The Value of a Child

“The Value of a Child” After wiping away a few tears and researching the importance and urgency of adoption, I learned that it is extremely easy to take life for granted. Today in the United States there are over 100,000 children entered into foster care with ages ranging anywhere from under one year old to twenty-one years old. Most children in foster care or other systems of care are school-aged or older. There are siblings that are trying to stick together and brothers and sisters being split up. It is easy to become wrapped up in your own little world, not realizing that there are children out there struggling through this journey of adoption just searching for love and security. The types of children that are waiting to be placed into safe and permanent homes are children who have been removed from their families due to abusive or neglectful situations. After viewing a few short clips on the Adopt Us Kids website, one teenage girl that is waiting for placement stated, “People place judgment that we are bad or did something wrong. That is not the case. Our parents just couldn’t take care of us anymore.” The majority of individuals that are still in foster care are teenagers. Most adoptive parents are looking for infants to raise as their own child and teenagers have already gone through physical and life changes that an adoptive parent would have to adjust to. Some of these children are moving between five to twenty different placement homes making it difficult for them to accept any type of care or love from their foster families. On the other hand, in the same short clips that I viewed there was more than one child who states that their foster families have been an answer to their prayers, their “guardian angels.” Unfortunately, they always have the thought in the back of their minds that where they are isn’t permanent. They are living out of suitcases. According to our class survey 58% of people said that they wouldn’t adopt if they were capable of having their own biological child. I would have been one of those people until I did the research and realized how many kids need homes. Now I want to adopt them all. Unfortunately, adoption is a very long, expensive and tedious process. Although the time frame and costs of adoption ranges from agency to agency the average wait is between 2 and 7 years for a healthy infant. The founders of Children Awaiting Parents (CAP) stated that after completing a home study, a long educational process designed to help agencies get to know the awaiting adoptive parents and make sure the home is a safe and nurturing environment, children with special needs can be adopted within several months. Depending on state regulations, single, married, divorced and same-sex couples are capable of adoption. However, there are still states that strictly prohibit gay and lesbian couples to adopt including Florida, Mississippi and Utah. Not only do parents that look to foster or adopt have to go through a home study process, before even doing that they must go through MAPP (Model Approach to Partnerships in Parenting/Group Participation) training. This training is over a ten week period consisting of thirty hours of role playing, personal profiles and objectives to learn what to expect, finding one’s strengths and weaknesses, developing certain parenting skills, and much more. This is extremely important and helpful for parents looking to adopt and foster especially because there are kids that have certain special needs. These so-called “special needs” can include physical, mental, and emotional disabilities, history of physical or sexual abuse and even the separation of siblings. An experienced adoptive mother and advocate for children with special needs explained that although people may believe that love is all a child needs that is not the case. In reality, one must understand that it may not be the way you parent rather that the genes children are born with could have a huge effect on how they behave as an individual. You have to learn to adapt to certain situations and behaviors that an adopted child might portray. The value of a child cannot be based on statistics or measured by the societal norms that “regular” kids take for granted. Every child is unique and requires different types of love, care and nurturing to allow them to truly feel safe and secure not only within the foster care system but within their own lives as well. All of these foster kids need to be known and for them to feel valuable we must show them what they’re worth.