WTBL - Walking the Blue Line

WTBL Walking The Blue Line (00:10)
welcome back to another episode on walking the blue line. today we are blessed to have a couple of guests our neighbors and acquaintances for quite some time Troy and Collette Bice have joined us to kind of discuss a subject near and dear to their heart and how it belongs with law enforcement. ⁓

A lot of what law enforcement has to deal with isn't always the bad guys, the criminals, that kind of thing. We get called into a lot of family homes dealing with children and in those situations. you guys seem to have some expertise in that and have probably dealt with law enforcement in that capacity as well. So we'll let them introduce themselves as well and their credentials.

I'm Colette and my husband Troy. We have been licensed foster parents for eight years now, but

suitable other care for probably 10 or 12 years. It started a long, long time ago. We had someone from our church ask us if we would take a girl.

I'm literally off the streets because she was in a bad situation. She was not living with her family. She was living with another family and that situation was becoming really bad. So that's kind of

the wheels turning and then,

it kind of fit with Colette's,

education and her training. She works as a family services coordinator for a daycare in the area. she deals with a lot of families and the challenges that they face,

I think going back, was me that was dragging my feet. you were ready to do this and excited and I you kind of worked on me for a

I said, no, I said, I don't want any part of that. I said that we got our home and our family here. And, I just didn't know about bringing that chaos into our home. It felt to me like it was going to be chaos. And it was, well, it was, and yet when that girl, emerged and we knew who she was and.

She had been over to our house a couple times. I don't know. guess I had a soft place in my heart for her and I was the one that said, well, let's just do it. Let's give it a try. And I think I remember Collette told me something like, well, I like this, then Troy really dug in and then I kind of wanted to back out a little. That's about how it went. But we've since then have had 12 teenage girls come through our home. we chose,

teenage girls, had our youngest daughter, we didn't want to bring boys into the home because we just thought we'd keep it simple. and we said teenagers that's kind of unique and different because a lot of foster parents won't take teenagers because then they're afraid of what. So much could happen there. I don't know if you guys knew Betty and Brian O'Donnell. Some of the stories they told me, I was like, Ooh.

We've heard all those in that and more probably. Yeah. But we elected teenage girls and you know what? this isn't an advertisement to try to convince everybody to go into foster care, but, We loved every one of those kids when they came into our house and we loved them the day they walked out the doors. they have such a capacity to love. You think that you're getting these damaged derelict juvenile kids.

They're not, they are loving, caring individuals and they respond to love in a home. They respond to that love and that care. They've all got their problems and I'm not going to sugar coat it. We saw that and we dealt with it, but we love those kids We still do. A lot of them call us mom and dad still, and they'll call us on father's day or mother's day and on holidays. And we've got a soft place in our heart for all of them in spite of the fact that

many of them have gone back to not so great circumstances of their own choosing But while they lived in our home, we know they felt love and we love them. We would have adopted every single one of had we been able to. And we can talk about some of that as we go. So before we actually got

had the one girl and that was years before we even thought about getting licensed.

we had a dear friend of ours who had been fostering and had adopted several of her children and then she unexpectedly passed away. And that was really traumatizing for the children that she had adopted for sure. And one of those children really struggled and

just a myriad of different issues.

at one point she was downtown at the juvenile center, And she called us and she said, I want to do a chins petition. And I'm wondering if you and Troy will let me come live with you. because some people

are not familiar, wouldn't know what a CHINS petition is. Can you kind of tell us about that? I don't even know what it stands for, but it is where a child says they do not want to live with their parents anymore. And so they're, I want to say going rogue, but usually by the time something that came out, there's been some instances at home, maybe someone's been kicked out, maybe they've run away. Things are not going well.

so basically,

courts become involved. They're not fully emancipated, but yet they don't want to live at home any longer. we took a chance and let her come and live in our home. at that point, our daughters were juniors in high school. And then our youngest was

10 or 11 and so we told this girl if you're gonna come live in our home because again we're not foster parents yet so we still have a choice right but we said if you're gonna live in our home our number one priority is the safety of our youngest child and so if you do anything that damages that safety you won't be able to stay

the point of all this, what we thought might be of interest to your listeners is you talk about the

the trauma of dealing

this.

course

resolution that comes as a result of that. Were the two, three, four months down the road, a year down the road,

I want to say the ambulance in the valley and you're the guard rail, but that doesn't really work either, but we're what comes after you come in and say something's not right here. Let's fix this.

