Stories of Love...

The Reward for Being a Foster Father

My wife and I have been foster parents for nine years now. The majority of our foster children have been teenage boys, by our choice. Some days are a little intense, but we have found that providing a home with structure and love can make a difference.

We hear from most of the boys periodically. The other day I got a call from Andre. He came to live with us after completing a sentence in juvenile detention. He only lived with us for a few months before he moved to a family where he lived until he was an adult.

As with most of the kids that have lived with, he had been pretty severely abused and neglected when he was younger. He is now 21 years old, married and has a baby boy. We talked for quite a while.

Of course, we talked about the responsibility of being a parent. He said to me, "Every morning I get down on my knees next to my sons crib. Then I pray that I can use my foster families as an example for fatherhood instead of the one that I had from my biological father." I was in tears.