The challenge of trying to do the Senior Picture Challenge

Sending apologies to those who tagged me about this - but I can’t post a photo for the #SeniorPictureChallenge, because I never had a senior year in high school.

I started college at age 16 #StraightOutOfFosterCare, ended up homeless within a year, bounced back and made it through college and grad school. All is well today - it was just bumpy in the beginning and took a while to get there.

Here’s glimpse of 15 year old Lisa as a junior in high school getting ready to turn 16 in Dec., with no idea what she’s headed for, but wanting to move forward regardless.

Sending hugs and love to one and all - especially my brothers and sisters of the foster care system. One thing is true: We can and WILL move mountains together. #LetsKeepPushingForward

Support with Reconnecting With Bio Families After Foster Care

--> Adoption Network Cleveland recently created “Reconnections Support” to support former foster youth who are trying to reconnect with members of their biological families…  Through one-on-one and peer support, this program focuses on helping young people navigate those relationships, set realistic expectations, and maintain healthy boundaries.

As foster care youth and alumni, this challenge of how to reconnect with biological family members after foster care can be complex for each of us:

- Some of us are contacted by family members who try to take advantage of us financially.

-  Some of us seek out and are finally able to connect with our long-lost sibling - but the process of rebuilding that relationship can take time.

- Some of us reach out to family members and experience rejection.

- Some of us try to talk with parents about previous abuse or neglect, and the parent denies it ever happened.

From the time when I first “aged out” of foster care to my volunteer work ever since, I have both witnessed and experienced these complications. Trying to reconnect is complicated, and I am deeply grateful that Adoption Network Cleveland has created this statewide resource to help.

Thoughts on Director Comey's Testimony

It might sound weird to say this - but when I hear Former FBI Director Comey giving his legislative testimony, all I can think is that I wish I had someone like him for a father.

He is a Boy Scout of a man. He makes unpopular decisions based on his own integrity.

I would have loved to have had a father like that.

PS: 

Advice for Foster Care Alumni When Working With Teens

Nine times out of ten, when I volunteer my time as a foster care alumna to reach out to teens and young adults of today, they are incredibly receptive.

But not always.

And why on earth should I expect them to be?

I still remember being that 14 year-old in an all-girls group home, pissed off and bored out of my mind, and not hesitating to "smart off" to staff members. I was in pain, and sometimes it felt better if the people around me felt some of the hurt, too.

I also remember that, at age 15 and 16, I "tested" the very staff members that I respected the most - because I wanted to see if they would still care..

So, after a challenging experience on Monday, I've been mulling it over and have come to the following conclusion as a Life Lesson:

Always remember who you are, and where you came from -- it keeps you humble and makes you strong. And hopefully, it will also give you compassion and patience for others... Because you once were where they are now -- and really, at that time, did you need one more person to judge you? 


Maybe what you really needed at that time was someone who was willing to: 

• Look below the surface 
• See beyond the tough shell you created in order to protect yourself 
• Ignore the smart-aleck remarks that came so easily and freely at the time 
• And, just for once, UNCONDITIONALLY love you

I am willing to live up to this charge, with no illusions that doing so will always be fun...

Why Good Will Hunting and I have hard heads

Quote from Good Will Hunting:
Will: He used to just put a belt, a stick, and a wrench on the kitchen table and say, "Choose."
Sean: Well, I gotta go with the belt there.
Will: I used to go with the wrench.
Sean: Why?
Will: Cause f*ck him, that's why.

When I was a child, my father used to grab me by my shoulders, dig his fingers into my arms and throw me up against the wall over and over again.

He was bigger than me and stronger than me.
My voice was the only weapon that I had at my disposal.
So what did I do? I mouthed off:

Quote from Lisa's childhood:
Dad: SLAM!
Me: You're a terrible father.
Dad: SLAM!
Me: You're a bully.
Dad: SLAM!
Me: (having looked up "passive aggressive" in the dictionary) It's very passive-aggressive to take out your anger on a nine-year-old.
Dad: SLAM!

Just this morning, for some odd reason, my husband and I were talking about this. It baffles Nathan that I kept mouthing off.

Quote from this morning's conversation:
Nathan: Why didn't you just shut your mouth?
Me: What I told him was the truth.
Nathan: Yeah, well, you couldn't have picked a less teachable moment.
Me: He was going to hit me anyway.

I could have begged for mercy I suppose. I could have cried. But, in my mind, at the time, that would have made me weak.

