Foster Diaries: Risking Your Heart

One thing that we as human beings do not like to do with our hearts is risk them. Risk means uncertainty and with uncertainty comes the possibility of loss and pain. But however much we try too limit the risks we have to take, it has been a life lesson for me to learn to hold your heart out there anyway..even  if you are hurt.And in the event that you are, you must learn not to let it keep you from loving again. This is the heavy lifting of the heart and way we build its capacity to love. Yes, I know...it sounds like the inside of a Hallmark greating card but it is also a fact of life as I have lived it.

One of the ways this lesson was brought home to me was through adoption and foster care. Many of our readers may have been keeping abreast of my previous writings about "Baby Boy". The two year old who has stolen our hearts and who already feels like a member of our family. He came into our lives with two ear infections and soul full of pain and made me question my ability as a foster parent only to later steal all our hearts. At that time we had to say goodbye to him and let him be with a member of his family for long term care only to have him return six months later after having suffered horrific abuse in that home. We welcomed him back with the intention that this time we wanted him to stay. But as with all times you open your heart to someone...there is the possibility that it wont work out. Such is the case with Baby boy.

Stolen Childhood

Welcome back everyone....

I know it's been a long time since I have written anything. But, that does not mean that it has been an uneventful beginning to the year. The kids are still off for Christmas vacation and my husband has taken off some time to help care for Baby Boy and the others...so our house is full and very busy. Additionally, I have not been so happy with the gay related news these days. It seems like it's all completely wrapped up in the Republican primaries and the insane viewpoints of it's candidates. I have to admit that I am sick of hearing about Rick Santorum, Rick Perry, and Michelle Bachman to the point that I am afraid to even log onto the internet anymore. They are on everywhere, all the dam time...and they seem intent on pushing each other over to prove who is the most "conservative(I.E. against the gays). Case in point...

Via Towleroad and reported by the Miami herald...Rick Santorum wants to be your president...and this is what he thinks of same-sex adoption and children's rights to a safe home:

Citing the work of one anti-poverty expert, Santorum said, "he found that even fathers in jail who had abandoned their kids, were still better than no father at all to have in their childrens' lives."
Allowing gays to marry and raise children, Santorum added, amounts to "robbing children of something they need, they deserve, they have right to. You may rationalize that that isn't true, but in your own life and in your own heart, you know it's true."

Really?...robbed?!...then I have a little story to tell about how Baby Boy came to be in our care this Christmas. Brace yourself and grab a tissue...it's going to be hard to hear...