptions had to be handled through another adoption agency and were finalized in December 1995 and March 1997. Our lovely daughters are now grown and have always been a blessing to us. They know the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Saviour and are " twice adopted". They believe Romans 8:28 "...and we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose." Knowing this is healing power for an abandoned, abused or neglected child.

James 1:27 (NIV)
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

Our first little girl (we'll call Hope) was first placed with us in foster care on Fathers Day, when she was three years old. A six year old half sister also stayed with us for three weeks and was then reunited with her birth mother. Her five year old biological sister (we'll call Grace) and a two year old younger half sister were placed in two other foster homes. Hope and the others were also reunited with their birth mother in August, even though the birth mother had recently tested positive for cocaine. Hope was returned to us two weeks later before her fourth birthday when their birth mother abandoned them all and left the state. Grace was returned to the same foster home she had been in and the others were placed in separate foster homes. About a year later, social workers finally decided to pursue terminating parental rights due to the abuse and neglect. The children had been severely neglected and both Hope and Grace had a vocabulary of less than 50 words at 4 and 5 years old. Hope was an adorable little girl who weighed less than 25 lbs at four years old, could barely walk and was very sickly because of malnutrition. She has seizures because of fetal alcohol and cocaine effects. We were asked if we were interested in adopting her. OF COURSE WE WERE! Our adoption was final when she was six years old.

I met her older sister, Grace, also on that same Fathers Day, (she was 5 years old) but social workers already had a plan for her to be in a separate foster home due to several previous disruptions in placements with the girls together. They had never been properly disciplined so they were rather out of control. We occasionally did respite care for her and they had sibling visits with the two other half sisters. I advocated for Grace to get speech therapy and to keep her from being placed in a group home. I knew that she belonged with us and basically pleaded to adopt her after knowing that we were adopting her sister, Hope. They had the same biological parents and similar issues. I felt they should be together, even though some of the social workers didn't.
Grace finally moved in with us when she was seven years old. Our adoption was final a year later.

Our foster care agency didn't do adoptions at that time so they arranged for an adoption agency to do our homestudy and adoption. We went to their office and they came to our house. Our agency does the whole process now.
The older child was adopted by a Christian family and our good friends adopted the younger half sister. That also required a lot of advocating, but it finally worked out. Our prayers for Christian families for all of them was answered!

My husband and I are so blessed and so thankful to have our lovely daughters! No regrets. They both know Jesus Christ as their personal LORD and Savior and are TWICE ADOPTED! They were baptized August 11, 2002.
I'm so thankful for this and that they are so well adjusted. One of our greatest fears was "what if they don't overcome the past?" We know that Christ is the answer.
They always refer to us as their "REAL" parents and their biological parents as just that or birth parents. We are all thankful for their birth parents' part in bringing the girls into this world and anything inherited that makes them who they are.
They know God can use even a terrible beginning for His glory. We've always been honest about the past and how this affects their lives, for example because of fetal alcohol and cocaine effects, learning has been very difficult for them and they know they have to try harder than most people. But they know they CAN and draw that strength from Christ. We take emotional issues to the Great Physician, He can heal any hurts and pains and work it all together for good.
Early on they had occupational therapy and speech and language therapy to help overcome their developmental delays. We have homeschooled for thirteen years and I'm so thankful for the wonderful bonding in our relationship that came from that as well as the freedom to learn at the pace they needed and the real life learning style that helps them learn.

This verse is framed in our kitchen where they see it everyday:
Romans 8:28 "And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose."

To God be the Glory!

a friend responded:
Wow, thank you for sharing your story with me! You know I have always had a special fondness for your two beautiful girls. I knew they came from difficult circumstances but I didn't realize it was this difficult. But whatever difficulties they encountered it is obvious that The Lord has been victorious in their lives!

another friend responded:
They are such talented, confident, and sweet young ladies - one would never know they had gone through all that in their earlier years - what a testimony to the Lord's transforming power and your family's obedience to Him.

A friend asked- "do you have experience with an open adoption or is the adoption closed?"

Here's my response:
CLOSED! Parental rights were terminated by a judge in a court of law for abuse and neglect and they didn't even bother to show up. They left the state. They should have gotten jail time for what they did.
I don't know how they get off so easy, and then can go anywhere they want and have more children to abuse and neglect until enough people make reports to put the children in foster care and repeat the whole process. I know this happens, we became foster parents almost 30 years ago.
It's an imperfect world with lots of misplaced compassion.
I get passionate about child abuse! The Bible warns us that children suffer for the sins of the parents for many generations. We have to help break the cycle of abuse and neglect by showing people the healing power of Jesus Christ.

My daughters have written beautiful testimonies of God's love and plan in their own lives for a friend of theirs from our church with a similar background who just can't seem to realize that God can work it all together for good, if she'll just trust Him.
I pray that they'll be able to make a difference in their friend's and other children's lives who just need to know they aren't alone and that God has a plan for them.

