Not Everyone Should Foster or Adopt a Child
But everyone can and should do something; a review of Rob Henderson's "Troubled" and a call to action
Dear Inklings,
May is National Foster Care Month in the U.S. I’m not going to give you numbers of how many children are in foster care or how many of them will suffer lifelong impediments as a result of their traumatic childhoods.
Instead, I’m going to share stories.
At the end of this email, I have a special discount code for you to watch an amazing movie of a foster community.
Our story began when we met a little Chinese girl in an orphanage in Shanghai, Eliana. Bureaucracy, red tape, and various other restrictions meant she was not adoptable, but because of her, we put a face to the crisis for the first time.
We could never again unsee what we saw in that orphanage.
A number of restrictions meant international adoption was closed to us at that time, so when we came home, we researched until we found a foster family agency that was ethical and vetted by people we trusted who had also fostered and worked with them. The agency focused on children aged five and under, and were dedicated to keeping sibling sets together. Foster parents had to commit to caring for a single child or sibling set until a permanency was attained, whatever that looked like.
Unfortunately, this was not the norm for many children growing up in foster care.
Rob Henderson writes in his memoir,Troubled, “Kids preemptively get shuffled around so that they don’t get too attached to any one particular home,” in case a relative becomes available to care for the child. After being removed from his drug-addicted birth mother at the age of three, Rob grew up in a number of horrible foster homes throughout Los Angeles before being adopted, only to experience further unpredictability when his new parents get divorced and his adoptive father cuts off ties with Rob as revenge against his adoptive mom.
Instability in a child’s formative years has detrimental effects that linger for a lifetime.
On the surface, Rob looks like a foster kid success story, the kind of adult a foster-adoptive parent would be proud to show off. “Look at my son that I ‘saved’ from the system; he served in the U.S. Air Force. He graduated from Yale. He has a Ph.D. from Cambridge.”
And yet, what he truly craved and needed was a loving family.
Rob’s memoir is not just a story of his life, but a social critique on class and elitism. He doesn’t shy away from criticizing the hypocrisy of the elite classes. From the introduction, Rob points out that “even if every abandoned, abused, and neglected kid graduates from college as I did and earns a comfortable income, they are still going to carry the wounds, or in the best-case scenario, the scars, from their early life.”
Rob describes a number of the foster homes he lived in before he was adopted: homes where multiple kids fended for themselves, and one where he was little more than a slave. None of his foster parents took an interest in him; some only took in kids for the government stipend. Not exactly pillars of society.
But most people I know who want to foster or adopt do it because they care about children, or as a way to expand their family.
A stable family for children is what can solve many societal problems, not higher education
Henderson points to America’s obsession with higher education as a red herring. Education can never heal the wounds left by an harmful childhood.
When my husband and I were finally qualified to adopt, our adoption agency required us to attend a three-day parenting training in another state. I’ll never forget what one of the instructors said.
Before pivoting careers to the adoption world, he used to work at a prison. He described the disproportionate percentage of inmates who had grown up in the foster care system.
“Giving kids a stable home and loving family helps shift the trajectory of their lives sooner rather than later. Maybe less kids will end up in prison as juveniles and adults,” he told us.
He recognised the importance of early intervention.
Imprisonment is not the only negative consequence to childhood instability. Other adverse outcomes include homelessness, teenage pregnancy, drug and alcohol use. And of course, it all comes back to childhood trauma, which can perpetuate trauma. Becoming a foster/adoptive parent has the possibility of breaking intergenerational cycles.
Something to remember, however, is this: no matter how strong it is, your love will not heal all their wounds.
And equally important, fostering is not about you.
Foster care and adoption will break you
We sponsored Eliana for a little over half a year before she disappeared into China’s orphanage system, and we never heard of or saw her again. We don’t know where she is or what happened to her. She will be ten this September.
My husband still cries when he thinks of her.
Six foster babies came through our home when we provided respite care before we adopted our first son. I think of them often. I wonder where they are now, how they are doing, if they are happy.
We adopted our first child (aka our chronological middle child) who was described as having “minor medical needs.” For anyone unfamiliar with the adoption world, “minor medical needs” merely means “possibly-not-needing-lifelong-care-needs.” At only six years old, he’s already had two major surgeries and sees six medical specialists twice a year, in addition to his regular pediatrician. And this is only the physical aspect.
And our Ren, who lived in group homes until age 8 after being orphaned at 5, then adopted into a family that abused and trafficked him. If not for what happened there and the failings of the child welfare system, he would still be alive and we would have celebrated his birthday with him this week. Well, I needn’t go into how Ren’s case broke us, as that is self-evident.
Our family is not unique in our heartbreak. Every single person who enters into the trenches with these children ends up broken—what specialists refer to as “secondary trauma.”
Everyone should consider fostering/adopting
But not everyone can or should.
I haven’t been in this world very long, but long enough to know that children who end up in inadequate foster-adoptive homes will only suffer more.
There are some key things to consider before going down this path. It’s not glamorous, nor is it noble.
It’s messy, heart-wrenching, frustrating, and lonely.
Another thing that has stuck with me from our adoption training is learning that almost all disrupted adoptions (that is, adoptions that fail and result in children re-entering the system) are a result of attachment issues on the part of the adopting parent.
Parenting under normal circumstances will always trigger unresolved issues. Parenting a child who’s experienced trauma—even more so. We all go into this thinking we’re the ones doing the healing, but the reality is, both parent and child will be healing concurrently throughout.
Good intentions are not enough and they will not sustain you.