And I always knew that I was strong enough to outlast him.

What does this mean to me today?
Well... hopefully I've gotten a little bit smarter about when to speak out and when to be silent!

But I hope that I always stand up for things that matter most to me. I hope I never cower in fear rather than telling the truth about something.

I was never sure what to expect from my father when he walked into a room.

If you need something, please ask in a timely, honest manner

The following blog entry represents a personal struggle that I have had this week. I am trying to learn from this experience and move forward.

I am always leading workshops and telling other people about defining their boundaries -- but this week was a reminder that I need to maintain my boundaries, too!

I'm trying to formulate:
1. Where are my boundaries when it comes to working with other foster care alumni? Particularly when they are in a state of immediate crisis.

2. What is my role as a leader within my state chapter of Foster Care Alumni of America?

3. How can I better handle situations like the ones I faced this week in the future?

Here are my ideas so far, in terms of communicating my expectations and boundaries to other people...

1. If you need something from me, ask.

Say: "Lisa, I need this: _________"
Tell me what you need, straight-out and give me a chance to say yes or no.

Please don't try to manipulate me.

Don't hint at what you need, and wait for me to figure it out. That disrespects me and it disrespects you. Because you are underestimating both of us.

What the hints mean are that:
- You don't think you are worthy of having your needs met
- You don't think that I care about you

And until you ask straight out and wait for my response, you won't have the chance to find out that neither one of your fears are actually true.

2. When you ask, please tell me the whole truth.

Think of it like a doctor. If you lie to a doctor about your symptoms, that doctor will not be able to diagnose you correctly.

I am not a doctor. I cannot be your counselor. But I can and will move heaven and earth to get you connected with the right resources - something I CAN'T do if you are lying to me.

Please don't lie to me about what is really happening. Don't shade the truth about what is going on. I am guessing you are doing that because you think that I will judge you - and yes, again, you fear that I will reject you.

3. If you need something, please don't wait until it is catastrophe level.

Again, I know WHY you are probably doing this. So many of us grew up in chaos, that we just get used to living in crisis level. Once we age out of foster care, crisis still seems very familiar.

So, during the steps before a crisis, when things are just starting to go wrong, we might not think to ask for help then. No, we think we can handle it.

We can handle problem A and B and C... Which means that by the time we ask for help, we are handing the other person an enormous, HUGE amount of problems that have snowballed.

And the message to the other person (or in this case: to me) is "Fix this now. Fix this fast."

Trying to help would have been a lot easier if I'd been asked earlier.

4. When you ask, think about WHEN you are asking.

I can honestly say that: I am no longer addicted to crisis.

In my life, I have worked very hard to achieve stability and safety, not just for myself, but for my marriage and my family.

Do you really need to call me after midnight? Could you call during the daytime?

When you text me at 3 in the morning, are you really expecting that I am staying up all night?

5. I am your friend, but I am not your Savior

And again, this line has been blurred for me before.

When I first aged out of care, there was this guy, Jon. And he was the first person who really seemed to care about and take care of me. We were friends, we dated, we broke up, etc.

But at the time, I had somehow endowed Jon as being my Savior. The big brother I never had. The dad who didn't care for me. He was somehow supposed to fill that entire hole in my heart and make up for everything that I lacked.

And that is WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY to much to ask from another person.

But even after we parted ways, I still kept that guy on a pedestal for years. No one else could measure up.

Finally, I realized that I never even really knew Jon. The real Jon was just a human, fallible, feet-of-clay guy with his own dreams, desires, faults and failings.

But the Jon I knew somehow existed in my mind to help me.

When I figured that out, I regretted the unfair demands that I had subconsciously placed on him.

None of us exists to SAVE everyone else.
We are not building a community of Rescuers.

Hopefully, we can build a community that supports one another, and encourages our members to each take individual responsibility to grow and heal and become more empowered.

And as for me as a leader, as a result of this painful learning experience week, I am seeking to partner with local mental health professionals, so that I can make timely referrals when faced with situations that are over my head in the future.

Who we WERE and who we ARE today

When do you feel most like yourself? What are you feeling? What are you wearing?

Tonight, I am wearing a dark blue sweatshirt that says "Maxwell Elementary." I have owned this particular sweatshirt since college... It dates back to when I worked at an after-school program at a local elementary school.

This sweatshirt resonates with me on a deep, internal level.

I can remember being nine years old, playing outside and wearing my "grubbies," which included a similar dark blue sweatshirt.