then there's this whole system set up to, hopefully, get things back on track and to some extent it works to a lot of extent it, struggles under its own weight. but,

there is a process to try to help not just the kids, take care of them and take care of their needs, but help rehabilitate the parents and get them back. We always said when we took one of these young ladies into our home, we're also establishing a relationship with some parents who want those kids back. And so we have to work with them and we have to try and, they're sometimes.

not so easy to deal with and sometimes they are, but they're trying to do what's being asked of them so that they can get their families back on

experienced all that through the years and got to see that whole system in all of its glory. I would have to say as a previous law enforcement, you saw a whole myriad of situations out there. ⁓ Most of the ones,

that I was ever dealing with were the really young kids that you had to go in with a court order and actually take them out of the house because the parents weren't involved or the parents were living in such tragic conditions and abusive. So you would remove those kids. And then by the time you get to the teenage state, there are some of those, but a lot of those kids are kind of figuring out how to survive on their own and they're staying with friends and it's...

juvenile court a lot of time that seemed to involved and say, we need to, order this child to be under Washington state, guidelines and they'll find some suitable place for them to live. am kind of amazed on talking about the teenagers, how many they call them couch

Couch

had no clue that so many people even families live like that.

where they don't have a home, they just go where someone will let them stay. Well, and you know what's really interesting? So I have another side hustle. I work with Alliance Cares and we support kinship caregivers and foster parents. so, about every two or three days I'll get a list of new kinship care providers and often

a teenager has shown up at their house. The teenagers especially are just getting in with boyfriends, girlfriends, and parents are saying, we'll take care of them. friends all the way around. And so then, they start to realize they might need some support and they

In a lot of ways, it's a really good thing. What DCYF has done is allow these kinship caregivers to get a child specific license to become foster parents for that specific child and receive the foster care payments. it's not even that much money, but my gosh, it helps so much. It clothes Drivers' Ed, all of these things that these kids need.

and then they get the support of a social worker as well. That is a lot of help. we've never done anything like that. We had a foreign exchange student for a year. ⁓

And that was cool in a completely different situation obviously was a good kid, but I didn't realize the financial responsibility we were taking on and afterwards it was like well this was an awesome experience and she was a great kid, but I was like whoo that was a little more than I thought and so I can imagine. They tell you with those kids that you don't have to pay they'll pay everything you're still feeding them we didn't have to clothe her or anything like that she had all of her own money for that.

if we went somewhere, obviously we paid for her her parents,

were great parents and they had

it completely different situation, but I can understand what you're saying. A little bit helps. I look back on a life of this and I can't imagine how much of this is going on that most people aren't even aware of, because as we said here at this table, all four of us have had some experience with this. did professionally, but I.

had an experience with a juvenile runaway when I was a juvenile and you had the young child that you were taking care I did and I watched him for six months.

A baby that I took in. That basically got left behind. Mom just disappeared. Left him at the babysitter and didn't come back. So, you know, and then you two obviously out of your kindness at your own heart, but also almost making a career out of it, you know, in a way. Well, Lyle, I had no idea. I don't know Collette, she could speak for herself, but you say some experiences in your background. I had nothing like that. I had no idea.

I lived in a bubble literally raising our kids taking them to sporting events Having holidays together, just helping them with their After-school jobs and sports and homework and yeah, this was our lives and we

had no idea and people like yourself would be in this profession that you're in and I just thought that was just so fringe. That's way out there and that's a small segment of the population and that doesn't affect my world at all. That's not happening down the street. Boy was my eyes open through this experience. Me too Troy, because when I met Lyle, I lived in that same bubble. My family was in Ohio, was a big family and

we all had houses, they were all clean, they all had food, clothes. And I met him and he started telling me, Yvonne, that's just not reality for most people. I'm like, what do you mean, come on? I'm like you, Christmas is dinner, you eat all of it. And then he would tell me- is how life is for 90 % of the population, right? Yeah, that's what I thought. And no, and then he would tell me, you wouldn't believe this house I went in today. And then when I did my ride alongs,

I would go in with him and I was whoa, you're not kidding. And then I kind of felt like, I don't know anything. you step into foster care and you.

are going to deal with situations that you had no idea. The stories, and you don't press these kids to tell their stories, but as they develop trust in you, they begin to divulge and tell stories and share. You don't know, you're going to get the kid whose parent prostituted them. You're going to get the kid who's sitting on the couch who is talking to a guy who is a hitman and their dad is in the other room doing drug deals.

while this kid is sitting on a couch next to a hired killer. You're going to get people who have left their kids there in the house with no food for long periods of time that you would not imagine. How do kids survive? they've gone through these experiences.

it's happening way more frequently out there than you could ever imagine. the kids go through these traumatic, how do you survive? yet these are loving individuals who respond to love and they start trying to put their lives back together deal and work through their

we were a small part in helping them to get through some of that. you don't know the things that your eyes are open to when you get into this.