Dear Friend, you might not know this about my past:

Before I was adopted I was mistreated severely. When I came to my Mom and Dad as a foster child at almost 4 years old, I weighed less than 25 pounds and my hair was as thin as an infant's because of malnutrition and severe neglect. I was not potty trained and I could not talk or walk very well. I was starving for food, attention and most of all, love. Mom says I was very thin with a protruding tummy, like the starving children you see on those "Save The Children" programs on TV. I spoke less than 50 words, that's what most 18 month old children speak. Later, I had to have speech and occupational therapy. Sometimes my birth mother left us all alone with no one to care for us, with me strapped in a car seat almost all the time.
We all have to try hard, but I know that I have to try even harder to learn things because of the damage done to me before and after I was born. My birth parents are alcohol and cocaine addicts, which hurt my sisters and me, both before and after we were born. I have something called Fetal alcohol effects which makes it hard for me to learn and causes me to have about one or two seizures a year. I had one two weeks ago while taking a shower on vacation in Florida. My sister had to crawl under the shower door to help me.
My birth mother never married and had many abusive men in our lives. I don't even know how many half siblings I may have. My birth father was in prison and I don't remember ever seeing him.
When the abuse and neglect was discovered my sisters and I were placed in separate foster homes and moved several times because we were such undisciplined, untrained, wild children.

After my Mom and Dad adopted me they had to beg to get my sister and adopt her. The social workers thought we should not be together. Our two half- sisters were adopted by other families. Sometimes we see the youngest one because Mom's and Dad's friends adopted her. I thank God that He gave me wonderful parents to love and teach me and help me to grow in righteousness.
Because I have been mistreated in my past, I could say that I can't help my behavior or I could have a pity party, but that would destroy my testimony of salvation.
"ALL things work together for good to them that love God and are called according to his purpose." (Romans 8:28)

I'm thankful that I came to know the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior. He can even use my bad past for good. He forgives me when I sin and because He Forgives me I can forgive any wrong that has been done to me. That gives me peace and a HOPE for my future.
I want to get married and have children someday. I won't be a perfect wife and mother (no one is) but I'm preparing now to overcome the cycle of the past and be the best I can for God's glory.
How are you preparing for your future?
"This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him. For the Lord is your life..."
(Deuteronomy 30:19-20a)

Your friend who loves you,
HOPE

Dear Friend, This is my Story. What's Yours?

I was severely neglected, abused and malnourished because of my birth parent's cocaine and alcohol addiction before, during and after I was born. My three sisters and I each were placed in separate foster homes, but because of the neglect, we were out of control, so no one wanted to keep us for very long and we were moved to several different foster homes and group homes, which was not easy on any of us.
After a judge in a court of law terminated our birth parents' parental rights, we were all adopted by loving Christian parents, who would love and care for us and train us in the way we should go. I was 7 years old by then.
Our new REAL parents had to teach us everything. When I was 5 years old, I had a 50-word vocabulary, which is less words than most 2 year olds, so I had to have speech therapy. I will always have to study harder than most people because of what the cocaine and alcohol addiction did to me while in the womb, but by the GRACE of God, I can and will learn to be the BEST that I can be.
I also have Scoliosis, which can be painful in my back and shoulders at times.
I could use my past or my pains to make excuses for being sour, angry and unforgiving to the people around me or as an excuse for choosing wrong friends and doing wrong things, saying, "I can't help it, that's just the way I am". But that would be rejecting the NEW LIFE GOD has given me through ADOPTION into my family and into HIS family. Instead, I choose to forgive and not let my past ruin my NOW and my FUTURE.
"For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of ADOPTION. When we cry, "Abba! Father!" it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ--if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him. (Rom. 8:14-17)

All things work together for good to them that love God and are called according to His purpose. (Romans 8:28)

This verse is one of my favorites because it reminds me that even the wrong done to me can be used for good since I have accepted Christ as my personal Lord and Savior and I love God and am called according to His purpose.
I don't know your story, but perhaps it's similar to mine. I know that God will let all the wrong done to you be used for GOOD if you have accepted Christ as YOUR personal Lord and Savior. All you have to do is ask for forgiveness and He will forgive all your sins. God can work ALL things together for good, even the bad things that may have happened to you. I Love You.
Your Sister in Christ,
GRACE

This is what one of my precious daughters (now grown) said when she was about eight years old, shortly after our adopting her.
Our family was riding in the car and out of the blue, Grace happily announced, "When I grow up, I think I'll adopt me some children... (pause)... of course, I'll try 'em out first, to see if I like 'em."
My husband and I looked at each other and feeling a little sad for her , I asked, "Is that what you think we did, tried you out?"
She said, "I know you did." Still wondering what she was thinking, I asked, "So what do you think?"
"I think you liked me!" she joyfully and confidently responded.
WOW! Thankfully she was assured of our feelings for her and that we were her FOREVER FAMILY! What insight from an adopted child who had bounced from home to home in foster care. She was right; we were concerned about the social workers reservations to place these sisters together and we needed to see if it would work.
She also knew it would matter to her when she grows up, if she "liked" the children she might adopt. She knew firsthand the fear of the unknown and that fostering is a way to see if there is compatibility and avoid a disruption of adoption.

These are the verses we put on our adoption announcement:
"From the fulness of His GRACE we have all received one blessing after another." John 1:16
"The GRACE of our LORD was poured out on [us] abundantly along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus."
1 Timothy 1:14

If you have similar fears about adopting, you may want to try fostering. There are so many children here in America who need homes TODAY. The child you foster may already be or become available for adoption. God can use you in a child's life, even if it isn't permanent. You don't have to wait so long or go broke to make a difference in a child's life! Children grow up fast and parenting is only temporary, whether you are a biological, adoptive or foster parent. Looking back it was all only a short time. I know this because I've experienced the brevity of parenting from each perspective and now I'm a grandmom! Hindsight comes quickly!