From Foster Youth to Father of Five: Rob Scheer on Foster Care, Adoption, and Permanency

Kids in foster care, I remind you all, they do not belong to you. They don't belong to me. They belong to us. To us.And so the way I saw these groups of kids being treated, after all of these years, how I was treated, I said, I can't stand on the sidelines and watch a game being played, because as a leader, it's my responsibility to get in the game and play it.

It's the Foster to Forever podcast. Happy stories of non traditional families born through Foster to Adopt. I'm your host, Rachel Fulgenetti.

I am absolutely thrilled to welcome my guest today. He is Dr. Rob Shear. He is the founder of Comfort Cases Dr. Which we're going to talk all about.He's also an author, and he is a former foster youth who adopted. Is it five children now?

Five.

Five children through foster care. Dr. Shear, welcome.

Oh, Rachel, thank you so much. And please call me Rob.

Okay, I'll call you Rob.I have to tell you, first thing, I skipped the gym this morning because I was so engrossed in your book that I was like, I have to get to the end before I talk to him. I'm an audiobook narrator, so I love, love, love books. And, you know, it's hard for me because I read for a living.It's hard for me to always get through everything before I talk to the person. I just finished the part where you. You won the case with Makai and Amaya. He was fighting to become the adoptive dad of these two children, and,.

Oh, my gosh, made my heart smile. You just made.

I can't recommend it enough. The name of the book for the listeners is A Forever Family Fostering Change One Child at a Time. And it is really well written.It's beautiful, it's engrossing. I mean, I started it two days ago, and I'm almost finished through the whole thing.

Wow.

Yeah.

So, first of all, I have to say thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. You know, writing a book as you know, is not always the easiest thing.And for somebody like me, and by the way, I'm very. I'm not educated. I. You know, when Simon and Schuster came to me about, you know, doing my memoir, the first.First thing I told them was, you know, I don't know the difference between there, there, and there. And they said, you know what? We're going to help you with that. And so they did.We wrote A Forever Family, put it on the pages, and put it out there in the universe. And by the way, I have to say, there's been so much love from the universe about this book.And, you know, as our lives have gone on, you know, my kids are getting older, and in 2019, Rachel, we did something that we never thought we would do. We adopted another child.

I. Wow. Wow. So this book was published in 2018. So that child is not covered in this book?

No, no. So a second book is. Is in the talks because. Because, you know, when we met Alex. We met Alex in September of 2019.I was giving a talk, and this young man walked up to me, and he asked me to sign my book. And I was on a book tour, and, you know, I found out this young man had been in foster care life.You know, he didn't have that one caring adult who really cared about him. He was a senior. 3.6 Bridge. Wow. And I knew at that moment that we had to do something.So literally three months after that, my husband and I asked him if he wanted to live with us, and he was just. What? And it was.It was two weeks before his 19th birthday, and my husband and I were the very first couple in the state of Maryland to petition the courts to have a child from foster care live with us without a stipend. And I remember the judge said to me, Mr. Scheer, why would you do this?And I said to the judge, as I say to all your viewers and listeners, every child deserves a foundation. Every child deserves to know there's someone they're rooting them on.But what I want children to truly feel is, what does it feel when someone loves me unconditionally? Unconditionally. It's something we don't see enough in this world. And for our son, I said that.And I remember I looked over and Alex was crying, and he was like, pops, you've changed my life. It's like, no, you changed our lives. And I remember I said to the judge, you know, your honor, I only have one regret.And the judge said, Mr. Shear, what is your regret? And I said, I didn't get to walk into kindergarten, but now I get to walk with him for the rest of his life.

Yeah. Oh, that's beautiful. Wow. That's so great. So you're. All of your kids are. Are grown now? Grownish. How old are you grown?

Ish. So our kids are now 17, 19, 19, 21. And Alex is now 25. And so. And by the way, Rachel, all five still live at home.

Oh, my God. I just love.

They also.

I love hearing about the. The animals. You. You live on a farm. And I was reading Your bio, and you have animals and a pig named.

Penelope, all for Makai. And, you know, you read the story about Makai. Makai was, you know, we were told he would never talk and probably would never walk without braces.And I look at my son. He is 19 years old, finished his freshman year in college. Still to this day, he has taught Rhys and I how to look at the world upside down.And I think that's the reason that we have been able to be where we are, you know, 17 and a half years ago, Amaya Makai arrived at our front door with a trash bag. And then three months later, Tristan Grayson arrived and, you know, to see their journey now.And yesterday, I was on a TV show with Tristan, and he was talking to them about. They said to him, they said, tell me how. How do you feel growing up with parents who are, you know, in the limelight?And he said, my life is not the same as most kids. I'm on TV a lot. He says, but my life is so amazing. To hear my boy say that, Rachel, it's all been worth it.

Yeah. It's incredible, particularly knowing from reading the book, where you came from, where you started life out with a lot of trauma. A lot of trauma.And then, of course, getting to adulthood and having to cope in various ways when you weren't able to, you know, you had. Didn't have a solid foundation under you. And to surmount all of that and then be able to do this is quite extraordinary and quite. Not the. It's.It's not the typical way that it goes for most kids from foster care.