When I was 9 years old, I loved one person the most in all the world. That person was my mother, and she was drifting away...

Cancer was eating away at my mother, like an evil force - determined to rob me of her presence, her comfort and her security. It had diabolical plans to leave me in the hands of my father, who was cold, detached, removed, and abusive - a man I knew didn't love me.

But in my sweatshirt, I felt most like myself. And I knew that there was still time.

Time before my mother left me forever. Time before my father would abandon me... as, deep down, I always knew that he would.

In my dark blue sweatshirt and blue jeans, with a string of fake plastic rubies around my neck, I was ready to wait things out. I knew that ultimately, I was going to survive and kick some a** and make a difference in the world.

I could see the shadow looming above me, but when I looked deep within myself, I knew that I could and would survive it.

So.... tell me, are there any similar outfits, songs, events, etc. that resonate with you and remind you of your childhood, how you survived and how YOU became the amazing person that you are today?

Life, as an imperfect human being

A quote that I read in college, two years after I was legally emancipated from foster care, still resonates with me today. I return to it, as an adult, when I find myself battling with inner demons.

Here is the quote:“When I was young, I thought that I had to be perfect for people to love me. I thought that if I ever did something wrong, their love would be withdrawn…

We need to give ourselves permission to be human, to try and to stumble, to be momentarily weak and to feel shame but to overcome that shame with moments of strength, courage and generosity.” -H. S. Kushner, You Don’t Have to Be Perfect To Be Loved

What does it mean to me?
For those of you who have not experienced foster care, remember back to what it was like to be a teenager.

Did you ever say things and haste, and regret them later? Did you indulge in risk-taking behavior? Did you act a certain way to fit in with your peers, which sometimes included behavior that alienated adults?

When this happened, did your parents pack your things and send you someplace else? Did they forever reject you for that behavior, and perhaps never choose to see you or spend time with you again?

For a young person living in a foster or group home, your every mistake can lead to larger-than-life repercussions. Chances are that you will be removed from the place that you are staying and placed somewhere else. Even if the mistake was not yours, even if that mistake was actually perpetrated by the son of the man who owned that group home, you will be blamed.

What does this do to you inside?
It makes you feel that you are unlovely and unloveable. It instills the desire to you to become love-worthy at all costs. You might try to be prettier - in order to be loved. Smarter - in order to be loved. Thinner - in order to be loved.

Do you see how emaciated I look in this picture?
That was how I looked as a 19-year-old college student when I first read this quote. I was trying all those things... to be loved.

I had recently experienced two forms of rejection; one from my father whom I had tried to reconcile with, and another from my best friend-big brother-evolved into boyfriend, who wasn't my boyfriend anymore.

I reacted to their rejection by blaming myself. I couldn't see that there might be something lacking in my father - like courage or emotional strength. I couldn't see that my boyfriend was just a bad match for me. I was chasing after perfection and beating my hands against the wind.

Chasing after perfection
I still do that sometimes. I push myself hard, and I keep my energy level going for a long time. By the end of this year, I will have presented at four national and four statewide conferences in the hopes of improving outcomes for young people in and from foster care.

But trying to be a perfect person can be exhausting.

Some of my goals for the next year are:
- To delegate more and not take everything on myself
- To partner with others and share the workload
- To design workshops that can be shared on a national level... but not always by me
- To train youth and alumni to present at conferences

Four recurring nightmares that I have...

1.) Back to school: Sometimes, like tonight, I dream that I didn't really get my degree after all... I am informed that I am just one credit short, and because of my oversight, I now have to go back to school and start all over again from the very beginning.

And Lisa, the once-perpetual college student, just doesn't have the energy to go back to school and re-earn my college and graduate degrees right now!



2.) Shopping: I dream that I am at the store, and see all these pretty things that I want to buy. I take them into my arms and my hoarder's soul fills with glee.

It is as if by the very act of holding these beautiful things, I become more lovely myself.

Then I hear my husband's voice in my head asking, "Do you really need all these things, Lisa? Will you even use them?"

One by one, I put them all back on the shelf, and go to the checkout with only one thing in my hand.

3.) 'Save the children' dreams: For as long as I can remember, I have had these intense dreams of children who are running from some unseen enemy and looking to me for help.

The premise of these dreams is that only I can save them.

4.) Sent back to foster care: I frequently dream that my husband and stepdaughters are disappointed with me, so they send me to a group home.

