The Alfonso family experience

1. When did you first feel called to foster care/adoption?In May of 2019, I (Naomi) began to sense God opening my heart to the idea of foster care. Early in our marriage, we had some discussions about fostering, however imagined ourselves doing this once our biological children were much older or in college. As a pediatric nurse practitioner at Nemours, many of my patients are in foster care so as I continued to see them in clinic, my heart began to tug for it even more. Eventually I shared what had been on my heart with my husband who wanted to wait and pray about it. We both knew that there was a great need for it and that God calls us to care for the orphans, but we were not sure if the time was right with having young children and us both working full time. As many would, we had concerns and questions about how it would impact our family, however we both agreed to at least continue to pray about it. After several months of praying and processing what God was revealing to us, we both began to realize that there really was never a “perfect time” and that we had to rely on faith alone to provide and guide us. We signed up for training classes that were being offered in January 2020 since our schedules just so happened to be open. Although our initial plan was to only start with offering respite care for foster families, it was not long before we were sold on jumping fully in.2. Tell me more about the process of growing your family in this way?We had to take a parenting class that was held on Saturdays for 5 straight weeks. This was to prepare future foster or adoptive parents on how to care for children coming from difficult backgrounds or experiences. This was followed by background checks, a home study inspection, interviews, and LOTS of paperwork. When you go through this process, you are given the option to be a foster family or adoptive family. We chose the foster family route, although, we are open to adoption if our foster child cannot be reunified with family.3. Having experienced growing your family in this way, what does it take to serve as a foster or adoptive family?It takes a great amount of sacrifice, grace, and compassion for these vulnerable children and their biological families. Also, there is a lot of unpredictability in foster care so being flexible and patient with the process and system is important. Placements are often needed on a last minute notice so you may not have much time to prepare. With our first placement, we got the call after midnight and within a couple hours went from a family of 4 to 5 caring for an infant!4. Has this changed your family dynamic? How so?Our life is busier and may seem chaotic to some, but the reward is absolutely worth it. Foster care has allowed God to shape us individually and as a family. We work well as a team and see this as a family ministry. We have already seen changes in our biological children at ages 8 and 4 as they love selflessly and serve sacrificially which has been beautiful to watch. The idea initially is that these foster children need us, however we begin to realize that we needed them as well. Although, they may only be in our home for a season, they will remain in our hearts forever.5. Describe what having a care community has meant to you and your family.Our care community has been a huge blessing for our family. They provide dinner for us once a week which may not seem like much to some, but it is one less thing to plan and prepare for in the midst of the craziness. They also pray for us and check in with us. A favorite quote of ours is that “God does not call the equipped, but equips the called.” We see our care community and organizations like Commission 127 as the hands and feet of God to equip us in this journey. We are so thankful for our care community team.6. What do you think the community needs to know about foster care/adoption?Not many are aware that the true goal of foster care is reunification, when appropriate, with family. Yes, you get attached (which is a good indicator as children need secure attachment and connection for proper brain development) but there is a much bigger picture. Not only are we making an impact on the child’s life, but we get the privilege of helping another family be restored. Often these parents are not bad people, but just make bad decisions or are in a tough situation needing some type of support and encouragement to get them where they need to be to care for their child/children. Sometimes they themselves have aged out of the foster care system and have had their own challenging upbringing. We see this as an opportunity to not only care for the child but also care for the family. Also, there are other ways one can get involved in foster care without fostering or adopting. You can pray for the families/children, provide meals, offer respite care, mentor, tutor, babysit, be a guardian ad litum advocate, donate needed items, and the list goes on. Everyone can do something.