+
“A balm for the soul”
  review on Goodreads
GOOD PEOPLE Book
upworthy

foster care

Family

9 things to know about kids in foster care. Plus an unforgettable view into their lives.

Foster care is a nightmare for some kids and their foster parents. For others, it's a blessing.

A clip from "ReMoved Part Two"



Zoe's story, "Removed," has been seen by millions of people.

It was previously shared by my amazing Upworthy colleague Laura Willard. We got just a tiny taste of what it was like for kids in foster care, right after being removed. Specifically, a little girl named Zoe and her little brother Benaiah.

My wife and I, foster parents for the past year, even shared the original with our adoption worker, who passed it along to the entire agency and, then, it took off like wildfire among those people as well.

This is part 2 of that story, and it hits hard.

(Yes, the video's on the long side at about 20 minutes. But it's worth the watch to the end.)

She describes her life as a cycle, interrupted by a tornado. She's a foster child. I don't think I need to say any more.


So ... let's accompany that with 9 uncomfortable — but enlightening — facts below. There are only nine bolded, but within those headers, there are several more facts.

1. There are an estimated 400,000 kids in foster care right now.

Some are awaiting adoption. Some will go back to their parents. Others will age out or, sometimes, run away.

2. Foster kids can suffer from PTSD at almost two times the rate of returning veterans.

And PTSD can mimic a lot of other mental illnesses, and it can manifest as nightmares, flashbacks, fight-or-flee responses, anger outbursts, and hyper-vigilance (being on "red alert" at all times), among other symptoms.

Image via Nathaniel Matanick.


3. The average age of a foster child is 9 years old.

They're just on that edge of childhood, and chances are, it's been a pretty messed up childhood at that. Trauma does that.

4. About half of all foster kids are in non-relative foster homes.

8% are in institutions, 6% are in group homes, and only 4% are in pre-adoptive homes. Read that again — only 4% are in pre-adoptive homes.

5. Some of foster children experience multiple placements. In some cases, eight or more.

That's eight homes that they move into — and out of. And just consider ... that means they lose not just adults and other kids with whom they are establishing a bond, but friends, schoolmates, pets.

Clip via Nathaniel Matanick


6. The average foster child remains in the system for almost two years before being reunited with their biological parents, adopted, aging out, or other outcomes.

8% of them remain in foster care for over five years. Of the 238,000 foster kids who left the system in 2013, about half were reunited with parents or primary caregivers, 21% were adopted, 15% went to live with a relative or other guardian, and 10% were emancipated (aged out).

7. In 2013, more than 23,000 young people aged out of foster care with no permanent family to end up with.

And if you add that up, year after year, hundreds of thousands of foster youth will have aged out of the system. What does that look like? "You're 18. You've got no place to live and no family. Good luck — buh-bye now!" One-quarter of former foster kids experience homelessness within four years of exiting the system.

8. Foster "alumni" (those who have been in foster homes and either adopted, returned to parents, or aged out) are likely to suffer serious mental health consequences.

They are four-five times more likely to be hospitalized for attempting suicide and five-eight times more likely to be hospitalized for serious psychiatric disorders in their teens.

Based on that set of statistics alone, it's in the public's interest (ignoring, for a second, the interests of those kids) to help them through their lot in life and spend resources making it all work much better for everybody before it gets to that point. Right?

So there's a lot to be angry about in this whole messed up situation. But this next thing? My blood boils.

What's one of the biggest risk factors in families whose children are placed in foster care?

Your guess?

Cruelty?

Drugs?

Sexual abuse?

Neglect?

The answer is ...

9. Poverty

Together with homelessness and unemployment, it's a main contributing factor. It happens all the time. The fact that it's far easier for a parent to be accused and investigated for neglect or abuse because of simple things like lack of access to a vehicle, or a working refrigerator, or the ability to get a kid to a doctor's appointment — that has a lot to do with this. Tie that to the link between drug abuse and poverty and between poverty and child abuse ... well, you can see where this is going.

And in a country where one-third of children are living in poverty (hint: the good ol' U.S. of A.), imagine how that affects the number of kids being removed and placed into foster care.

