The Ugly Truth

I have a new friend.  Her name is Reyna.  She doesn't know she's my friend, but her face and the story of her life will forever be etched in my heart.  Reyna came to my house a couple of days before we moved from California to buy Charley's crib and changing table.  She showed up in an average vehicle with her husband and 10 year old daughter.  To most people, Reyna would not have stood out in a crowd as being "different"...but I saw it.  As I stood chatting with her in my living room, I couldn't help noticing the darkness.  Her dark eyes, dark hair, and the heaviness surrounding us.  Don't misunderstand.  She was very pleasant, kind, and even excited about buying a crib for the child they were planning to conceive.  But...Reyna has a story. 

Reyna noticed Charley playing across the room and commented about how much he looked like my husband (isn't that funny?  We get that all the time!).  I took advantage of the opportunity to tell her Charley's story of foster care and adoption.  She listened intently and as I finished, she boldly said, "I grew up in foster care."  Somehow, I already knew that.  There was a connection there between us that only God could have weaved.  As she shared her story with me, my heart felt like it was being squeezed and rung out like a washcloth.  This girl knew pain.  She knew heartache, disappointment, and fear.  This was the darkness that I saw.  But, she also knew victory.

Reyna grew up in several foster homes.  She left her bags unpacked when she arrived at a new home because it wouldn't be long until Family Services would come for her and her siblings to take them back to their mother, who had straightened her life out just enough to get them back for a few weeks.  Family Services would once again, would show up to whisk them away to another foster home.  At fifteen, Reyna became pregnant.  She told me that she hated life and had decided that she was going to let this baby grow up in the same F***ed up way that she had known.  But, something changed.  She didn't explain, but she somehow, for some reason, turned her life around.  My hope is that she had someone in her life, maybe a foster parent, that showed her that God really does love her and wants to give her hope and a future (see Jeremiah 29:11). 

So, at 16, Reyna became emancipated and raised her child on her own.  She finished high school, attended college, landed a good job working with developmentally disabled adults, and got married.  Yea, Reyna! Before we said goodbye, I hugged her tightly and told her how proud I was of her.  She didn't see my tears or even know that I saw MY foster children in her face...Claudia, Star, Collin.  The darkness that I saw was something that only I could see.  I was supposed to see it.  I was supposed to be bothered by it.  Jesus WANTED me to be disturbed.

I needed to meet Reyna more than she needed to meet me.  I needed to see that being a foster parent is what God intended.  Foster care is ugly.  Unless you have been placed in the middle of it, you will NEVER really understand the utterly desperate situation in which these children are placed.  You will never know how their lives are forever scarred and how screwed up their version of "normal" really is.  BUT THERE IS HOPE!  Reyna is an example of hope.  She is an adult that pulled herself out of that "muck" and made something of her life.  Unfortunately, I also know adults who have grown up in foster care or less than perfect situations that just couldn't get away from it.  They learned to be dependent on the dysfunction.  I can't and won't judge them because I didn't live it like they did.  But, I KNOW THERE IS HOPE from this ugly truth and I pray daily that they will someday know that too.

God placed another person in my life recently that made a lasting impact.  I will call her Sarah, because she asked that her name not be revealed.  She too grew up in foster care and now has a precious family and a thriving career.  She is a beautiful person inside and out. Our meeting was not by chance.  Again, Jesus wants me to be disturbed.  Why and what for?  Not exactly sure right now, but I know that He will make it clear to me when the time is right.  I asked Sarah if I could share her story, because it's one that I think everyone needs to hear.  It's THE UGLY TRUTH of foster care.  You may have no interest in being a foster parent, or loving a foster child.  But, you need to know the TRUTH.  So...here it is.  Straight from Sarah's heart.

"When I was little I have very few memories.  I remember one time my mother's boyfriend tried to light me on fire while standing at the kitchen sink, and i remember another time when my brother was in trouble another boyfriend of my mothers held a shot gun to the back of his head and told him not to move a muscle or he was a goner. And then my sister being shot with BB guns over and over and over again. I don't remember being happy but I remember listening to Black Velvet as a caseworker slowly drove me away from my smiling mother who just simply didn't want us anymore. The first family i lived with seemed nice, they had a boy who they adopted named Marcus. Marcus had everything, his own room, his own clothes and I had nothing. They made me sleep in the basement by the laundry shoot. when my caseworker found that out she made me move again. I went to an orphanage...from there group home after group home, no body wanted this little girl. By the age of 6 I had been sexually molested and raped, drowned and cut with scissors. When I turned 7 I went and lived with a pretty descent family, they had 4 foster children. It was alright but if i didn't eat my dinner they ground it up and made me drink it :O it was pretty awful. But the worst thing that happened came after about a year and a half of living there, the eldest girl had claimed that the dad of the house touched her inappropriately and for the first time being in the system the caseworker listened to a child.. I was immediately moved from the first stable home i have ever lived in. then i went from group homes to respite care facilities until i was 10 then i was introduced to a nice couple. They had me for two years and they sat me down and i figured it was bad news.. but they asked me if i wanted to shorten my name :) all i could do was cry. On the day I was adopted June 22, I couldn't have been a happier little girl. Last year (2010) I learned that my adoptive mother had been trying to get me since i was 5, she begged and pleaded with the state to let her take me, she was turned down on multiple occasions. I couldn't love my mother more than I have since I heard her say that she was fighting for me when no one else would."....So, there you have it.  THE UGLY TRUTH. 

I share these stories with you only because I feel that God is commanding me to do so.  He has literally woke me up WAY early (and I'm NOT a morning person) several mornings in the past month with a heaviness for sharing this story.  I have hesitated because it's long and it's difficult.  It's difficult to share because I have foster children that I love, that may live a life like I have described. And, because it's long, many of you may not even finish reading this blog post.  But, if you did, please know that God wants you to be disturbed too.  Ask Him what he wants you to do with what you now know.  It may even be as simple as being kind to a person that needs love.  Recently, our pastor, Ron Watts, wrote an impactful statement in an e-mail that resonated with me.  " I want to live for what really matters, those things of ultimate importance. And there is nothing more important, according to Jesus, than loving God and others."

Isn't that what it's all about?  Now that I've shared this, my prayer is that God will reveal what he has in store for the next phase of my journey with Him.  This UGLY TRUTH can become a beautiful story of love, forgiveness, and compassion for so many who live it if we only open our eyes...May God break our hearts for what breaks His.

Love to you,
Shell