A friend of mine recently asked me about the phenomenon of how our time in foster care can haunt us as adults.

It makes perfect sense that we might try to hold onto people or fear that if we make the slightest mistake, we can lose everyone and everything that we love.

Because that is what foster care is like... If you make the slightest mistake in a foster home/group home, you will indeed be sent elsewhere.

I responded to his question by sharing a quote that has meant a lot to me regarding this issue:

"When I was young, I thought that I had to be perfect for people to love me. I thought that if I ever did something wrong, their love would be withdrawn…

"We need to give ourselves permission to be human, to try and to stumble, to be momentarily weak and to feel shame but to overcome that shame with moments of strength, courage and generosity."

-H. S. Krushner, You Don't Have to Be Perfect To Be Loved

My experience has been that the more loving, caring people that you surround yourself with, the more that wounded, insecure part of you will heal.

Connections of encouragement and acceptance are part of what Foster Care Alumni of America is providing for people in and from foster care all over the nation.

What is Cognitive Dissonance?

Cognitive dissonance is a psychological term describing the uncomfortable tension that may result from:

- Having two conflicting thoughts at the same time
- Engaging in behavior that conflicts with one’s beliefs and self-concept
- Experiencing something that conflicts with everything the person previously “knew” about the world

Cognitive dissonance can be defined as “an internal contradiction.”

We all want to believe that we are good people. So if we do something harmful to another person, we feel that prick of our conscience. Since we cannot live in a state of “cognitive dissonance” for an extended period of time, we have to somehow make it right in our heads.

Our choice is:
- To tell ourselves that what we did wasn’t wrong (denial)
- To tell ourselves that they deserved it (excuses)
- To confess and admit responsibility (best option)

Cognitive dissonance can occur in the minds of neglectful and abusive parents. I can’t tell you how many foster care alumni have come to me and told me about this type of experience.

After being reunited with a parent, a young person might try to tell mom or dad what happened during their time in foster care. Or a young person might say, “Remember that guy you were dating before I left home? Did I ever tell you that he touched me when you weren’t around?”

More often than not, the biological parent will respond, “I don’t want to hear about it.”

Why? Because hearing what happened to their child when that parent was unable or unwilling to care for them sounds like an indictment. They don’t want to look at it. They don’t want to face up to their responsibility in abdicating care for their child.

My father is the perfect example. I rarely saw him during my time in foster care - but when I did, I was always mystified by the fact that he could never look me in the eyes. He always looked away. Later, when I came to him as an adult, to try to tell him some of the things that happened during and after my time in care, including the fact that I experienced rape and homelessness, he didn’t want to hear about it.

He even went so far as to say, “Lisa, we have no way of knowing whether or not those things ever happened to you.”

I had to raise my eyebrows at that comment.

Being the person who experienced those things and survived them, I found it mind-boggling that another person might think that by his denial, he could edit my entire life history, and make those painful experiences no longer exist.

I made up my mind at that moment that I wanted to be a person who could face reality, in all its beauty and all its ugliness, and take full responsibility for my actions.

As a stepmother, if I feel that my reaction to something was wrong, I will go to my husband and stepdaughters and apologize. I will not make excuses for myself — I will just call it what it is: “I have a big mouth sometimes,” and strive to do better.

Sadly, cognitive dissonance can occur in the minds of abuse victims as well. When a parent is the perpetrator, rather than the protector, that clashes with everything that a child instinctively knows.

So, might a child be tempted to do?
- Tell themselves that what the parent is doing isn’t wrong (denial)
- Tell themselves that they deserved it (make excuses for the parent)
- Tell themselves that a parent should be protector, and that the fact that theirs is not, is due that parent’s choice and not a reflection of the child’s worth (best option, but it often takes years for an abused child to recognize this)

The first two reactions can lead to both current and future emotional damage: A child experiencing sexual abuse might try to make sense of the experience by equating the act with love. Later, that same child might grow into an adult who expects abuse from his or her partner.

Now that I advocate for young people in and from foster care, it is so easy for me to see that their parents’ actions are not a reflection of their worth. But, back when I was still in college, it was hardest of all to see that value in myself.

I still remember the moment when I realized that my father’s rejection did not make me unworthy of love. I was reading the quote, “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child and I reasoned like a child. When I became an adult, I left childish ways behind me.”

It occured to me in that moment that if I were ever to grow up, I needed to assert my own worth and not judge myself as unloveable based upon my father’s reaction.

