Asked & Answered: Is the Experience of Foster Parenting Worth the Hardships?

Foster care is a rollercoaster, but it’s so rewarding. We have had six kiddos in our care, with permanency with one of them. We love and care for each one like they are our own, while also maintaining the primary goal of reunification. We have gained so many relationships with other caregivers, transport workers, social […]

Healing After Pain

Healing… It feels weighted. If I am being honest, I have just had a panic attack and thought, “How am I even going to talk about healing when I am not HEALED yet?” Because we know that healing can be complicated, it can be layered, and it can feel strange when we are in a […]

From Housing to Home

Nearly 10 years ago, Georgie Smith and her partner Melissa Goddard were on the journey to adopt. They embarked on a yearlong training program to prepare themselves, where they were educated on topics such as adopting internationally or raising a child of another race. They also began volunteering in the foster care space to learn […]

A Change of Heart

It was right after Thanksgiving dinner in 2015 when our daughter, Lisa, and son-in-law, JJ, shared their intentions to become a foster family. A bit taken back by the news, I savored a bite of pumpkin pie before responding, “Really? Tell us more.” They had contacted a local agency and were scheduled to begin training […]

Does Your Child Need Residential Treatment?

In June 2024, a congressional subcommittee released an investigation slamming residential treatment facilities for youth, calling them “warehouses of neglect.” It warned children in these settings face alarming living conditions, shoddy education and, too often, physical and sexual abuse. High on the list of concerns identified in the report: Too many children sent far from […]

Educating Kids About Sex and Relationships

Six years ago, when Zoë Jones-Walton was about to turn 18, she sat in a windowless Dallas-area conference room with dozens of other youth who were in foster care. A series of lectures on how to navigate adulthood covered the gamut: how to write a check, how to land a job, how to get an […]

Book Review: Beyond Blood

by Michelle Snyder with Ben Snyder, Jr.

While several books focus on how to welcome a child into your home — and the mental/emotional toll it takes on the resource parents — not too many tell the story from the viewpoint of your own children. “Beyond Blood” jumps into that space where Ben, the narrator, is only 5 years old when his parents decide to foster. Written by mother-son duo Michelle Snyder with Ben Snyder Jr. (now 14), the tagline of the book explains what to expect: “How being a foster brother shattered my world and rebuilt it.” The authors do not sugarcoat their feelings at any stage, making the book a must-read for families that choose to foster. When Ben’s mother first explains the decision to open their home to other kids, Ben feels, “My parents were choosing to allow suffering into my life — suffering that I wouldn’t have to go through if I weren’t a biological child in a foster family.”

Recollected with wit and honesty, the following chapters outline how Ben and his family (including his parents and younger sister Annabelle) adjust to the various children who come into their lives — some for a very short period and some for longer stints. As his mother notes, “Ben’s childhood was molded through kids with shocking lives arriving at his home at all hours of the night and disappearing just as abruptly.” Through the process of caring for the different children, each with their own set of challenges and triumphs, “Beyond Blood” will resonate with many FFT readers, especially the younger family members whose parents decided to foster.

It is a must-read, and the unique author combination achieves what it delineates, “The goal of this book is to disrupt the idea that a person should not foster or adopt because of the impact it may have on their home or family … There is safety in stepping out, in no longer having the luxury to focus on the superficial, in setting aside personal desires to accomplish something larger.”

“Beyond Blood”
Publisher: Ballast Books
Paperback: 127 pages; ISBN-10: 1962202895; ISBN-13: 978-1962202893
Dimensions: 6 x 0.27 x 9 inches
To place an order, contact [email protected]

Celebrating Families

May is a month of blooming flowers, warmer weather and, importantly, a time to celebrate families in all their forms. It’s a chance to recognize the incredible impact of foster care, kinship care and adoption, and to express our deep appreciation for the individuals who open their hearts and homes to children in need. These […]

Against All Odds

I will never forget that day. I had just started a full-time job and after five years of fostering with 16 goodbyes, we thought we were done fostering (the ultimate joke on anyone with an active foster license). But I heard something in that call that stretches a person in the way only foster or […]