Every two years we have to be re-certified by the County that holds our foster care license. The process is fairly simple.
First, we have to do physicals. There’s a form our doctors have to complete that basically confirms we are healthy enough to be foster parents and are up to date generally.
Second, since we take in special rate medical kids, we have to provide documentation that we have engaged in at least 5 hours of special training annually. Only foster homes that take special rate kids need to do this piece. For some folks it’s a struggle to get the training hours done, but for Seth and me it’s a cinch. Seth’s pediatric CPR training counts, as did his class on child development in nursing school. Many of my trainings for being an Attorney for the Child count (topics were things like trauma informed interview tactics, the Indian Child Welfare Act, and domestic violence’s impacts on families). Plus I’m an avid reader/listener to books and like a lot of autobiographies by/about foster parents and former foster youth. My recent Audible titles include these three books all on the topic:
I love that reading relevant books counts. I’m about to start a book called “In Their Voices: Black Americans on Transracial Adoption.” I also listen to podcasts and just found “Creating a Family: Talk about Adoption and Foster Care.” I’ve listened to one episode and I’m hooked. So many relevant topics to choose from! I suspect that would count toward my training hours too.
Anyway, I digress. The third component of recertification is that we have a home inspection and interview with a “home finder,” who is kind of like our own case worker. We did that piece today.
Our own home finder is out because of a family member’s medical issue, so we had another home finder in the department come to our house today. We really hit it off with her. She’s super engaging and high energy, and we talked with her for several hours. She told us at the start of the visit, when she was barely in the door, that she had snapped up the opportunity to come do our recertification because “you guys are legendary.” What? We ARE? Apparently, at least according to her, the home finding unit loves us because we are veterans who know what we are doing, can handle anything, fully support reunification of families, advocate for kids in our care, and are pleasant to work with. Who the hell knew?!? It was really flattering to hear.
She completed a house walk through first, checking for fire extinguishers, a fire safety/emergency exit plan on the fridge, working smoke detectors on each floor and in each bedroom, basic cleanliness, number of beds, etc. That part was quick and easy.
As a side note, I had forgotten she was coming until very shortly before she arrived, but with my new status as a homemaker, things around the house were presentable without our having to scramble for hours trying to get the place clean. Bonus!
Then we just sat and chatted with her for ages. We talked about our current placement (Sprout) and of course Kiddo’s weekend visits. We talked about some good experiences we’ve had as foster parents, and some atrocious ones. We talked about my career change, Seth’s job, philosophies about screen time for kids, and the myriad felines with whom we share our home.
We also talked about the really important issues about foster care, like the goal of reunifying families, and kinship care, and how important it is for kids to have a sense of where they come from.
She was fully aware of our case file and some, eh hem, disagreements we’ve had with management along the way. We’ve butted heads with one woman in particular, who is sort of mid level management at the agency. Today’s home finder actually liked us extra for having had those disagreements, because she feels that means we are advocating for our kids. We’ve certainly learned some hard lessons along the way and have almost quit being foster parents twice, both times involving this particular mid-management person. We have long known that woman hates us and wishes we’d disappear, but it was SO GRATIFYING to learn that doesn’t mean the whole agency hates us.
All-in-all, it was my favorite recertification visit to date. Sometimes I need to be told we are doing our jobs well. Sometimes I need to hear we are respected for all our hard, hard work. And I certainly feel better knowing we’ve got some fans at the agency, even if it won’t ever be universal.
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