Good Will Hunting
Similarly, one scene from the movie “Good Will Hunting“ has resonated with many foster care/child abuse survivors. Robin Williams (playing Sean, a psychiatrist) is counseling Matt Damon (playing Will Hunting) an abused child.

After holding up pictures of Will Hunting, covered in bruises, the script continues:

Sean: Will, you see this, all this ****?
[Holds up the file, and drops it on his desk]
Sean: It’s not your fault.
Will: [Softly, still staring off] I know…
Sean: No you don’t. It’s not your fault.
Will: [Serious] I know.
Sean: No. Listen to me son. It’s not your fault.
Will: I know that.
Sean: It’s not your fault.
[Will is silent, eyes closed]
Sean: It’s not your fault.
Will: [eyes misty with tears] Don’t **** with me Sean. Not you.
Sean: It’s not your fault.
[Will shoves Sean back, and then, hands trembling, buries his face in his hands. Will begins sobbing. Sean puts his hands on Will’s shoulders, and Will grabs him and holds him close, crying]
Will: Oh my God! I’m so sorry! I’m so sorry Sean!
[Will continues sobbing in Sean’s arms]

My husband's strange and mysterious world

I was sent home sick from work today…

Flushed and feverish, I found comfort in my husband’s arms.

He wrapped me up in the warmth of his cuddles until I fell into a deep and restful sleep.

I awoke to hear music at high volume. My husband, a talented musician and songwriter, was downstairs jamming his guitar full-blast along with recordings of his songs.

I lay in bed, listening to him strum his chords and sing his lyrics.

It just cracks me up that while I am out there saving the world, he is in our house, working from home, typing on his computer, playing WOW, and then picking up his guitar to create music that is out of this world.

This is the world that my husband has created. This is the oasis that I come home to every day...

Some of the songs he has written are about me...

Some of his songs were what made me fall in love with him in the first place...

There are so many reasons why I love this strange and wonderful man that I have married, and all the strange and wonderful things that he has brought into my life…

Including: His sitcoms, his technology, his Beatles obsession, his wry and astute commentary about life, his sarcasm and sometimes inappropriate humor, his strength, his razor-sharp intelligence, his sexy profile...

Here are the links to some of my favorite songs of his:

Apple Girl: (which he wrote for his daughters)
http://www.dicksonaudio.com/applegirl

Gunk: (which I think is his most polished and amazingly deep song)
http://www.nathansbrain.com/archives/2006/08/gunk.html

Have You Seen My Sunshine: (because I’m his ‘sunshine girl’)
http://www.nathansbrain.com/archives/2006/07/have_you_seen_m.html#comments

There are many others... but those are the ones that I am thinking of right now (probably because he just jammed all of them!)

For more silly songs of us, please see:
http://nofearinlove.com/songs/index.htm

The past is not through with you

There is a powerful quote from the movie Magnolia: "You might be through with the past, but the past is not through with you..."

During my involvement in Foster Care Alumni of America, certain people and situations come up from time to time that remind me of my past...

When I first aged out of foster care, I started college.

The year was 1989; I was sixteen years old. I had never been trained in independent living skills. I didn't know how to cook or budget or drive.

But, worst of all, I had no 'common sense.'

Common sense isn't born into most people. It is something that your mother or father teaches you.

And so, lacking all common sense, during my second year in college when I was 17 years old, I had a roommate named "Janice" (not her real name). We knew each other from an earlier group home.

Janice was hard as nails on the outside, with a fragile and broken interior that it seemed like only I could see.

I tried to rescue her, but I couldn't save her from her worst enemy: herself.

I couldn't keep her from numbing out on sex and drugs, becoming a prisoner to both, stealing to feed her habit, eroding her own conscience -- and eventually stealing from me.

Six months later, when I was broke and homeless, and she had stolen my last $50, I realized that I had to cut ties with her. I had to find a way to survive, and get back on my feet again. I needed to finish college, earn a graduate degree, establish a career, and build a future for myself.

So, I finally left Janice to sink or swim for herself. But she didn't make it. She sank like a stone.

Her life is a cautionary tale: Janice became a stripper, had several children out of wedlock and was eventually murdered by one of her 'clients.' Her children were placed in foster care. Did I mention that Janice's mother had been a prostitute? And, so the cycle repeated all over again.

It broke my heart to find out what had happened to her.

It was January 1996 when the story came out in the papers. I was in graduate school at the time. I was wracked by survivor guilt.

