Close to Home: Becoming a foster family for a teen — it can work

I became a foster parent by accident. When my son was in middle school he had a friend (let’s call him Michael) who was in foster care living in a group home. They were close in eighth-grade but drifted apart when they started high school.

During his sophomore year, Michael’s social worker called me to tell me that he had again been kicked out of his group home due to his behavior. He was headed to Valley of the Moon Children’s Home, and she was worried because his girlfriend was also at Valley of the Moon and their pattern was to run away together. I called my parents to see if they could help. They couldn’t.

I didn’t know what to do, but I felt like I had to do something. I hastily called a family meeting with my partner and our three biological children, ages 9 to 15. I asked if we could bring Michael into our home for “a while” because he had nowhere else to go. None of us knew Michael well, and we especially didn’t know the Michael that the world was seeing at that time. Everyone said yes.

That was two years ago, and not only is he still here, he is now legally ours.

The first year had challenges that were harder than anything I had dealt with before. I was so disappointed in myself for not being strong enough to handle it. Michael is a smart, sensitive and charismatic boy. But back then he didn’t communicate. He didn’t know how to think about things. He was so quick to react. He didn’t do any schoolwork. He flirted with gangs. He got angry. He didn’t trust me. He didn’t care about my family.

I was sure trained foster parents knew how to deal with these things in a patient and loving way, but I was tested to my very limits. I cried a lot that year. I didn’t understand trauma and how the years of abuse and neglect plus the 10-plus years of being in foster care limbo had affected his psyche.

I now know that his heart was aching for the kind of love and belonging that we can only get from being in a permanent family. He longed for an enduring and deep connection. His behavior was a smoke screen to protect himself from more hurt. I can see this now.

The second year has been one of incredible bonding, the kind that you have with a newborn. He has become our child, and in many ways he is my youngest, my baby, even though he is the eldest at nearly 18. He is like a cuddly kitten, far from the thug persona he once projected.

Right now, foster care is in the news as part of efforts to get kids out of group homes and off psychotropic medications. Michael was in a group home for six years and was prescribed psychotropic meds. Both may have been necessary from a certain vantage point, but our experience has suggested that they may have been harmful as well, keeping him from the thing that would give him real healing - fierce, unconditional love.

Our journey with foster care has been the hardest thing and the best thing ever for my family. I believe it has been a true blessing for us and for him, and I don’t think any of us could now imagine our family without Michael. I am sharing this story as a way of saying it is doable to step into the unknown and become a foster parent to a teenager. It really is. And it does make a real difference.

Katie Greaves is a Santa Rosa parent.