I just was amazed. Just literally amazed. I too was. I was kind of mind blown actually when I started realizing what all was out there. I was terribly sheltered.

you imagine a kid in a living room hiding behind their couch while someone is being shot in

out in front of their house and shooting is

you imagine a scenario like that?

of our podcast was almost exactly like that The child was in bed with the father they were asleep and someone breaks in and stabs the father to death and even talks to the child oh my gosh that was one

cases that I ended up investigating, but even more prevalent, just on a day to day, going to domestic violence calls and those kinds of things in these homes, and you would run into these kids that are living in such conditions where...

It's totally normal for the parent to leave their drug paraphernalia sitting out on the table or their sexual devices or whatever else they're into. these kids are right there. And the children oftentimes, are pre-adolescent, and they're seeing these things that you would say, they shouldn't be exposed to in any situation, but really at least not until they're much older and start.

knowing how to process this. like you said, the ones that are prostituted out, daily abused, they need a foster care system. They need someone to show them

there's another way to live. Or a parent who looks the other way while another adult abuses their child and does that over and over again and breaches that trust and the kid has nowhere to go. Nobody to go to and say, hey, this thing is happening in the other room here. And you know it. I know you know that this is happening.

What's unfortunate about some of

in ones that we know of the mom that was her life. Her father did that to her and, they don't know any different. mean, maybe they do somewhere, but I don't think they know how to get out of it or stop it. They're so fearful. We're here to stop it. Yeah. I think that a lot of that is a survival

technique is that if you have lived through it and you figured out how to survive and you do see a lot of women who are then put in a position where they feel so powerless to do anything that when it starts happening to their child, their survival position. to their head down. Is put their head down and do whatever they need to to get through the situation. Yeah, I survived, you'll survive. Yeah, And if you think about that, isn't that how,

we all raise children, right? Like, yeah, know, somebody teased me in school, you'll get through this. we weren't helicopter parents we weren't on those kinds of things.

loved what Lyle said a minute ago, that we, hope that somewhere or something that they experienced in our home.

will remain with them because when they leave us, they don't go to beautiful lives again. They go almost right back to what they were doing. And we were talking about this earlier, how that feels normal to them. it's so

we had a little eight-year-old and she was with us for a year. I remember that little girl. was such She was a

think about this situation because we loved that little girl and that was the youngest one we ever had, but we just loved her.

As we got closer and closer to her being reunified with her mom, one day she said to me, I know that I would be better off living with you for the rest of my life, but I really feel like I have to go home and take care of my mom. And that's exactly what's happened. You know, she is now the parent in that home. The mother,

has so many struggles, can't work,

she has to control the scenario with the brother, she has to control the scenario with her mother, and then her mother moved them away from here, so there's no support system

when I was taking care of that little boy, he had a mom and she had other

I don't know if she got into some trouble or she was fearful or what, but she dropped him off at the babysitter and took off. And was actually a family

they were gonna turn him over to

we'll take him in, and watch him Well, we thought it was a week or two, it turned into six months and you get attached as a little baby,

didn't really matter that she left for six months. As soon as she came back in and said, hey, I'm back, the courts were like, him back. And you have no...

Recourse he almost feels like he's yours now But you have to just hand them over and if the kids are old enough to kind of know what's going on they'll go back to that mom. Yeah, ⁓ every single time because even if they know in their hearts Betty and Brian used to tell us that we could be the best parents they had but if that mom or dad come back that those kids wanted to go back

a lot of those situations are exactly what you're describing where the child actually ends up becoming the parent to some degree. They know the better choices right from wrong. Not always. mean, I've seen a fair number of kids out there that were definitely,

the problem in the equation, but a lot of times when it is the parent, the child becomes the parent in terms of making good

let me just shine

a light of hope on this whole conversation because in a lot of cases, in the majority, I would even say that the cases we felt that they knew we loved them. we also gave them a taste of what it felt like to live in a family that had dinners together around the table, that had Christmas without a big brawl at the end of it and people throwing bottles of drink at the wall and breaking them. A family that

took them to

would

fun together. We'd watch movies together. We showed that experience to them. So we consider that a success that we gave them a taste of, family life without some of the dysfunction they might've experienced. most of the cases they went back we still stay in touch with them and we have hope for them. But one of them turned their life around. One of them.

got their high school completed, got a job, a car, got an associate's degree in a local college and will graduate from ⁓ the university here. And we're so proud of her. We are so so proud of her. She's getting a degree in think the social sciences because you know she's got a of thoughts and feelings about that.