I blamed myself for not giving her another chance. And so I became the Lisa that I am today. The Lisa who always wants to give people in and from foster care one more chance...

Sometimes that means that I get taken advantage of. And so, as an adult, I have to force myself to set limits with other people. This can be the hardest lesson. The book Boundaries has been invaluable to me.

Because there is a person in my life right now who is hard as nails on the outside, but through that shell, I can see a fragile interior. I can see the many times she has been wounded. I can tell the outlines of the scars.

And yet, she has been taking advantage of me - and I have to confront the situation, both for myself and for this other person. It's not healthy for either one of us.

Foster Thoughts

As one person has noted, I don't usually talk a lot about my day-to-day personal life on my blog. I tend to focus more on the news, and what's going on, and my opinions based on both research and personal experience growing up in the foster care system. And, I will continue to do so.

But for Foster Care Month, I am going to open the veil a little bit, and give you a glimpse of little girl that is still inside the grown-up me.

I watched the TV show 24 for a while, until they started basically killing off cast members like flies. And one thing that ran through my mind was that the foster care experience is not unlike being Jack Bauer. He has a wife, he's lost his wife. He has a daughter, he's lost his daughter. He has a girlfriend; he's lost his girlfriend.

I am 34 years old. I have a husband and two stepchildren. I live in a house that my husband and I designed together, that I just love.

And if I were placed in the witness protection program tomorrow, and lost my husband, children, house, job and everything familiar, I could adapt right away. I could make myself "forget" them. I could bury my love for them and my memories of them somewhere deep beneath the surface, and force myself to move on and get the job done (Which sounds just horrible).

It is not that I am cold-hearted. I love my husband and children. But this is how I would survive. It is what I learned, at an early age. Moreover, this is what the foster care system teaches each and every child, especially those that have more than one placement.

One day you have a brother, and then you don't.

One day you live here, and now you are living there.

One day, you are at this school with this circle of friends, and now you are somewhere else with strangers.

And you can make it. You are resilient. You can and will survive.

But one of the coping mechanisms that you learn is not to hold onto people too tightly. You can love them and invest in them, but a part of you is always ready to let them go. A part of you might even be waiting for the other shoe to drop, and your new family might not want you anymore.

Why do we do that to small children? At the very time that they most need to bond and imprint, to connect and to learn, the foster care system takes them through one placement after another.

What can we do to change this?

Importance of college tours for youth in foster care

Photograph of Pinkie Thomas

Although 70% of 17-year-olds in foster care express a desire to attend college, only 54% graduate from high school and only 2 - 5% earn a college degree.

Why? According to a 2002 study, barriers to college access for youth in and from foster care included:
-Multiple school placements
-Inconsistent social support
-Low educational expectations from caregivers
-Schools placing foster youth on vocational tracks
-Poor quality of education at group home and residential on-site schools
-Lack of access to college prep resources

Factors that helped foster care alumni to enter and succeed in college included:
- Information about financial aid
- Advice about college
- Attending college prep classes in high school

In a recent forum with Ohio foster care youth, two sisters shared their experiences with two very different social workers. One sister had a social worker who was willing to take her on college tours. The other sister had requested this assistance - and her social worker had refused.

When social workers don't expect their charges to succeed in college -
When they refuse to invest in youth people with whom they are entrusted -
When they don't share information about financial aide and ETV funding -
They are investing in the failure rate of foster care alumni.
Didn't they enter into their profession in order to build up the success rate?

Among child welfare personnel, it is the staff members who are willing to invest in young people who make the difference. College tours are a wonderful way to demonstrate that higher education is accessible to people in and from foster care.

Pinkie Thomas, director of the Ohio Family Care Association, a statewide agency supporting foster, kinship, respite and adoptive parents, wants to increase the college attendance rate of young people in and from the Ohio foster care system.

She arranged for a group of teenagers in the custody of Franklin County Children Services to travel by bus on a series of college tours, led by college students and/or admissions counselors.

Destinations included Kentucky State, Central State, University of Toledo, Bowling Green University, Hocking College, Ohio University, Mount Vernon Nazarene and Kent State University.

I applaud Pinkie Thomas for her foresight and dedication. She's right -- foster care alumni can do a lot better than 2 - 5%.

It is the people in our lives who can make a positive or negative difference. I still remember Randy Mills, the admissions counselor at the University of Kentucky, and how I came into his office as a scared 16-year-old, and left as an enrolled university student.

