After a year of marriage, and while we had the extra space, Brittany and I decided to dive into foster care. We felt a call to begin fostering before starting a biological family. But, as God would have it, mid way through the certification process, we got pregnant with Tessa.

We decided to finish the certification process anyway and planned to begin fostering as soon as possible. We made the call to wait until Tessa was at least 6 months old before we said “yes” for the first time.

Are we crazy?
Tessa was born about 2 months after we got our license in the mail. As we got to know this little girl, it was so clear that she was created to be a foster sibling. When she was 3 months old, we got a call for a short-term placement. If we said “yes,” we would welcome a newborn baby girl sometime in the next 7-15 days, depending on when she was born. We were nervous, but also excited, considering we had just done the newborn phase 3 months earlier. we felt equipped, “experienced,” and ready to do it again. But the closer the time came, we kept asking ourselves, “What are we doing?” We had just gotten Tessa to sleep through the night, and now we were going to voluntarily go back to sleepless nights…??

This just got real
After saying “yes,” it was about 7 days until Sophia (her name while we had her) was born. She came to us straight from the hospital and only 2 days old. It felt strange — the social workers walked into our home, handed us a baby, and within 30 minutes, they left. There we were with a brand new life – someone else’s child – completely and solely dependent on us to keep her alive.

Sophia was sweet and challenging, just like any newborn baby. We had her for 23 days. Such a short time, when you think about it, but she quickly became a part of our family. We fed her, gave her her first bath, trained her to sleep in her own room. We celebrated our 2nd anniversary while she was in our house. She came with us to church, out to eat, to visit friends and family. And then, after 23 days, the social worker came to pick her up and take her to her new adoptive parents. And just like that, we would never see her again.

Short-term placements
Sophia’s case is a more unique case in fostering. This kind of short-term placement gives the birth mother time to decide if she wants to terminate her rights and go through with the adoption. Sophia was with us during that time, and while her agency found a good permanent home for her. Sometimes this takes a couple of weeks, and sometimes it can take 5 or 6 months, so they call these cases short-term (different from typical fostering, which I will blog about next time when we talk about K’s story).

We do miss Sophia, but we learned that she went to a family who had waited years to have a baby! Sophia taught us that we could parent two kids. She gave us confidence, patience and love. She taught me that I could manage with nighttime feedings (since I had no excuse with her…). And she showed us what it would look like for Tessa to have a sibling. We will be forever grateful for our short, but sweet, time with her!