My Teens Changed My Life!

When Scott and I first decided to foster, we had a lot of decisions that still needed to be made. Such as: gender, age range, how many, and location. Some of these decisions we were on the same page about, but not all of them. The reason we felt lead to foster was to help the ones who weren’t getting help they needed and weren’t getting adopted.
Scott felt from the beginning that we were called to have older kids, but I was terrified of that idea. The more I think about why, it was solely because all of our family and friends were against it. All I was hearing was that ” we would deal with a lot more drama” and ” you don’t want a child that is in high school in your home, when not too long ago you were in high school”. All they were trying to do was convince us that younger would be better. I fell right into this. I thought to myself that they had a great point about our ages, and I let it over take my husband and I’s decision. I didn’t believe that our God is mighty and wouldn’t give us anything we couldn’t handle.
So, we began the process, with our now son (who was 9 at the time) and his sister who was 11. These kids captured our hearts from the beginning. As the agency started to get over-flooded with kids, We began to take in emergency placements. We had age ranges from 5 to 16! We had a placement of three girls 5,6, and 9. Which were the ages my family was encouraging us to foster. This placement was the hardest placement for us. They were about to be placed with their adopted family, and Scott and I were planning to quit fostering for a while, but God had different plans.
God gave us a call for a 16 year old girl. We knew she was going to be a big piece of our lives. She moved in about a week later and she was showing us that she was grateful, caring, and loving. We began to love that age and our foster experience again. Two weeks after she moved in, we got siblings, a 13 year old boy and a 14 year old girl. Instead of looking at myself as a mom figure for them, (since I was so close to their age) I told myself my role was to mentor. Someone to help guide them with college, career decisions, budgets, and just how to treat people. As I started viewing myself as their mentor, I started noticing that they had started viewing me as a mom figure. They respected me, regardless of age, but because of the things I do for them, how I am there for them, and even how I challenge them.
So now, Scott and I are the parents of ages 1,10,13,14, and 17. We tell people this and when our families and friends see us, they seem to be waiting for horror stories, but this household we have is the best. Yes, we have situations that come up, but we handle them. Just like the situations we will have come up with Mikey ad Rory. So the idea of teens is scary sometimes, yes, but I truly believe that God will not give you anything you can’t handle. I am so glad that I started truly following God and trusting his true plan for our path instead of half way. These kids have truly changed my perspective on life and I love all of them as they are my own!