I'll end this with a bit of hope through my story.

My kids went through something a lot like the kids in the clip above before they came to live with us. We've been through the ringer in ways that we're going to have to talk about one day because it's not just that the kids have been challenging — they have — it's that the system itself has been more challenging.

The entire system — from agencies to government entities to social workers to even the schools — seems like it's designed to fail these kids and the families who are attempting to help. It's almost designed not to work. There, I said it.

But that doesn't mean we won't fight to make it better for everybody. We most definitely will.

Image from a photo by my wife, Robin.

As for us, we're just a few weeks away from becoming the legal parents to these kids, and we're extremely happy to be right here, making it happen. And they seem quite happy to be our kids. Along the way, we fell in love with them, and we can't imagine life without them.

But to be totally honest ... if we'd have known how hard it was going to be when we started this journey, and if we could somehow turn back the clock and NOT do it ... well, would we have actually gone forward with the process?

I take that back. I won't be totally honest here. I will simply let you decide.

Here are some places to help, if you're so inclined.

        • AdoptUsKids.org is a place to start if you're considering fostering or adopting.
        • My Stuff Bags is a really cool and inexpensive way to help foster kids by gifting them actual luggage, duffel bags, and more, so that they don't travel from home to home with garbage bags for their belongings — or nothing at all.
        • CASA for Children offers legal help and advocates for foster kids through a network of volunteers.

        This story was written by Brandon Weber and originally appeared on 07.17.15

        Photo courtesy of Matthew Straeb of the Sarasota Heart Gallery.

        In a newspaper portrait from last May, Becca Eldredge flashes a delighted smile as she stands beside her husband and son and their newly-adopted 13-year-old daughter outside their Florida home. The teen girl a floral dress and a tiara and holds a small marquee that reads After 1,783 days in foster care, today I was adopted.

        "There are so many children who need a home and love," Eldredge says. "My daughter has brought so much joy and fun into our house."

        Over 400,000 children across the U.S. currently live in foster care, due in large part to the country's opioid crisis. More than 120,000 of these kids have been permanently relinquished by birth parents; they often wait years for adoptive families and a stable home. Many age out of the system without either, leaving them vulnerable to poverty, homelessness, and substance abuse. But Familyfinder--a new Florida-based digital program relying on targeted advertising--may change all that.



        Matthew Straeb is president of the Sarasota Heart Gallery, a national organization that displays professional portraits of adoptable foster youth in businesses across the country with the hope that adults might see and adopt them. He came up with Familyfinder in response to a sharp decline in adoption and foster care applications during the pandemic.

        The program searches for public information on a potential parent's geographic location, ethnicity, and other pertinent details, then delivers ads via Facebook and Google. In one, a child in purple shorts and a blue t-shirt grins in front of a palm tree below the words, "With our support, you could change a child's life and make a difference."

        Click on ad's "Apply Now" link, and you get a personal call from staff within a day, along with digital tools and animated videos that describe the process of adopting a child from the foster care system. Staff maintain continuous contact with potential parents to maintain their momentum. The result? Teens and sibling groups—difficult to place because many moms and dads want single babies—are finally ditching their duffle bags filled with meager personal belongings and moving into permanent homes with adoptive parents.


        Adoption Foster homePhoto courtesy of Matthew Straeb of the Sarasota Heart Gallery.


        Katie Nail entered foster care at six months old and lived in 15 different placements before she was a teen. Twice, she was featured in The Heart Gallery, in her home state of Alabama. There's a video of her at age 11 with big blue eyes and shoulder-length black hair, explaining to the person interviewing her that she wants a family that "loves me forever, and to know that I'm safe for all my life." Seven years ago, a couple saw the video and adopted her. Now, Nail is a student at Yale.

        Still, The Heart Gallery seemed to Straeb an inefficient way to match children with adoptive parents, especially knowing the trauma that incurs every day a kid languishes in the foster care system. "Let's say you're a nine-year-old kid and the police come to your house and give you a trash bag and tell you to go get your stuff," he says. "You're ripped out of your home, away from your family, and put into a stranger's house. The longer a kid is in that situation, the more negative the impact. We want to reduce a child's time in foster care."

