Foster Care and ttc

coriet

My husband and I have been talking about becoming foster parents, and we're wondering if they will accept you if you're trying to get pregnant, or if you are pregnant? How does that fit in with fostering? Is it harder being a foster parent while ttc/pregnant?  I know I read somewhere that if you have biological children that you should keep them in birth order, like the oldest stays the oldest, but if we're fostering how does that fit in?

Sorry for the questions! I wanted to see if I could get the big one answered before I spoke with a case worker! 

elissaann26

I know in our county that they make you wait a year after giving birth before they will license you as a foster parent.  Their reasoning is that your family just went through a big change and you need to make sure you are able to adjust to it adequately before adding a foster child, who needs lots of consistency and structure.

The weird caveat to this rule is that if you get pregnant after becoming licensed that can't take your license away.  I highly doubt they would take you off of the list since there is such a great need for foster parents, but maybe they would.

I think you might just want to consider what your family is comfortable with.  If you welcomed 1 (or 2 or 3 or however many) child(ren) into your home through foster care, would you be able to give that child the attention/care/love they deserve and need if you were pregnant or had a newborn.  I will tell you that since my DH and I are first time parents, the answer for us would no.  But your family it may be a yes. 

I would just stress that you should make sure that you can commit to giving the foster child(ren) what they need and that you don't intend to ask for them to be moved if you become pregnant or give birth.  This really isn't fair to the foster child at all considering they have already been moved at least once at that point.

Our county doesn't have a birth order rule and typically will license a family with whatever ages they feel will work with their current family.

After all of this, you should really talk to a social worker in your county to get more information.  Things vary greatly from state to state and even county to county.  So make sure whatever you decide that it is an informed decision.

ctbride08

We TTCed for a full year while fostering with no issue.  In general our rule for ourselves was to try to only take placements that we would consider adopting if the opportunity arose and that was still the case while we were also trying to conceive. 

So, during the year that we were TTCing and fostering we had a 3 year old and an infant and knew that we had capacity (space, love, time, energy, financial) for another child.  When we were call for their youngest sibling and said yes, we stopped TTCing.

 

CaptainSerious

I think preserving birth order in adoption is a much bigger concern than it initially appears in many cases, especially in fostering.  It doesn't mean that you can't have a baby while fostering, but there are definitely some additional things of you should remain aware.

 

Adoption/foster professionals often cite jealousy and the child's understanding of how they fit into the home as a reason for preserving birth order, but there's a much bigger side to it that they often choose not to discuss when not relaying the circumstances surrounding a specific child.  Many older children who are in foster care have experienced trauma in their lives.  This could be as simple as losing caregivers through death, but more often means witnessing or being the victim of abuse, neglect, or other violent behavior.  Children who have suffered these types of trauma often act out those types of behaviors on younger children around them.  This can happen even if they are getting all the emotional and psychological help they need; it's often part of their process as they learn to cope with what happened to them/what they witnessed.  So in the minds of many adoption professionals, placing an older child, who may have had a turbulent past, in a home with young children is not ideal in most situations.

 

Also, as children adjust to a new home and work through their trauma, they generally go through periods of testing behaviors.  These can be very difficult to deal with when you are emotionally stable and well rested, and often the only way to get the child through this stage is to remain strong, consistent, and show them lots of unconditional love.  It's a draining stage and takes a lot of energy.  I can only imagine that in the aftermath of giving birth or while being sleep-deprived, it would be exponentially more difficult to meet these behaviors and help the child through them to a more healthy adjustment.  I'm guessing this is a large part of why some programs make new parents wait a year before fostering.