But she turned her life around and it could have gone the other way and it didn't It's uplifting to when you see those ones that are able to climb out of it. Yes and go and yes now She's her mom still involved in her life and there's still some Stuff that she works

she's doing really

your first experience was brought about because someone you knew got you into this. So if someone was listening out there and they wanted to get involved, how do they go about getting involved?

in the state of Washington, you would apply to become a foster parent. And all of that is done online. All of the classes, I think there's 24 hours of training. When I did it, it was all in

since COVID, they changed it all online. makes it easier then. Yes, I would think so. And then you have a home visit from the licensor and they'll come look at your home. there are a lot of things that you're like, we've got a

pond or we have this or you know we'll never get licensed. My brother lives in Kentucky and he and his wife were yeah we'd love to foster just babies but we've got this and this we've got too many dogs and I'm like no foster parents are so needed it really would not be that big of a deal to get yourself licensed as a foster parent.

they've really shortened the process. I had some friends that did that, Yeah, took them a long time. I guess a long time at three to six months. So if you say that's long or short, I don't know, but it can be done in three to six months. If you take a kinship placement...

someone that's related to you. Sometimes DCYF will call and say, hey, you're the third cousin of this child. Would you like them? And you have the opportunity to become a foster or kinship care provider that way. And that license is slightly different and super, super fast. You do a few questions and 10 days after you, they say your license, then the next 30 days you get the payment at the end of the 30 days. So that's kind of.

how fast it goes for kinship care providers. But if I could add, you know, there's a couple of other ways. Some people just are not in a position to be foster parents. And there are so many really good agencies that you can donate money to to help them out. you can volunteer to be a... Big brother, big sister.

but this one would be like a mentor. You would volunteer to be a mentor and then they would ⁓ match you up with a kid that maybe has interests similar to yours and once a month you would go do something with that kid to give them another experience of a stable adult in the area.

Lyle's friend Rob does that. It isn't maybe on a full-time basis, but they have a shop with a cop. They get Christmas time and stuff. so police officers will,

volunteer and they'll be matched with a child and then they take them and they'll go do little things or Take them to go get a Christmas present it's pretty cool. This group is called Spokane Angels. That's that was easy enough. I was so There are there I love that I think that that also is an amazing way to get involved You don't have to have the full-time responsibility, but you have the opportunity to

another stable adult person in their community. I can see how that would be needed. when you guys also started off, you were the hesitant party.

What were you envisioning in your mind was going to happen? That's a great question. in fact, I started queuing up a response to that question before you even asked it because I wanted to say something about that. through the experience we've had now looking back upon it, I think that there's three reasons for getting into foster care. Three motivations that I see as we look at other foster parents and our own experience. And the first two, you would be able

to name off pretty quick, but the third one...

You probably wouldn't name off and that's the only legitimate one that I would say to do it is the one that's not a parent. The first one is a little bit of a baser and this is a reality. Some people are in foster care because they make a little money. They get a certain stipend for each kid. So they'll fill their house full of four or five kids. And then it comes, comes almost more like a group home. I don't think that's the right reason to be in foster care. I wish people wouldn't do it for that reason, but you know, they need foster.

parents and and they'll take people that are willing to do that and unfortunately, I don't think they get the love and care but but

Who's to say? mean, those people are giving of their time and their efforts, The second reason is to make a difference in the life of that child. That's what I thought. That was my motivation for doing it in the first place. Because we were fine. We had enough funds. We didn't do it for the money. I had a good job and Collette was working.