        A tech-minded entrepreneur, Straeb contemplated the ways in which he might harness the power of Google and Facebook advertising to locate adoptive parents. "I mean, all I have to do is think about buying a bicycle, and before I know it, I've got a hundred ads on my phone telling me about bicycles," he explains. "If tech can do that, then why can't we flip the model for our purposes? Rather than wait around for families for these kids, let's go find the families."

        He and colleagues identified the characteristics of adults most likely to adopt. "For instance, we know that seventy percent of foster and adoptive families in our region are faith-based," he explains. "And we know, based on experience, that there's a certain age range, and that females are most likely to germinate the idea of adoption. Right there, we've nailed down the parameters quite a bit." He adds locale, ethnicity, and specific religious practices into the mix to increase the chances of a positive match.

        Since its launch last June, Familyfinder has shown a significant increase in foster and adoptive parent inquiries, and saved the state $28,200 for every child placed with a family. Straeb and his colleagues plan to expand the program throughout Florida, and hope to conduct pilot projects in Colorado, Utah, and Nevada. Ideally, they'd like a philanthropy group attached to Google or Facebook to take over the project. "Then we could offer it to the whole country," he says. "With their support, we could solve this whole problem of getting these kids adopted."

        Becca Eldredge is hopeful, as well. "Familyfinder is a way to get more information out there so that people understand that they can adopt from the foster care system," she says. "I don't think people realize how many children are waiting for homes."

        She describes the rewards of adopting a teen from the state—benefits that expand beyond the personal to the global. "A lot of these kids, if they're given love and support, are huge change-makers, because they've had to develop resilience at such a young age," she says. "If people step up for them, they're going to be the kids who make a difference in the next generation. I know for a fact that my daughter is going to change some part of the world someday."


        Melissa Hart is the author, most recently, of Better with Books: 500 Diverse Books to Ignite Empathy and Encourage Self-Acceptance in Tweens and Teens. Twitter @WildMelissaHart .

        via ABC Action News

        It's never too late to find your family. That's the heartwarming message being shared by Leah Paskalides and her newly adopted daughter, 19-year-old Monyay.

        At the age of 11, Monyay was placed into a foster care group home. The pain of having to go through life without a family was always difficult, but it hit hard in her senior year of school. "My senior year is when I went through one of those, 'I don't want to do it anymore, I'm done,'" she told ABC News.

        Monyay finished school a year early and took the extra time to focus on volunteering with foster children like her. But she faced a tough road ahead, as she was about to age out of the system.


        According to the Children's Home Society of Minnesota, the 23,000 children who age out of foster care every year without families face many challenges. Only 3% earn a college degree, half will develop a substance abuse problem, 60% of boys are convicted of crimes, and 70% of girls become pregnant before the age of 21.

        After she turned 18, it looked like she would have to enter the real world as an adult without any real support. But then her caseworker and mentor from the Safe Children Coalition stepped up.

        Leah had always wanted to adopt Monyay but it was a conflict of interest with her work.

        "She always said, 'I wish you could adopt me, wish you could adopt me,' and I couldn't because of the job and then I was watching a documentary where the person had been adopted as an adult, and I had never really heard of it," Leah said.

        So she decided to adopt Monyay as her adult daughter. "It was important to me that she knew that she was wanted by somebody, that somebody loved her," Leah told Fox 13. "I could say that as many times as I want, but actions speak louder than words."

        On Tuesday, a judge signed the paperwork making the adoption official.

        Rose Rising on Twittertwitter.com

        "Being told 'no' so many times, to hear that 'yes' and to hear them pronounce her as my mom, it's something that's like, oh my gosh, this is for real," Monyay told Fox 13.

        The funny thing is the two didn't hit it off at first. Five years ago when Leah was assigned her case, Monyay didn't like her. "She told me what she was going to be doing and helping me out with my case, and I didn't like her; she'll tell you that," said Monyay.

        But over the past five years, the two forged an unbreakable bond.

        "She was very motivated and had aspirations for a future, and so I knew she just needed support," Leah said. "She was always a kid that did not deserve to go through life without a support system of a family."

