Last night I was talking with some neighbors and the topic drifted over to a little boy who is missing. He is unfortunately autistic and a foster child. The whole situation is horrible. I had to hold my tongue through a bit of the conversation though when it was said, "when you have foster children you have to watch them like it is your job."
Well, no, I have a job and foster care is not a job. Foster care is an imperfect life. Today was my great example of "I can't keep a constant eye on you two".
Last week I got some nasty "day care flu" from the neighbor... well, for some reason it came back to me for today. You see a typical parent may be able to call someone and ask for a play date, a babysitter, a something. Nope, not here. Foster parents have to have approved care givers so I just had to tough it out with the duo and trust that at times if I didn't hear any trouble I had to trust they were doing okay. I'm lucky they are as small as they are or I would have major issues keeping track of them on a day like today.
Our kid's older sister did go missing for a clip of time today. After I had the duo at their family visit, biomom and biodad went back to the playground and took an unsupervised visit with their older sister. It was something the school never should have allowed. At 3:00 she was nowhere to be found. At 3:45 she was found in a classroom. As foster parents we have to trust the systems around us. They fail at incredible rates. You spend an inordinate amount of time jumping through hoops at the beginning of the licensing process for this to only find out once you are in it that it is your own personal support network that will keep you afloat. The rest of the "system" is often invisible and missing.
Did I do okay today, yes. They ate, they were safe. Would it have been better for the girls if I could have sent them on a playdate for a few hours, yes, but that isn't how this works.
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