Fostering...

A colleague of mine, with three school-age children, surprised me this week by saying she was considering  being a foster parent. She's motivated by the positive impact she could make in children's lives, a real difference to their childhood and beyond. I think of foster parenting as a half-way point to adoption, and wondered if that was really what she wanted to do. I'm open to adopting, but I think I'm not open to fostering. As I think about it, it's because I think of being a parent as all-or-nothing, and I would find it hard to invest time and cultivate love, and then have it be impermanent, to be taken away on a timeline and according to circumstances outside of my control. I'm not a selfless enough person to "fill in the gap," or be the interim measure of hope and stability but not be quite family. Foster parenting is a special calling - to do the best you can for the children that come to you, to be a safe haven for a time, a soft landing, until they move on.