I'm excited to begin a new series of blog posts today. The "Our Foster/Adoption Financial Story" series will be a set of guest posts by foster parents and adoptive parents discussing the financial impact of adoption, foster care and special needs parenting on their lives and how they've made it work (or haven't). It is my hope that these stories will help people considering foster care or adoption be better prepared for what the future may hold, and help those of us who are already fostering or adopting get support and ideas and maybe even inspiration.
There is so much stigma in our culture about talking openly about finances. This stigma around talking openly about money is even more intense for foster parents (who are routinely perceived socially as "doing it for the money" despite the fact that we often lose money and careers due to fostering). Adoptive parents also face stigma, such as the perception that privately adoptive families are wealthy or that people who do subsidized adoptions of children through the state do so only because they want the money or cannot afford private adoption.
People of all economic backgrounds become foster and adoptive parents, and for most of us who aren't wealthy it has impacted financial and career choices. Saving for adoption costs... proving you make enough money to be approved as a foster family... discovering that your child's past trauma and attachment issues require services not covered by insurance... losing your ability to hold down a job because of the higher-than-anticipated needs of an adopted child with behavioral, emotional or medical issues... You are not alone if foster care and adoption have impacted your family financially in challenging ways, so let's talk about it! Tell us what has been difficult, what has been successful, how you've made things work.
I am looking for more families to share their story of adoption or foster care from a financial/career perspective. If you are interested please e-mail me. Let me know what name you'd like to use (you can use your real name or a pseudonym) and if you'd like me to link to your blog, and be sure to include a brief bio or mention in your piece the ages of everyone in your family, your professional/educational background and what state or region you are from. Your piece can be an autobiography, a rant, an essay, a poem, a proposal for policy changes. Include a photograph or drawing that represents your family if you can.
Posts in the "Our Foster/Adoption Financial Story" series:
As posts are added, they will be listed above.
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