Our third foster care child was a 13 month old infant girl. It seemed like she cried almost half the time she was awake. She cried if I held her. She cried if Janine held her. She would cry more if we put her down. She cried so much that we worried she was allergic to milk, so we asked the social worker to check with the family. The report we got back was no, she wasn’t allergic to anything. Often she would cry and gesture towards the door. It appeared she wanted to return home.
I got my first and only smile yesterday at church. She was much happier away from our home. I think she recognized we were a family and lived in a home, different from hers; however, she liked being with larger groups of people.
Her extended family met Saturday and worked out which of them would take this little girl. The social worker checked out the home and approved it. Janine and my middle daughter took the little girl to the children’s shelter Sunday evening. The little girl was relieved to see her two aunts and her grandmother.
One of the problems the Foster Care system worries about is something called Attachment Disorder. My understanding of this problem is that if a child does not learn to emotionally connect with people before they turn five, then they may never be able to empathize with other people. This little girl is clearly not at risk for this problem. She was very, very, very attached to her family.
We only had her three days. We’ll miss her for a long time.
We still have the five year old girl. Janine is trying to work out the schooling situation. The county wants her in school. There is an elementary school a couple blocks away from our home. Janine learned that we might also be able to homeschool her under a local charter school.
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