I haven't updated about our foster journey in a while, well, because we've been waiting. Literally. We finished our training in July and have been on the waiting list for home studies since August. The process is supposed to take 3-5 months. Covid has slowed everything down, so we have just been praying and preparing.
Then in September, God gave us this precious bio baby girl (currently 17 weeks pregnant). I had heard mixed statements on whether we would be able to move forward with fostering, so we just decided to wait until we had our first home study and tell them then.
We officially had our first home study (on Zoom) Tuesday! We have our 2nd of 4 on Wednesday of next week. They are totally fine with us fostering and having a bio baby. The nursery was already set up with 2 cribs. God totally knew. I never thought it would be with an Eskew baby and a foster baby, but here we are. :)
Now, some real heart talk...
Y'all, I swore I wouldn't have two under 2 again. Our big girls are 22.5 months apart and it was so hard. Now, we are looking at being licensed beginning of January and even though their may be a wait (since we can only accept a placement under 2 due to room/bed requirements), we could possibly have a precious foster placement before I give birth to baby girl in May.
What?
How is this going to work?
Do I think I'm superwoman or something?
Nope.
I canNOT do this alone.
From the very beginning, I've prayed two big things:
That God would take away the things in my life that didn't matter. That I would focus all my time and energy on what was most important. Obviously, that's my relationship with Him, Tim, and my children.
That He would sustain me and send help when needed. That I would trust Him to show up for us.
I know Him to be faithful and good. I know He will provide what we need. I know people will come alongside us and offer help that I never expected to have. I do. He won't call us to this and then leave us here. He walks with me every step of the way.
Still...
There are fears and there are doubts and there are concerns and questions. I just keep having to bring it back to Him and surrender over and over again.
Please pray for peace in this process.
Pray for these children and their bio families.
Pray for the grace to love them well.
Also, some have been asking more details about what we are actually doing:
We are fostering. NOT fostering to adopt, which shouldn't even be a thing. You either foster for reunification or don't foster. That being said, if reunification is NOT possible and the best thing for the child is to remain with us, we will adopt.
I have a heart for teens in foster care. However, with the age of our bio children and only having a 3 bedroom house, we are very limited on what age we can take. That's why we are looking for a placement under the age of 2 since they will be sharing a bedroom with our bio baby girl.
He is always good,
Natalie