        The newly-formed family is sharing their story to bring hope to children in the foster care system by letting them know they can be adopted as adults. "It's never too late because I'm grown but I'm still being adopted," Monyay said. "Just because it didn't happen then it doesn't mean that it won't happen."

        Monyay hopes to one day open her own group home for teens to help children who grew up like she did.

        As a child in the foster system, Ashley Lacasse had already attended 19 different schools by the time she was 17. But now she has a stable home and the opportunity to attend college, thanks to her two adoptive moms and the generosity of a perfect stranger.


        "There's sort of this unspoken rule with older kids that are in the system," Ashley told her new moms, "and once you hit about 10 years old, nobody wants you anymore and you will never find a family."

        That sense of hopelessness is why Ashley is adamant about sharing her good fortune of being adopted in January by Zoe and Amanda Jette Knox, who live in Ottawa, Canada. But she had no idea how much brighter her future would soon get.

        This happy chain of events all started when Ashley befriended Amanda and Zoe's daughter, Alexis. Ashley was in a heartbreaking foster placement that left her crying every day, and Alexis advocated for her friend to join their family. When Alexis' older brother moved out to get his own place at the age of 21, Ashley moved in.

        RELATED: They almost lost hope in foster care, but these teens found their happy ending instead.

        Ashley's adoptive mom, Amanda, is the bestselling author of Love Lives Here, and even she is surprised by the sweet and happy ending to this story. Not only does she have a new daughter she loves every bit as much as her biological children, but an anonymous stranger who heard about the adoption has offered to contribute towards Ashley's college education.

        Amanda shared her excitement in a tweet thread that went viral:

        "Yesterday, the BBC published a piece about my wife & I adopting our teen daughter. Today I got an email from someone who offered to help pay her college tuition because they've been where she is, and today they can. So they did. They really did. Holy cow, people are amazing.

        I'm keeping this vague because the person (understandably) wishes to remain anonymous. But they had no idea who we were until they read the article, found a way to contact me and we've since spoken on the phone and I'm still processing their incredible kindness and generosity.

        Ashley is on cloud nine. She just can't believe it. We haven't had much time to save for her tuition, so this help is seriously life-changing. It makes everything easier. This person changed everything, and I know we're all hoping to meet in person someday."


        Within days, Ashley applied to enter a baking program at a local college. Amanda describes her as a talented baker and reports that they are awaiting a response to her application. The good news of the anonymous donation touched the hearts of many people online, with countless tweets praising the generosity of the donor. Life has turned around in a big way for a young lady who had been through so much.

        While Ashley was excited to be adopted after bouncing around the foster care system, Amanda is quick to point out that Ashley already has a mom and that nobody is being "replaced." Now she has three moms!

        "I think it's really important to acknowledge that Ashley has a good relationship with her biological family and that her joining our family also means that her biological family is a part of our family. I really think sometimes we villainize or at the very least really misunderstand parents whose children are in care. They love her very, very much. Our job is not to replace them. Our job is to help them provide stability for her, so that she can keep having relationships with them, and keep growing as a person," Amanda explained.

        RELATED: When this man told his foster care story, people listened — 39 million people.

        Amanda offered her advice for parents considering fostering or adoption:

        "The biggest thing to know is that just because a kid has been through trauma doesn't mean that they're not deserving of love. I think sometimes people shy away from this idea of fostering or adopting an older child because of the things that they could have gone through and what that could mean. And yes, certainly there can be attachment issues, and yes, certainly it can be more challenging in some areas. But when you create that trust and when that love really starts to grow, it is so worth it. It is the most amazing experience….So I would say go for it, and know that your own experiences, if you've had any struggles yourself, your own experiences can really help you parent better."

        The gift of tuition was life-changing, like the shared gift of adoption and a new family member. Amanda summed it up beautifully in saying, "We have three biological children and I really do love Ashley just as much. She has taken a piece of our heart in a really good way and it's surprised me how much I can love this amazing kid."

        Alison Tedford is an Indigenous freelance writer from Abbotsford, BC, Canada. She blogs on Sparkly Shoes and Sweat Drops and operates Feel Better Marketing.