My husband and I both see our own therapists. It helps us work through underlying and hidden issues so we don’t pass them on to our children.
The only other thing I know for certain is that foster and adoptive families cannot do what they do without support.
If you’re unable to foster or adopt, there are some other ways to be involved with varying levels of commitment:
Be an emotional support for the parents. Take them on a lunch date and swear not to talk about the kids for once. Commit to being their midnight listener for when things get rough and they’re staying up with a screaming child with nightmares again. Hold them when they need someone to cry on. Being a foster parent is lonely and isolating, and this can be a way to be there for them, especially when the initial homecoming is over and normal life sets in, because that’s when people start tapering off.
Help set up wraparound care for foster families. There is a high turnover rate for foster parents because people simply burn out. Wraparound care looks like dropping off meals, babysitting the family’s other kids, helping with chores, laundry, groceries, etc. CarePortal is a nationwide system in the U.S. where families in need send their requests to the portal, and alerts nearby community members to respond to the need. In San Diego, Restoration225 is a local organisation that equips people to wrap around foster families.
Provide respite care for foster families. This is what we did with our foster family agency. We took care of children already placed in foster families for up to half a month so the families could have a break. This requires you to go through the full foster family training and certification process. Research agencies in your area or go through your county, as requirements will vary depending on where you live.
Volunteer with reputable organisations in your vicinity that mentor and support foster youth transitioning out of the system. It’s a critical stage, as the government provides no safety net for them, and many end up homeless as soon as they turn 18. You can provide career mentoring, life skills coaching, and simple companionship as they leave the foster care system and enter the adult world, acting as one potential barrier between them and homelessness. In San Diego, Just in Time for Foster Youth is one such organisation.
Advocate for policy changes. A recurring complaint among foster parents is that the system is often more difficult to deal with than the children in it. Lack of workplace support for last-minute placements means few working parents have the capacity to take children even if they are willing. For many people, lack of childcare for working parents and little-to-no buffer in daycares or schools for last-minute enrollment for these children limits foster parents to stay-at-home moms.
Advocate for children as a CASA (Court-Appointed Special Advocate). This is a national program in the U.S. With so many voices telling a judge what’s best for a child, a CASA is the one who works most closely with the child(ren), listens to them, and advocates on their behalf. Because a CASA has no skin in the game and their sole interest is the good of the child, their only role is to give a voice to the voiceless.
As with anything, do your due diligence. Research and vet organisations to ensure they are responsible and ethical. The Archibald Project is an excellent resource for learning about ethical practices and spotting red flags.
Despite all the heartache, it is worth everything.
As I look at my six-year-old, I think of how he came to us, silent and shy, terrified of everything and everyone. Today, he bursts with energy and affection. He’s friendly, talkative (perhaps too much so); he’s generous with his love and belongings. I can’t begin to tell you the joy I feel from watching him with his baby sister, making her laugh, giving her toys, nuzzling her cheek.
I think of Ren, who, after struggling with suicidal ideation for years, told me he finally wanted to live, who wrote in his last letter to me just before we were to bring him home, “I'm still very amazed, that we're really headed where we're headed, that I'm really going to be living with you, that I'm going to be one of you just this week. That I'm already accepted and yearned for as we wait for me to move in and settle. It feels as though, every single wish, every single prayer, want and need I've ever had is being fulfilled in you.”
As someone in the unique position of having risen from extreme poverty and dysfunction to rubbing shoulders with the elites, Rob Henderson writes:
“The tradeoff isn’t worth it. Given the choice, I would swap my position in the top 1 percent of educational attainment to have never been in the top 1 percent of childhood instability.”
The system is broken. The most vulnerable children fall through the cracks every single day. Rob’s book highlights how far-reaching the effects of childhood instability are.
It takes a village to raise a child. Let us each do our part.
As for me, I don’t care if my children graduate from an elite school or succeed in the conventional sense. I care that they grow up knowing they are unconditionally wanted and loved.
Further Reading & Resources
Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class. Rob also writes a brilliant newsletter I highly recommend subscribing to.
The Generosity of Grief ( Ashley Neese, 2024). Ashley is a foster mother who writes about grieving a previous foster child, the brokenness of the child welfare system, and holding space for her children’s sorrow in this post.
Darien Karenbauer’s story: “Take a Chance on Me.” After being in foster care since age 10, two failed adoptions, Darien was living in a juvenile detention center, about to age out, when a young couple took him in. I think of Darien’s story often; we also adopted a teenager just as he turned 18, with a small age gap, just like Darien and his parents. People are usually scared of teenagers, but there is something special about the bond that forms. Ren became my closest friend, something Darien and his mom also say about each other.
Eva Muilenburg’s story. Eva writes about her childhood experience of sex trafficking and foster care. It’s an unbelievable story, but real life so often is. She became a foster mom herself, and later adopted a daughter ten years younger than her when she was 25. Today, she continues to advocate for children in foster care, foster parents, and fights against sex trafficking.
Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot (2024). I had the privilege of being invited to a premiere for this film. It tells the true story of a small Black church in East Texas whose members took in all the foster children in their area. It doesn’t sugarcoat the hardships of foster care, nor give a perfect happy ending where love and prayer solves all the brokenness, but it does offer hope for when a village finds the courage to step into the darkness and carry each other through it.
About Me: I’m Tiffany, a literary fiction, fantasy, and memoir author. My writing has been published by The Cultivation Project and Renewal Missions. I’ve been writing this publication, The Untangling, since 2023. Order my books here or here.