He saw beyond my 'troubled' background and recognized me for my grades, ACT scores, and the letters my high school teachers had written on my behalf. He didn't view me as a victim or a statistic, but as a survivor. And, I proved him right. I made it through college and graduate school.

Youth in foster care rely upon a system of caretakers for the things that a family normally provides.

The significant adults in our lives need to believe that we can succeed. They need to invest in school stability, provide us with a challenging curriculum and make sure that we have at least one adult role model who invests in our future.

Source:
Merdinger, J., Hines, A.M., Lemon, K., & Wyatt, P. (2005). Pathways to college for former foster youth: toward understanding factors that contribute to educational success. Child Welfare, 84 (6), 867-896.
Hines, A.M., Merdinger, J. & Wyatt, P. (2005). Former foster youth attending college: resilience and the transition to young adulthood. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 75 (3), 381-394.

Fathers & Daughters

My favorite scene from the movie, "Good Will Hunting," is the one wherein Robin Williams assures Matt Damon that he (Matt) is not to blame for the abuse he suffered as a child. "It's not your fault... It's not your fault... It's not your fault."

Robin keeps repeating this phrase, until finally Matt bursts into tears and reveals the feelings of guilt and shame that he has been carrying.

Running from a feeling of shame
Sadly, children often internalize traumatic events. Part of being a child is sometimes viewing self as "all-powerful." Also, feelings of loyalty toward the parent can cause children to shift the burden of blame onto themselves.

Shame can be a depressing, disturbing and deadening experience. Dr. Norman Wright describes it this way: "Shame is like a hole in the cup of our soul. Since the child in the adult has insatiable needs, the cup cannot be healed."

What do insatiable needs look like?
Shame often demonstrates itself in the form of compulsive behavior. Workaholic, sexaholic, money hunger, eating disorders, substance abuse... Take your pick.

Alan Jones describes it this way, "I consume things - to stop myself from being consumed... trying to gratify an immediate hunger, without accepting that hunger is part of being human and so cannot be dealt with or understood by an endless succession of leakplugging operations."

Compulsions can be self-destructive in the long-run, but in the present, they serve a specific purpose. They distract us from fear, worry, loneliness, anger and pain.

Father loss & daughter reaction
A father might die, abuse or abandon his child or be present physically, but not emotionally. In the case of divorce, he might want to see his children more often, but be unable to do so...

Regardless for the reason for paternal absence, the impact on a child can be astrononical.

Abandonment and neediness
When I was in college, my roommate was father-hungry. She feared abandonment, and reacted to that fear by clinging to her boyfriends.

Her behavior was not always endearing. One night, when her boyfriend said he needed space and was about to drive off to his apartment, Andi took his keys and through them into the bushes, so that he couldn't leave.

Deep inside Andi was the little girl she once was... The little girl who stood at her bedroom door, counting cars and telling herself that one of them would be her father coming to visit her.

Insatiable needs can be difficult for others to deal with...

Achievement as a substitute for intimacy
After living in foster care from age 12-16, I was also father-hungry. But my father hunger manifested itself in a different way than my roommates. I experienced the same fears, the same anxiety as Andi -- but my conclusion at the time was that it would be better to rely on myself.

A father's absence teaches a young woman the precariousness of love. One response is to invest emotions in activities, rather than people. There is often an underlying desire for paternal approval.

Living under a father's shadow
For any experience, there can be a myriad of reactions. Why did Andi and I react so differently? One factor can be the role that the father plays in a child's life prior to his absence. Before his absence, how did the daughter perceive her father?

Dr. Wright describes weak fathers as unreliable, undependable and having no strength to offer. Weak fathers do things like ending their relationship with their daughter because their new wife asks them to choose.

Daughters of weak fathers worry that they might overwhelm others with their emotional needs. They have been disillusioned by witnessing their father's ineffectiveness.

My father was a weak father. I can say that now, after having married a strong man.

Source
Jones, Alan W. SoulMaking.
Wright, H. Norman. Always Daddy's Girl.

Foster Children and Hoarding

I would like to start this blog entry with an embarassing - but, in retrospect, rather funny - story... When the man who is now my husband and I were dating, he looked in my kitchen cupboards and noticed something strange.

I did not own dishes, nor glasses. Rather, I had shelves filled with plastic cups; the kind you get at fast food establishments. I also had a huge assortment of empty cottage cheese containers. Lots of cups. Many, many empty cottage cheese containers. This was what I ate and drank from, every day.

