Hello Scrutiny, come on in

I'm writing from a low point right now.  We have now been fostering Sweetie for 6 months and are coming to the climax of her case.  Some of the nostalgia has worn off and it feels like we're in the trenches.  She is definitely not a tiny, sleeping all the time baby anymore.  My free time is rather non existent as I juggle actively parenting 3 kiddos, managing the required paperwork, answering the weekly calls and emails, attending required trainings, and pursuing needed further medical therapy
for Sweetie.  There have been a few things I wasn't prepared for in this journey.

First, I wasn't aware how much my care of her would be scrutinized.  Sometimes uncomfortably, and definitely more often than I was with our bio boys.  This week Sweetie was evaluated for ECI services.  After the 2 hour visit with 3 staff members, I was emotionally spent.  I know it is all routine and needed for her benefit, but to walk through my entire day with her from wake up to bedtime in detail and analyze each area with strengths and weaknesses made me uneasy, sometimes defensive, and emotional.

For me the hard part of being a foster parent is the constant psycho analyzing that takes place, externally to a degree but more as I become aware of the information.  So much literature and training is out there concerning healthy attachment, answering every cry, keeping them extra close, brain development and behavioral cues all because of their prior trauma.  On the one hand, I felt confident caring for a baby because I felt I parented successfully two boys.  However, a traumatized baby is a whole new ball game.  They don't settle as easily, are not attached to me obviously the same as our boys, may never sleep as deeply as a healthy child.  I know all of this can change over time as the child experiences healthy attachment, parenting etc, but we're at the beginning of that journey.

With our boys, I spent too many hours trying to figure them out, only to end almost every day of their baby stage feeling like a complete failure.  With fostering, I feel doubly so.  With weekly and monthly meetings where I have to rehash so much of my relationship with her, activities, strengths and weakness, there are plenty of opportunities for me to feel like I'm not doing enough for her.

It's ok sometimes to remind myself that she is in a safe place, a better home than she would have been, she has brothers who adore her, but of course I'm not content with just that.  I want her brain to learn deep trust and attachment.  I want her to sleep on a schedule for her own health benefits, as well as for her mom, so she can think more rationally when and if she has to care for Sweetie by herself.  I want to give all I can to heal her while she is in our care.  She's worth the exhaustion and sometimes mental anguish of all of it.  I'm just at a place where it feels overwhelming.  I just needed to share that.

As for an update on her case, as so many dear friends are so wonderful at asking, she is on the path to being reunited with her mother by the end of the case.  Her mother is doing many of the things she needs to do to get her back.  Her visitations have been increased.  We are preparing the boys that she will be leaving us within the next 4 months.  We praise God that he is healing her mom so that she can care for Sweetie.  We pray for Sweetie that she knows how much God loves her and has a plan for her.  We thank God for allowing us to care for her and being part of her story.  We thank God for the ability to care for babies in need and that he would prepare us for the next girl (as very much requested by the boys) who comes into our home.

In addition to the above, it's a lot to process right now.  I think I'm putting a lot of urgency on myself because of her timeline with us.  It's a weird limbo of wanting to start grieving the loss of her, but also intenstly loving her to deeper healing.

This is where my own baggage comes in.  I emotionally detach I am faced with relational pain, and that is absolutely the wrong response here.  Fostering has been an incredible growth process for myself and our family.  I would not do anything differently.  If Sweetie returns home as she is intended, we fully plan on fostering again.  We have decided to take a few months break in between kiddos to catch up on sleep, give our boys some extra attention (and do big kid stuff we haven't been able to do), and allow ourselves to process the experience.  While it's hard and I feel run down right now, I know our God is greater than any emotion, thought, or circumstance.  Just because it's hard, doesn't mean it's not the right path.