I think we both wanted to make a difference. We wanted to help these

I think we have, but not what we'd envisioned. Not as much, and it's not as immediate as you would like it to be. And sometimes you do. But the third reason, and this is the motivation I wish somebody would have said to me at the beginning, this is the reason, the only viable reason to do it, is a change it made in my heart. It literally changed me as a person.

and I would never not have had the experience. I just knowing these kids and the

We raised six kids and I love my kids and they're all, they're doing great and they're working through their lives and the challenges of this economy and everything trying to get through. But

kids I love them. Like they were my own kids and it changed me as a person, changed my heart.

And it will do that for you if you go into it for the right reason. It'll

open your heart and mind up to something that's out there. And like so few things, that connection that we strive for is everybody's on their devices and losing the connection with people and losing the ability to make a difference in people's lives and the ability to love and care for others and receive that love back.

this will do that like I don't know anything else it will. And so for me those were the three motivations and that third one if I'd have known that going into it I might have

not been as reluctant or maybe he would have gotten maybe I wouldn't have been a stress or my expectations would would have been tapered back a bit and just let the relationship flow with those

kids care about them love them let them experience of a

we're kind of crazy in our house, but I think it was a pretty stable environment for them for the time they were there. Let them experience it. I remember walking with one of our kids and, I was talking to her about, what are you going to

You're 17, so what are your plans? You want to go to college? You want to get a trade? You want to, get a job? she had finally just calmed down from this chaotic life that she lived. she said, I just want to be a kid for a while. At 17.

because a lot of them don't get that opportunity to enjoy life it's kind of going back to what I was saying earlier about some of these kids are actually the parents. they grow up in a stressful situation. the only responsible person in the house. And so they don't get the opportunity to be the kid that they should be. in that moment I just thought, okay, you just be a kid.

Don't you worry about anything for as long as I can make it that way for you. And I don't think that you're purposely avoiding me, you didn't tell me what you

I have these visions of bombs going off. absolutely. Lyle, Stealing everything you I thought they were going to break holes in our walls.

We have a set of biological twins and so they were seniors in high school and we took three kids and this is what actually made us get licensed. The mom called I know you guys are foster parents and we're like we're not foster parents We took the three kids into our home right at Christmas time and

my gosh, I think we better get licensed. We need that support. We need, a social worker. need all of the things that come with that support. But anyway, at one point Troy and I went on a date and left these three kids home with the two older daughters. And one of my daughters called me and she said, mom,

I'm downstairs in my room and it smells like someone's smoking in our house because it's coming through the heater vents. So we rushed home and one of these girls was smoking a cigarette upstairs. She caught the blanket on fire. Oh no. But she managed to it all in and get it out. When we went upstairs, found the hole upstairs smelled like.

smoke and we found the blanket.

need to be strict with them and you need to lay your expectations down. And then there's consequences for,

not following the rules. have certain strict rules

One of the rules we didn't have is lock the pantry up at night. they'd have dinner and you'd have your dinner and your dessert. if there's something you want to eat, just get into the pantry and here's

once one of the kids left, we found a hoard of food in the mattress. Why did you do that? Because you could have anything you

So our pantry was open and we didn't stock a lot of really unhealthy foods, but we had some snacks and a few goodies. ⁓ it wasn't at all what I thought, Lyle. wasn't that these derelicts are gonna come in and just graffiti my wall and put their fist through the Which that happened too. Graffiti? No, but the ball, when one of them was-

practicing her softball pitching and threw it in the room right into the wall. But I will tell you, I'll answer your question. What Troy envisioned, so when Troy was a kid, his mom was a foster parent and she fostered just little boys that he would just little little boy, but both he and his mom were heartbroken when those boys went home. And so what he would say to me, so when we first got married and we might've been pregnant with our first, and I'm like, we need to foster.

⁓ And I signed up to be a foster parent in Utah and I didn't even have to get licensed or anything. The next day they called me, have an infant. ⁓ my goodness. And so I'm like, hey Troy, should we take this infant? And he's like, no, not yet. So we didn't, but that was always the thing that he would say to me is he would.

put it on me, it will be too hard for you to let these kids go. But I think that's what he envisioned and why it took him so long. For me, I'm like, yes. No, I'm just kidding. And as it turns out, we haven't had to let any of them go. Their circumstances have changed, but they stay in touch with us. And they come see us. sometimes we'll take them out to dinner. We can find out where they are, track them down.

They've maintained and we try to maintain that

thought it was funny, one of the stories that we could tell you that when our youngest

I remember the week that everybody moved off to college or left and it was just her and us for the first time in the house. We're sitting around the table having dinner, just the three of

she puts her fork and her knife down. She looks at Colette and then she looks at me and she goes.