The man who would one day become my husband looked at me and said, "Lisa, you are hoarding."

I said, "What are you talking about? What is that?"

Hoarding
The clinical definition of 'hoarding' is: "the acquisition of, and failure to discard, a large number of possessions that appear to be of useless or of limited value."

Why Would People Hoard?
- Because the items are perceived as valuable
- The items provide a source of security
- Fear of forgetting or losing items
- Constant need to collect and keep things
- Obtaining love not found from people
- Fear others will obtain their personal information
- Inability to organize
- Self neglect
- Stressful life events

Children often communicate needs through behavior. A foster child might hoard food, for example, due to early neglect and a fear of being hungry.

The fictional book "Money Hungry" by Sharon Flake tells the story of a young girl who is obsessed by earning and accummulating money. What first appears as greed begins to make sense when the reader learns that the protagonist and her mother were once homeless. By hoarding money, this young lady is making certain that she can provide for her mother, if the situation ever arises again.

How to Deal With Hoarding
This behavior does not come out of a vacuum. Rather, it is an adaptive response to deprivation.

For a foster parent, who has just taken in a child who hoards good, a plastic bowl with a tight fitting lid may be the answer. As the child adjusts to the new placement, this will allow him to regulate his supply of food and assure him that food is available. The lid will keep out odor and insects.

As trust increases, the need to cling to an alternative food source might decrease.

Don't Overreact
Above all, I would encourage people not to "pathologize" the hoarding. I am a firm believer that there is a reason for behavior - it might not make sense to outsiders, but in some way it seems logical to the person displaying that behavior.

Do not rush to a diagnosis. Don't assume that hoarding indicates that the person in question has OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder). Try not to afix a label on a child, teenager or adult too quickly.

After all, compulsive hoarding was originally diagnosed as a psychological disorder that most frequently affects the elderly. It was described as "accumulation of useless possessions that clutter the person’s living space, often creates complex legal and social problems for the hoarder."

Think about it from the elderly person's point of view: What were they doing? Trying to hold onto memories. Attempting to relive the past. Treasuring momentos. Is that behavior pathological? Or normal?

Empathy
Viewing behavior within the context of the person who is displaying it is vitally important. Empathy has been defined as "understanding of another's situation, feelings, and motives."

If you were to visit my house today, you would see dishes and glasses. I no longer collect plastic containers. Yet I am as sane now as I was when my husband met me. What has changed is the fact that I am assured that I am financially secure enough that I can afford normal household items.

Source
Hoarding fact sheet. Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health.

Emotional Risks for Females Aging Out of Foster Care

Young women often emerge from foster care emotionally vulnerable. They have a deep (and legitimate) need for permanency, security and emotional constancy.

And there are men who prey on vulnerable women. Men who might offer to be a "father figure" or a "big brother." Men who offer themselves up as an oasis of safety (and maybe they even mean it at the time)... and then they want more.

Emotional vulnerability can translate into sexual vulnerability. According to the National Survey of Family Growth: “Women who spent time living in foster homes or with relatives other than their parents have an elevated risk of engaging in high risk sexual behaviors.”

These high risk sexual behaviors include:
- Teenage pregnancy (60% risk of unwanted pregnancy)
- A greater number of sexual partners
- Losing their virginity at a younger age as compared to women of “normal” backgrounds.

Two extremes of behavior exist:
- Emotional isolation
- Toxic relationships

One can result from the other. One can feed the other. A woman who is emotionally isolated is more vulnerable to predators. Likewise, a series of dysfunctional relationships might cause some women to fear intimacy and retreat from relationships altogether.

These difficulties can be overcome. I was raped when I was 16 years old. I distrusted men. I feared intimacy. I refused to date for eight years. And, where am I now? Married, to a man who loves me. Stepmother to two wonderful children. There is definitely hope.

My concerns is the "platform syndrome." By that, I mean, whenever I hear about a program for foster alumni, they are up on a platform somewhere. "You went through a hard life, kid, and now you owe it to us to save the world."

Saving the world is great -- I certainly want to do it. But postponing emotional healing is unwise.

When I hear about groups like CYC (California Youth Connection) that limit their members to under 23 years old, I feel concern. Perhaps because I look back at the person I was when I was 23, and I still had some growing and healing to do. Granted, everyone is different, but -

Where are the resources for foster alumni in their 20's who are unlearning all the emotional damage from their childhood?