February 20, 2008

• The praise of infants and children

  Verse of the day -
  “Through the praise of children and infants
         you have established a stronghold against your enemies,
         to silence the foe and the avenger.”  Ps 8

  Somehow God uses children to silence those who are not totally with Him.  Isn’t that interesting?  It seems strange that a baby would have such power… and if I had never looked into the beautiful eyes of a baby before, I would have my doubts about this verse.  But babies do cause hearts to melt.

  We had a pretty rough week last week because we made the big announcement to our family about fostering and were not exactly met with enthusiasms all around.  Though the ones who were enthusiastic were so incredibly enthusiastic, the ones who were not… were definitely not.  We were not at all surprised by the response — but the reality of the rejection that we faced was so terribly disappointing.  It pretty much breaks our hearts and I am without adequate words to describe the amount of angst and wrestling conversation that has transpired between Sam and myself.   We are mostly sad that they will miss out.  We are not sure what the real issue is (beyond all the worse-worse case scenarios that they posed) except that perhaps the foreign concept of inviting others into our home really
  challenges their core value of what ‘the family’ is.  We are breaking
  up their idea of family.  But we are hoping that, in the end, they will
  see that rather than breaking down the family, we are, in fact, enlarging it (by inviting ‘strangers’ in).  Perhaps the praise of infants and children will melt their hearts.

  In the meantime, I wanted to share more about the WHYs we are doing this.  Though we have not started the 8-week course, in which we will learn a whole lot more, we have been doing a lot of research, so this is what we know thusfar.

  At any given time in San Diego, there are over 6,000 children in
  foster care who do not have parents to love them and teach them what is
  right.  Without families, it would be unlikely that they will grow up to be helpful to our
  society but, more likely, harmful.  If they have families, on the other hand, they could grow up to be contributors to society.

  Studies show that without a consistent caregiver during the critical
  period of infancy to 2 years, a baby will not be able to develop proper
  attachment.  Their brains will not physically develop as it normally
  should and will not be able to after this time period has passed.  This
  means that they may not be able to relate with people in a healthy way –
  they may not be able to have compassion on others and so would not feel
  bad about hurting someone.  So, really, there is such a necessity to love the baby and bond with them by a consistent caregiver (i.e. foster parents).

  The babies that might be placed in our home may have some minor developmental delays due to the abuse they may have experienced like being kept in a playpen all the time, so they may not crawl at the usual age, but they are very resilient at this young age and will catch up very quickly.  Since these babies are so young, they will not have much cognitive memory of any negative events they may have experienced so are unlikely to have any emotional issues.  And, furthermore, as they are placed in the loving and nurturing environment of a foster family, they will receive any emotional healing that they need.  Our agency has followed-up on babies that they have placed into homes who are now older, and they are doing well — well-adjusted like other kids. (Isn’t that exciting?)

  As we have shared this news with friends, we have received a wide range of responses.  Mostly, good and very supportive – but for those who don’t know much about it, there are lotsa questions.  We want to answer questions and help educate people and perhaps even inspire others to do the same!   

  One question that I get often is the matter of whether or not we are going to get ‘real children’ of ‘our own’.  This question could probably be better formed differently because the opposite of real children is fake children, and I sure hope that adopted children are not fake (seen or treated as fake or second-class).  Any kids who come into our home will be ‘our own’ kids, and we will treat them as if they are our flesh and blood.  We will treat them as the ‘real kids’ that they are.  So to answer the question…at this point, we are not sure how long we will foster for, we are not sure if we will adopt, we are not sure if we will have biological kids and when.  We are just following God one step at a time, one day at a time… 

  If you have any questions about what this fostering thing is about, please ask!  We’ll try to find the answer for you if we don’t know it.

  • 5:44 am
  • 12 Comments