Unpacking

There's so much to share, so much that we are asked and want to use this space to answer.  I guess we'll move right into placement and the path laid out for us, that led us to baby girl being placed in our home.  There were a lot of ups and downs until she came.

On the last post I mentioned we were getting on a plan to head to Germany for a week long vacation/conference, just me and Phil.  While we were walking down the aisle to take our seats, I reached into my purse to turn off my phone.  At that exact moment, my phone rang.  It was our agency asking if we would consider taking a 2 1/2 yr. old boy in Bastrop.  I explained we were getting on a plane for a trip, but would be willing to consider it.  He proceeded to tell me a bit about the boy and his situation, and I committed to get back to him when we landed.  I switched the phone off, shared the news with Phil and started to cry.

My heart broke for that sweet boy.  I prayed for him, his family, his current foster family and us.  We knew right then that we were not just going to respite care, we were ready to be all in.  

We landed in Frankfurt and I emailed our intake manager and said we needed to know more.  We were willing to accept the boy upon our return, but his visitations were twice a week in Bastrop and we just couldn't make that work. (Bastrop is about 40 min. away from us.)

Ok, so that phone call was over, we vacation a few days, and while in Rothenburg, I get a call for a 5 week old baby.  Again, tears well up in my eyes.  We heard the story and said yes, we would take her.  We then got a message back that a family who had provided respite care for her offered to take her, so we weren't needed.  We all agreed no more phone calls about placements while on vacation.  What a roller coaster!  We had a wonderful trip (LOVE Freiburg, Germany!) and we returned anxious to foster.

Our first week back, and we hopped on the roller coaster again.  While Ethan was at his piano lesson, I was sitting in the car with Noah, who fell asleep on the way to piano.  I received our first emergency placement call.  All we were told was a family of four was being removed from their home in Round Rock and there was a 3 year old girl and a 6 month old girl.  Would we take one or both within the next 2 hours?  My heart was racing.  And then I started crying as I thought about what those kids might be experiencing.  I immediately said yes, we would take the 6 month old.  We were to await a future phone call.

We were not called back for that placement.  We received another emergency placement call the next day, this time for a 1 year old girl who didn't talk.  She would need extensive therapy.  We said yes, but did not get a call back.  We later learned that is a total scrambling game trying to find homes for emergency placements.  Ideally, CPS wants siblings to stay together and we never quite know what other agencies and families are being contacted and what combination of kiddos other homes can take.

Our hearts were saddened that we weren't chosen for those kiddos.  We were so ready to serve!  A few weeks passed and we started wondering if we weren't really needed as foster parents.  Had we done all of this for nothing?  Did we choose the wrong age category?  Did we say something wrong in those emergency placement calls?  Then on a Thursday, we were contacted about a precious baby girl in the NICU with medical needs.