National Foster Care Month

You've been off the hook for a good 10 days here this month and not so much for lack of effort as the complicated nature of technology and the simplicity of my mind.

Yesterday I was YouTube-ing trying to find some videos to show you about Foster Care. I watched a bunch, saw a few that were good and then couldn't figure out how to make them move from there to here and was too lazy to make the link and remember that picture from this morning, well, they were "helping" too. Let's just say that shutting off the power does not help blogs to post very well.

Ahem.

Yeah, anyway.

So I'm wondering what you think happens to Foster Kids. Do you know? Do you wonder? Has it ever crossed your mind?

I'm guessing if you know me in person, I've bent your ear this way once or twice before.

Lots of them, I think around half, that's about 250,000 I'd guess, age out and become the nations young homeless.

Of the rest, some go home and some go to forever homes. I'm not sure I'll ever know which of those is "better" or if there even is a better. In the end, the damage is done either way and even when the child wins, they loose.

Not all Foster Care survivors go on to perpetuate the system by becoming birth parents who lose their children to the system. They don't all go on to become addicts, criminals or child abusers.

A lot of them grow up to become regular "normal" people like you and me. They have jobs, homes and families. They are "productive members of society".

What an interesting phrase.

Hmm.

But that aside, I'm trying to jog your mind about Foster Care. I'm trying to plant a few new thoughts or thoughts that stick and linger so that Foster Kids come to mind a little more often and maybe, just maybe, you'll be spurred to action. Any sort of action, that helps a child who is living a life they didn't deserve.

So, here's a little list of some "famous" or "successful" former foster kids.

Alonzo Mourning
Cher
DMC from Run DMC
Ice T
John Lennon
Marilyn Monroe
Eleanor Roosevlet
Willie Nelson
Duante Culpepper
Eddie Murphy
Eriq LaSalle
James Dean
Malcolm X
Dr. Ruth
Babe Ruth
Victoria Rowell

Not all of them were in a traditional or official foster care program, but they were raised in something far form the ordinary 2 parent family.

Something to think on.

These foster kids are not something to be ignored or written off.