Imparting wisdom

It is so funny to me that people care what I have to say about foster care. I have a lot of experience in the system and I speak/write about it passionately, so maybe that has something to do with it, but it still shocks me, after 8 years of presenting about foster care, that people really want to listen to what I have to say.

So what brought that on? I did a foster parent training over the weekend and there was the usual group of foster parents who liked seeing that the kids they are taking care of have a hope of making it in the real world. I am used to that. There was also a couple there who wanted me to kind of mentor their foster daughter, which I am more than happy to do. They met me for the first time Saturday morning and by Saturday afternoon they had told their foster daughter about me and how she needs to connect with me. That is what stuns me. I guess something I said had a huge impact on them, but I am not sure what.

Also, I will be going back to Washington DC in March to speak on Capitol Hill about foster care for the second time. I feel truly blessed to have done it once and getting to do it a second time is totally unfathomable to me. I am being invited to do this and the people who invited me value what I have to say so much that they are paying my way to DC and letting me moderate their briefing.

Not only that, but when I do not get to blog for a long time, I get e-mails from total strangers saying that they like the blog and that I need to write again. It absolutely makes my day to know that what I have to say here is ringing true for someone, maybe giving them hope or insite into a child in their care.

I do not think I could be much luckier than this. Thank you for reading my blog. I am going to send a thank you to the people sending me back to DC as soon as I get back from there. Would it be out of place to pass out thank you notes to the foster parents who I train? I really feel like I should. Not only do they open their homes to children like I used to be, but they value what I have to say and REALLY TRY to be the best foster parents they can be by embracing my ideas, advice and knowledge. They are some of my greatest heroes.