Foster Care is Not Fair

Injustice.  Unfairness.  Inequality.
 
If I had to describe foster care in ten words, all three of these would make the list.

All three are things that make my blood boil.  I get this fire in the pit of my stomach when I, or even more so, one of my loved ones, experience injustice or unfairness.  I’m kind of passionate.  Bat$#@* passionate, as I *may* have been called before.

  I was nicknamed the terminator in a past life and have been known to wage fiery verbal war on those who have wronged my people.  I *may* have done this overzealously on occasion.  I *may* have gotten my son’s soccer team a yellow card for going apoplectic at a referee who failed to call nasty fouls on my child.  I *may* have gotten into it with some French girls in front of the Versailles Palace.  I *may* have made a customer service rep. cry a time or two.  And the secretary at my kid’s school.  Oh dear.

In my defense, I grew up watching Designing Women and got a little too excited when she took someone to task for being unfair and unjust.  

Two of My Favorites:

And especially this one:

Thank goodness for Jesus because this passion of mine and lack of filter have certainly gotten me into some trouble a time or two.  God has been helping me to temper those reactions and learn to control them better.  I don’t claim to be “healed” or to now be “meek and lowly of heart” or anything like that… but I’m making some progress.  It’s a daily prayer for me that God will help me to control my tongue.  And frankly, I don’t want to become a door mouse, because I truly believe God has gifted me with the ability to speak out when others hold back, with the ability to put words together quickly and efficiently and the ability to advocate for others who need protection and direction.

I am a work in progress.  And man is it slow going.

Foster care is born of injustice and unfairness.   Children enter foster care because they have been treated unjustly and unfairly.  In most cases, that is a gross understatement. 

Being a foster parent often means putting yourself in between the child and unfairness and protecting them from it. We often absorb the unfairness for them to prevent more of it from splattering and wounding them further.  Being a foster parent also often means watching, with our proverbial hands tied and mouths taped shut as unfairness splatters all over our foster children, our biological children,our marriages, our selves.  It means holding the hands of children and empathizing with the unfairness with no power to change it or fix it. 

We were so excited and nervous to begin this process.  The fact that, on an intellectual level, we understood what bringing brokenness into our home would do to us, is hollow comfort.  The emotional weight of suffering the consequences of the horrible choices of others is often just too much.  Those are “eat the ice cream out of the carton” days.  They are “cereal for dinner” days.  They are “meltdown days”.

I feel as though we sit in a pool of unfairness every day. Every now and then, a bio parent or caseworker or judge shatters glass in the pool and then has the audacity to ask us to clean up the glass AND figure out a way to live in the pool of unfairness with this new mess.

So, last week, we were hit with another shattered glass of unfairness.  I have attempted several paragraphs trying to share this little story with you in ambiguous, confidential terms, but there's just no sharing it.  Sufficeth to say that we are being asked to do unreasonable things and being reprimanded for speaking out when the unreasonable things hurt our family or the girls.

I truly entered this process believing that my passionate, outspoken nature would be helpful to the process and the children we foster.  So far, I have done nothing but make it worse.  I was wholly unprepared for the people we are working WITH, to come to my home and imply that I "shut up and color" or they would move the girls to a family that was more.... passive.

I was not prepared for sleepless nights over the wounds inflicted upon these girls, on the willingness of caseworkers and judges to put the needs of these children second to their own ease and comfort.  I was unprepared for the unfairness of watching these children suffer from the actions of their parents and being the ones responsible for helping them deal with those wounds.

The unfairness feels almost tangible at times.  I, My husband, Sunshine, Luna and our whole family are asked to rearrange our lives over and over to make things easier on bio parents who take every bit of it for granted.  They go on, living their lives as they please, inflicting hardship and pain on these precious girls and, by extension, the rest of our family.  I feel the injustice coat my skin and my arms tingle with frustration and outrage.  It is all I can do not to scream or yell or "verbally annihilate them" as Julia Sugarbaker would do.

I watch them slide back into destructive behaviors and then turn around and tell us they are changing and I am supposed to believe their hearts are changing and they are becoming new people? I spent a good chunk of the weekend pondering how to accept their repentance.  And then I realized that it's not really my job.

When I sit there, judging their repentance and suggesting they deserve no mercy, am I no better then the brother of the prodigal son?

I have always listened to the story of the Prodigal Son and connected more with the prodigal son.  I saw myself as someone who went away from my Father in Heaven and was received back with open arms.  I never really pondered the plight of the older brother.

How do I treat those who have fallen away?
How do I treat those, who, in their sin have wounded those I love?
How can I be expected to love the very people who have hurt and neglected and harmed these precious girls? We spend every moment and prayer and thought and tear to help heal the wounds inflicted by their parents.  Can we really be expected to LOVE them?

But… there is another type of unfairness. 

Last night, I held the most beautiful little two year old as she giggled and said new words for the first time.  I got to watch a precious five year old as she spelled words for the first time and sang songs and laughed and played and I thought…. I am so blessed.  We are so blessed to watch them blossom.  And how very unfair that they don’t get to look over and see their first mother and father smiling back at them.  How very unfair. 

So, how do you sit in the pool of unfairness without going all Julia Sugarbaker on everyone?

Well, sometimes I don’t.  Sometimes, I DO go all Julia Sugarbaker on people.  Other times I get out and hug my people and let my unfairness drip all over them and let them hold my wet and heavy burden for a while. The Lord has sent some very precious burden carriers who hold me when I cannot sit in the pool one more minute. 

But 99% of the time, we must stay in the pool.  It’s what we signed up for.  If these girls must stay in the pool, we have promised we will stay in the pool of unfairness with them as long as God is willing. 

And so… last week, when someone threw a giant vase into the pool and shattered glass all around, I scrambled… trying to gather up all the pieces before they cut any of our children.  And yes… I got cut in the process.  Just as I was crying to God about all the unfairness, he reminded me:

“If life were truly fair, you and I would never be resurrected; you and I would never be able to stand clean before God. In this respect, I am grateful that life is not fair.” - Dale G. Renlund, "That I Might Draw All Men Unto Me" 

I stopped in my tracks and chills ran up my arms.

 Is it really fairness I want? 

Don’t I crave that God bend the rules where I am concerned?

Oh, Dear God, please forgive me.  I seem to constantly need reminding that YOU are God and I am not.  I need your mercy just as much as these bio parents and I am not the one to decide when that mercy should end. Please, please help me deal with the unfairness being heaped on these girls.

The very next line brought me great comfort. 

“At the same time, I can emphatically state that because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, ultimately, in the eternal scheme of things, there will be no unfairness. “All that is unfair about life can be made right.”¹⁴ Our present circumstances may not change, but through God’s compassion, kindness, and love, we will all receive more than we deserve, more than we can ever earn, and more than we can ever hope for. We are promised that “God shall wipe away all tears from [our] eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.”

I trust His promises.  I know He is FOR us. I know He is FOR those girls.  I trust that one day, he will wash away all the unfairness and we will sit at His feet, basking in His perfect mercy and justice. 

What does the future hold for these little ones; for our marriage; for our family?

I don't know.  But He knows the end of the story and I know He works for my good; for their good; for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purposes.