A few weeks ago we hit a significant milestone of fostering when we entered the "double digits" in the number of children we've fostered. We welcomed our second sibling group into our home: a newborn baby girl I will be referring to as "Jill" and her 11 month old brother "Jack"- two babies! Jack and Jill bring the total number of foster placements we've taken into our home to ten and eleven.
I guess you could say that 7:12:0 are my current "stats" for my personal experiences with foster care.*
7 refers to the number of years we've been doing foster care.
12 refers to the number of placements we've taken.
0 refers to the number of foster placements we've had which have turned into adoptive placements.
We currently have TWO BABIES of different ages in our home and I can't help but be reminded of the first time we had that experience: Six years ago (about this time of year, incidentally) we were fostering a four month old baby girl and a couple of weeks later we got a call from our adoption agency about our daughter whom we met (along with her birthmother) for the first time in the NICU when she was just three days old. We were able to officially adopt our daughter six months later, which was about the same time that our foster daughter returned to her parent's care.
Back to our present situation:
My dear mother graciously offered to give me an extra hand for a couple of days this week as I've juggled appointments for both babies with other obligations. She made the same comment/observation that she made six years ago: It's much more complicated to care for two babies who are not the same age or at the same developmental level than it is to care for twins. My mother should know as she is both a mother and grandmother of twins. Needless to say, our home has been extra busy lately and this may be the only time I have to write about our current situation for another few weeks or so.
*Any foster parents care to share YOUR stats in the comments just for fun?