I can't do

We go,

well you have to. This is your family. So she was very much in favor of the foster situation.

one of the things people need to look at. How's the rest of your kids gonna do with this situation? Cammie was very open and loving and very accepting in her heart to share her home with these other kids.

she'd welcome every single one of them into the house.

she's probably going to be a foster parent someday. wouldn't be surprised. She just has that kind of heart and that mentality,

We're now empty nesters for the first time ever that she just moved to Seattle. I remember our girls babysitting Cammie.

she has the most forgiving heart.

you look on the other side

these kids taking

taking things, taking

all of those things

not every day.

a lot.

she goes, that's just how they are. she never held any animosity towards any of them.

Unless they treated her like a child and then that made her mad. But for the most part they did respect our property and our

we'd laugh about the cigarette incident and we did have one that took some clothes from one of our other girls and we had to deal with that

You can deal with that in your own family too.

do you have a standout moment? In terms of one of the kids either coming back to you after the fact or they said something to you That just made you think this one thing

is all worth it or has been all worth it?

I'll share the experience with the one young lady who's turned her life around and everything looks like that's, she's gonna be a productive member of society and she's got some perspective that she can take out into the world and she chooses to follow a social work kind of path, I hope she does, because she's got a lot to

we're sitting around the dinner

I will joke and kid with them like I do my own kids. I mean, that's if you're going to live in my house, you're going to get teased and get a, you got to be careful there too. But we, we would have fun and laugh and joke. And we were having dinner and it was at the point getting close to the time where they were going back to another

we

has been your

biggest takeaway from the time you spent with us. think it was a question like that. And one of the girls stopped and she thought for a minute and then she said, I never realized that a man who would come into your life could laugh and joke with you and have fun during the day and then not come into the bedroom later that night. That was.

a time when I realized, okay, we're making a difference here. I joke with my kids and I tease them and give them a hard time, but that somebody would have that perception of men that what men do is they might joke around with you during the day, but then they're going to... I didn't think people lived like that. I know. With that kind of fear. Can you imagine?

sitting there and not knowing when someone's gonna come pay you a visit and... Well, and I think that everything that you're seeing in the media today, the number of...

sexual scandals amongst coaches and teachers and People that are supposed to be of trust, mean law enforcement clergy Medical doctors all of those are you know right in there? you grow up with this idea of hey There's certain people that you should be able to trust and your parents are definitely at the top of that list and And her perception was that men this is what they do. Yeah, because she had so many experiences with

that

was aha moment for me when I realized that you know you could really make a difference that way and just just be a dad just show them what it's like to have a dad a funny you know goofy

Carrying loving strict sometime, I had we held the line too, but we were we had fun We enjoyed the holidays. We enjoyed birthdays. We'd go do stuff together. I took them skiing we did a lot of stuff that they maybe didn't get to do and We had fun those those times and

There was no negative to it that would come from that relationship with other relationships they'd had with male authority figures.

Well, in fact, for several of our kids, I have done a scrapbook for them. Just even we had one girl that we were just doing respite for. But what was supposed to be a one or two week respite.

ended up being over a month and a half because that foster parent didn't want that child back and so we went to Yellowstone and rode horses and just all sorts of stuff for that child and another just made a scrapbook of here's all the pictures of the things that we've done so that you have something a little memory some sort of a memory,

in our home, we only took one kid at a time. Occasionally we'd have two.

DCYF rates the kids and then the higher rate of the kid is the more they pay you to have the kid and This one is really really hard. This one's does this and we would get these kids and we would not Ever see those behaviors, but we never saw the violent or the disrespectful

behaviors, we just saw kids who maybe just didn't know any better. And even, you the girl that was smoking the cigarette in the bedroom, we told her, you're not old enough to smoke, but if you're going to smoke, you may not smoke in our house. You can only smoke outside. we just left it at that. It didn't turn into this huge, deal. she was flabbergasted by that. But to me, all of these kids,

We had some that came to us on medication to try to tone down their behaviors and we would never see those behaviors and I would wean them off the

there was something within our home where both of us just did not have that kind of contention that would trigger these kids.

to feel like they had to go back to that place of violence, of throwing things, of all of that kind of stuff. And it doesn't mean it didn't happen. I had one at school that every day they would call me to come pick her up because she had destroyed a classroom or something, but it never happened at my home. it happened outside when outside influences would trigger that response in her.

