Adoptive Parent Profiles, But for Foster Care Adoption - Weekend Wisdom

Question: I would love to hear about family profiles for adopting older teens. 

Resources:

• Adopting a Child of a Different Race or Culture
• Adopting Older Kids
• Evaluating Risk Factors in Foster Care Adoption

Transcript

Please pardon any errors, this is an automated transcript.

Naomi was listening to our episode on creating a compelling adoptive parent profile
for infant adoption, and it got her thinking. She asked us how that idea might
translate to older child or teen adoption. It's a great question because while
marketing yourself is most common in domestic infant adoption, a similar concept and
preparation can be incredibly useful to those who are considering foster care
adoption. Hello and welcome to
So if you can reframe it, it can be a useful tool for helping you and your
caseworkers get to know each other and help that caseworker know what your intentions
are, what your plans are, and what your home environment is to make a great match
for foster care or older child adoption. So when you're thinking about what you want
to include in this profile that maybe only you will see or maybe only your
caseworker will see or talk.
your home every day for a child that you would choose to adopt. So you would think
about maybe what your routines are. Are you a structured family? Or are you kind of
a fly -by -the -seat -your -pants family? Are you laid back? Are you pretty active?
Do you enjoy quiet pursuits like music and movies or are you more of a sports and
outdoorsy kind of family? What kind of makes up who you are. But also you want to
include a sense of what your neighborhood is like. Are you a rural family? Or are
you a suburban family? Are you an urban family? Do you live close to parks and
schools? Do you live close to cultural centers like museums and art centers? And who
are your support people in that neighborhood or in that community where you live? Do
you have family nearby? Do you have close friends? Do you have a a broader
community that's pretty diverse, or is it a community that is very like -minded and
interested in supporting you on this path of choosing adoption? These are the details
that will help make a clear picture for your caseworker of what child would fit
well into that environment, whether they have particular needs or sensitivities. For
example, they wouldn't want to match a child that has significant mobility issues
with a family that hikes every single weekend. And that could be something that
could be worked with and worked around, but is that the best fit for that child?
And so those are the things that a caseworker would look at and assess and talk
about with you as they're looking at your parent profile that you've created. Another
thing to think about when getting to know your caseworker and creating this profile
of who you are is what you're excited to share with a child. Are you excited to
involve them in your family traditions? Do you have specific traditions that you
can't wait to pass down? Do you have family vacations or daily rhythms that are
very meaningful to you and to your family and you're going to be sharing them with
a child. And remember that older child adoption is the same in that sense as infant
adoption. You just are going to have to be adapting the sharing of those things
with a child's age and stage that would be different than sharing them with an
infant who grows up and grows into it. So you want to think about the things that
you genuinely value, your traditions and routines like movie nights, holiday rituals,
family meals, your faith community, activities that you might be excited to include a
child in would be things like, again, maybe hiking or traveling or gardening or
music or maybe you play in an orchestra and you want to include your child in that
lifestyle, those kinds of things. And then any passions or skills that you possess
that will help them understand who you are and what you're about and what you would
possibly be bringing to this child's life. You're not selling perfection, so try to
keep that in mind, but you are helping to paint, again, a warm, real, authentic
picture of who you are and what joining your family might look like for this child.
A third thing to consider would be your strengths and capacities as a parent. So
this part matters, especially in foster care adoption, probably more than maybe in
infant adoption.
and then where you need to maybe buffer some of your lack with other professionals
or other people in that child's life to help you raise this child and meet the
needs that this child has. Your honesty will be far more important than your
perfection in this particular area. You want to have that honest self -assessment,
but you also want to demonstrate that you have the ability to rise to the occasion
should a child's needs become evident that you Thank you.
of your skills and capacities will help them assess what is a good match for your
family. So you'll want to also include some conversation about your motivations and
your mindset. And again, this is an area that's similar to infant adoption because
the why we are adopting mentality is really good for caseworkers to hear about.
Are you adopting because you have experienced years of infertility and are just ready
to be a parent? Are you adopting for other reasons? Are you adopting because you
just don't feel like you are ready to finish parenting yet? What are the reasons
and the motivations and the intentions behind your purpose? And this will help the
caseworker be assured that your intentions are pure, that your eyes are wide open
and that you are ready to rise to whatever occasion may come with this child and
the needs that they bring to your family. So you could talk about why you're drawn
to foster care or foster adoption. You could talk about why permanency matters to
you. You could talk about how important you view birth family connections and what
you would do and how you would handle birth family connections. You could talk about
how and what you've learned about the needs of children coming out of foster care,
the impacts of trauma, and how that shows up in learning challenges or in behavior
challenges or in relationship challenges. And that leads well into the fifth thing
that you ought to consider, including in your parent profile, is the ages, needs,
and behaviors of the child that you're prepared to parent, kind of related to
specific about the needs and ages of children that they're interested in parenting
will seem picky or seem limiting. But if you have a clear sense from assessing your
capacities and your skills about your abilities, then you can have a clear sense of
how that translates into the child that you would be welcoming home. So you need to
think about the specific age range that you feel equipped to parent what behavior.
in an infant adoption profile, parents will often include their approach or their
intended approach to connection and correction and discipline.
And so for bringing home an older child or a teen, that's even more important. You
have to kind of know what your style is. Again, this comes from some honest self
-assessment. So how do you set or plan to set boundaries and expectations? If you've
already been parenting for a while.
or a racial identity, so you need to demonstrate your willingness to maintain and
celebrate a child's cultural heritage or ethnic background. You need to be willing to
learn hair care, language, traditions, music, food, all those things. And then you
need to also be willing to make sure they see themselves represented in their home,
their new home, and their community where they've joined your family. Representation
is super important.
and then how you prepare yourself and your family for transitions into your family
or out of your family should that happen. And how are you going to handle those
transitions and the challenges that they may present? These things will signal your
maturity and readiness to handle kind of the changing nature of the realities of
foster care. So that willingness to flex is really what you're looking for in that
conversation. So remember that while you're adopting an older child or teen from
foster care, you aren't going to be creating one of those glossy, pretty dear
expectant parent books, but you are still going to be creating some sort of profile
that tells the caseworker who you are, that helps you assess who you are, and will
be a tool that your caseworker and your agency can use to facilitate a match that
suits the child best and fits well into your family. The purpose may not be to
market yourself to an expectant parent, but it is to offer a true,
authentic picture of who you are and, again, get that best chance for a good match.
So don't worry about being flawless. Don't worry about being perfect. focus on being
human.