at last! our foster license was approved today, and we are currently eligible for placement. there's some serious celebrating happening in our hearts today. we started the process in mid-august, and have been working through it over the last seven months.
it was within a few hours of the final email from our licensor that we received our first placement request email. i was quite surprised. DSHS starts by emailing a list of all currently-eligible families with a summary of the situation, and we can reply if we're interested. while it would've been a crazy night, the situation sounded worth exploring, so i replied and asked if we could talk if the child was still available. within moments, my phone was ringing, a blocked number, which i knew immediately was DSHS. the placement worker told me the little boy had been placed, but that they now had a sibling set available out of our local office. we're not at all prepared for a sibling set, but i asked a few of my questions anyway, and told them to contact us if they couldn't find another place for the kids.
as i drove home from the office today, i reflected on this conversation. surely there is celebrating in our home tonight, but my heart is sobered too. that was a real conversation. with real kids. a real family. real moms and dads with real problems. and real kids with real pain and trauma. suddenly, this isn't just an idea or a theory or a dream anymore. it's become very real. and it will only get more real. so while we celebrate the end of the challenging beginning, i am sobered by the realities of the next chapter, and reminded of the vision God has given us for this journey. our hearts are for hurting kids.
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