I was going to finish the story on the little scrapbook that she made for one little girl. she was, under 10 when she left us. she was pretty young and she really enjoyed being with

she called us mom and dad. it was sad when she left. We

had this whole thing it still sad now cause we don't have any contact with her, but she was in the back seat of the car and she had this little scrapbook and in there were all these pictures, the ski trips, the boat, we took them out to the lake and we did some camping trips and there were different things that happened in the eight months that she was with us and she's rifling through this little book back there and, she got really quiet in the back and she didn't say anything and it's taken her.

back to her mom and she shut the book and she looked up at Collette and she goes, mom, did all of this really happen? Oh, that's wild. She's looking at it. It's like a dream. It probably was. It was and that was sort of, that should have been your aha moment. Well, that's awesome.

so did you end up with any actual law enforcement contacts during any of

most of the interactions we had with

law enforcement would be with somebody took off and ran away which once they got to know us they didn't do that they liked being there we didn't have to call them out to our house for domestic situations like i would have thought would be that never happened right they were respectful

you forget these aren't the people that created the scenario that they're in. These are people who are byproducts of a situation created by others and they are just trying to get through their lives and they want to try to just be a kid, we didn't have,

situations like that where we had law enforcement there all the time, we probably would called you. If we could get you right here. I did have some friends call me one time because of a problem with their child. outside of that, I have to say over all the years that I worked the job, I had obviously always the domestic violence situations and stuff.

I had one 13 year old one time that had gotten some information at school about how their parents can treat them. So they went home that night and got disciplined for something and immediately called 911. So I had to show up and explain to this 13 year old that no, your parents do have the right to discipline you and what they're doing. It wasn't even physical. was like, that's not abuse. Taking your phone away. They can do that kind of thing.

really I don't think I ever had any interactions with foster parents in terms of any of those kind of bad things No, we were pretty clear on the Establishing expectations look we want you here. We love you. We care about you and you can have a great time here But these are the rules that you'll follow and if you don't that's the thing about foster parenting like your your own kids You're kind of stuck with them, yours, but with foster kids,

we try to make it worth it for them to live that way, you know, because we're going to go have fun, we're going to teach you things, we're going to help you with your schooling, help you get your driver's license, all those things, this can be a great development experience for you, or you can...

wear out your welcome and move on down the line. And group homes were never fun. That's one of the worst places for these kids. Group homes are really rough. They don't want to be in those

we know your faith, our faith. Do you think God had a lot to do with how the outcome with the kids you guys had? Because I kind feel like maybe it did. I think so. I think definitely where faith comes in for me is

Asking for the right way to respond. it's not like make this child the way that I want them But it's how do I respond to this

really paying attention

you

ways to respond and I think all the way around all of us

could really use that ability to calm ourselves before we respond.

to something else, I'm always praying, don't change this, don't change that, but give me the wisdom and the best way to deal with this. not saying I do it right all the time, but I pray for that a lot, So in our preschool, we use a program called Conscious Discipline, which we just love, but it's adult first, and it's amazing how it works,

No child can be in a calmer state than the adult unless that child is very parentified typically the adult has to be calm and so if the child starts whining and it triggers you The child's just gonna keep her whining because you're not in control of your own emotions

So we teach take three deep breaths for the adults first, and then we teach that to the children. that's been a saver in foster care for me when I feel children starting to get triggered teaching them in moments of calm how to take those really deep breaths and bring themselves back. I think faith has a lot to do with it.

when I first learned about trauma, I didn't know that much about it, but when I first learned about it, I thought, ⁓ love can fix trauma any day of the week. Well, love is essential, but it's not going to fix trauma. It's not going to fix all of the things. And instead, what we have to do is look at what these kids don't know and look at every opportunity.

as an opportunity to teach a skill. how can I teach them this? It was for us. It's not for everyone. And like I say, there's so many other ways. Definitely, even volunteering. If you know a family that fosters and just volunteer to take their kids for their foster kid for a day or for an outing or something, it's just a beautiful way to help.

I love the faith question and I just, have a story. So this young lady that we talked about this really turned her life around we all kind of once in while get into this.

Why me mentality, victim mentality? why did it happen this way? And she was going off about that one day and talking about, then this happened and why did my life turn out like this? And what kind of God would let this happen here? And now my life went this direction and this direction. Why couldn't I have had, a father involved in my life? And then I had this and, my life was so different than most people's.

said, well, let's just look at this a different way. You're graduating from high school. You're getting your college taken care of. You know how to work.

