Mentor Program

waiting, waiting and WAITING!!! Feels like it has been forever since we got our license and we still don't have a placement! It is so hard for me to wait patiently for something like this. To pass the time I have spent a lot of time "shopping" for a daughter in the adoption profiles. There have been a few that I have been interested in and inquired on but no luck yet. They are very picky about who they will consider for adoptive families and that is understandable. Those kids deserve to have some one be picky for them and hold out for the best.
    Some of you probably remember a few months ago I was really interested in a girl named Shade. She feels familiar to me and I am always drawn to her profile for some reason. I feel like I am meant to be in her life somehow. After a lot of thought and talking to a lot of people we decided that we were probably not the best fit to be her parents because she is 15 and would likely feel as if we were more like older siblings when she really needs a mom and dad. Ever since we made that decision I think about her a lot and about all the other older kids who are available for adoption but will most likely not ever be adopted. They call it "Aging out of the system" But that is just fancy talk for leaving them to fend for them self when they turn 18. There are not very many support systems for these kids and they will live the rest of there life without a forever familly. Graduations, wedding, pregnancies, births, and everything in-between will be experiences without the support and love of parents and siblings.  I don't know that I can think of a darker more lonely life.
     The one resource that these kids have to help them to cope is a mentor program. Of course I had to join. It pairs stable, adjusted adults with 17-19 year old teens coming out of foster care. They set each mentor up with 1 or 2 kids at a time and ask that you mentor them for 2 years as they adjust and become independent. They need help looking for jobs, applying for college, finding apartments, learning to budget, shop cook, clean and some of them need guidance in parenting if they have become young parents them self.
    Some day, when our young kids are grown I think I would enjoy taking in teens and becoming there forever family. Until then I hope that this mentor program can be a way for me to make a difference for a small number of them.