You have this keen perception to understand the plight of kids in this difficult, challenging circumstance, and you're going into that field in your education. And you'll have the education and the background to understand these things. you've grown as a person. Look at how much more confidence you have in yourself now than you had even when we first met you. We went through all these things, and I said, do you think God had a role in any of that?

I didn't ever thought of it that way. Because that wasn't their life. No. Look at all these wonderful things that have come into your life. Look what you've made of your life. Look where you're taken and you're only 20 for criminy and you got the rest of your life to go. You're so much further ahead in understanding the plight of the human condition than most people will ever get to.

Do give any of that credit to God? We never pushed our religion. We take our kids to church, We believe in God and we pray and we worship Him. That's part of how we roll. And so they were exposed to that. I think every one of

We had some discussions about that at some level to help them move and develop and progress in life. I almost feel like that approach is better. I saw all different kinds, but personally to

showing what it can do for you, but not shoving it down their throat. you got to do this. is the only way. I think that tends to push people away. more of the, Look how we are living that we love God, we believe in God and, Jesus our savior Just letting the kids see that and how you live your lives, I think is huge. it might be the only chance.

they get to have God in their lives. Well, you look at Colette's shirt, she's got the word, you can't see it. Thankful. word thankful. mean, why do we do what we do? And we tried to tell the kids, eventually at the end I got to the point of finally telling them, I'm doing this for me. It's for my heart. I hope that it makes a difference in your life, but you've already made a difference in mine.

That's awesome. That's what people who worship God do, guess. Maybe that's what God teaches us. Well, that's what we're supposed to do. what the Bible says. what the whole idea of this experience is about. We're grateful for what we're given and we give Him the credit and then we try to spread it to other people.

Golden Rule, guess, or the two great commandments that they talk about in the Bible. Yeah, I think there's a role in that. in our home

How would you say social services was to work with? Because sometimes I've heard that that's kind of a pain. It is very much a pain. We actually had really good social workers. again, in this other role that I am in right now, that is probably one of the biggest complaints I have is the kid and especially for my kinship care families. When a kid is dropped off, they may not hear from a social worker.

for a very long time. so, you know, I always tell them you have to understand that there is the intake social worker and they, once they drop that kid off, they're no longer your social worker, but then they get assigned to another social worker and that can take a little bit of time, but you hope it doesn't take very long, because you've got a lot of questions that's why we have this role as we're called mentors and we.

can answer some of those questions. Troy and I worked with some pretty good social workers. They very loving people. Almost all of them were very responsive. there's a couple of things that I know that is

number one, there's not enough social workers. And so their caseloads are very heavy, just crazy. And so what I would always tell families is,

send an email and CC the social worker supervisor. if it's urgent, do it that way. Because if you just text or you just leave a message, you don't know where that goes. But when you send that email, it's going to go and it's also going to go to somebody else. the other problem is, there's a lot of new social workers that just don't know.

all the answers to the questions and they don't know all the resources and they don't know that yes, this foster parent can do these things with the kids. And so they just don't get back to the foster parent when they ask them. And again, maybe that's why we have the mentors that are helping them out. I think we worked with great social workers. I think there's wonderful social workers out there.

There's some that are a little more abrupt than others, but they're just people like everyone else. some of them are one way and some are another and... system's frustrating. Yeah, the system itself is very frustrating. And it's got to be frustrating for them.

Out of today's discussion, big things that I heard were all of the things that people worry about when they go into foster care really are kind of a makeup of myths and things that people really shouldn't probably worry about because based on your experience, a majority of kids don't come to you from direct law enforcement involvement. it's CPS, it's the juvenile courts, it's those kinds of things. So these aren't necessarily bad kids. And they didn't create a

amount of chaos in your house and social workers actually were pretty decent people to work with the children made a big change. I so am I misstating anything? Did I miss anything? I really do.

think that's a good summary. it's all about your expectations, right? If you have these expectations of social workers, if you have these expectations of foster kids, just loosen those expectations and let people be people. Let these kids be children.

let them come into your home if they put a hole in your wall they put a hole in your wall. It's not the end of the world. But they didn't in

well that's great to

we certainly appreciate you guys coming and sitting down with us to talk about this and thanks for your words of advice. Hopefully this will get out there to some people that might look at foster care a little differently in terms of how they can contribute. So thank Thank you. Thank