Yeah. I will have to say I do see that now that I've been through this journey, I call it the awakening.It's like all this stuff I've never realized, and, you know, for so many years, I was. I didn't want to tell people. People, my story. I think that we.And as I've told my story and as how this has grown, I have met so many amazing humans who have lived experience like me, who also felt ashamed. And so what we're hoping is this next generation of young people is to realize, don't be ashamed. Don't ever be ashamed of where you come from.Don't you ever be ashamed of who you are. And by the way, I made sure, like I tell people, I will never allow a trash bag to define me, much less define anybody else.

Let's talk for the listeners about the trash bag, in case people aren't familiar with what you're even referring to. And then what you did about it.

Yeah. So, you know, the thing is, is in 1979, out of I'm one of 10 kids and I walked into the foster care system with a trash bag in my hand.And people don't even realize that that is the norm. Happened again in 1984 when I aged out of the system and that bag was put in my hand again.And when I made the decision that I wasn't going to have that as a conversation piece. And when I joined the United States Navy. And by the way, I didn't join the Navy to take care of any of your viewers.I joined the Navy because this kid needed a future and I built it. And you know, I never thought much about it until my kids arrived.And when I saw that trash bag again, it was just that, oh my gosh, how could this be? You know, Nelson Mandela says it so clearly. Every single one of us in society are judged by the way we treat our children.Kids in foster care, I remind you all, they do not belong to you. They don't belong to me. They belong to us. To us.And so the way I saw these groups of kids being treated after all of these years, how I was treated, I said, I can't stand on the sidelines and watch a game being played because as a leader, it's my responsibility to get in the game and play it. So that's what we did. We grabbed a backpack and we put all those essential items that we take for granted.New pajamas, toothbrush, lotion, shampoo, bars of soap. Things that we don't even think about. These kids don't even know. And by the way, my beautiful teeth. And my teeth are beautiful.They cost me so much money because nobody gave me a toothbrush. They didn't care about that, you know, so with that, we saw this wave go across our country.And in the last 14 years at Comfort Cases, we have delivered over 320,000 backpacks.

How do they get to the children? Is there? Do you have partnerships with agencies or how did the children actually get these?

So we are actually, we're a 96 volunteer ran organization. Our organizations are unheard of when it comes to our 990s. More than 80% of our non profits throughout the United States are 250, 000 and below.So if you hit that 300000 mark, you come to the big games. The thing for me is that it wasn't about that. What was it about was making sure that our pathway move forward with, without hurting those around us.And here's an example. People think that the government's taking care of these kids, but let me tell you, that is not the correct answer.So many times all of this puts is put on the social worker. And our social workers, as we all know, are underpaid, understaffed, overworked.And so with us, we wanted to make sure that we did the easiest thing possible for them. So what social workers can do, they can go to comfortcases.org, they can go up to the top, order a case.They can order cases from birth up to the age of 21. They can order all month long. And by the way, we send them to them and our cases retail for about $133. They get them free.And the reason for that is because we have the largest corporation in the world sponsoring us. Our human race. Our human race. We don't have large corporations stroking us checks on a regular basis.But what we do have is we have people every single day donating $8, $10, truly making an impact to get us to a $5 million nonprofit. Wow.

I did see on your website, the thing about you have like a cute name for it.

What's the name? Comfort Excels. So about nine years ago, Reese and I realized that our trash bag wasn't being eliminated.We knew that we were given hope and dignity to our youth with all of those essential items in the backpack. But the trash bag was still being used. And so I decided to go.Door knocking and I got a meeting with Briggs and Riley, the leading luxury luggage brand in the world. And I told them my story. The story of a 12 year old little boy who had walked with a trash bag and how at 18, he was defined with that bag again.And I remember Richard said, what do you need? And I said, I need a bag. I need a bag that can fit. Because I hear all the time social workers don't have space, so I can't use a piece of luggage.I said, but I need the bag to be durable. I need the bag to be something that kids want to carry.It took about four months for Briggs and Riley to get me the prototype, but this is what they designed for me. This is what we call a Comfort XL. This is a 32 inch duffel bag. It folds out. This.

That's awesome.

These retail for a hundred and nineteen dollars. I've given out over 200,000 of them free.So when people become bag busters for $10 a month, I'm able to take this and give it to a kid in foster care. No more trash bags. And by the way, Rachel, that has started a movement.So in states like Texas, New York, Maryland, we are passing bills that are requiring social workers give these type of things. So, yeah, the movement is happening.

That is so great. I actually, I live in New York and I know that that law was passed. No more trash bags in New York, I think last year.I don't know if it's gone into effect yet.

It has gone. It goes in effect. Technically, it goes in effect this year. It took about eight months for the governor to sign it. I'm not going to go there.But it's signed and we're moving forward. And you know, again, this isn't not about somebody trying to hold. This is about accountability.This is not understanding that children come in with so much trust trauma that we need to make sure that we give them all the things that, you know, can make them feel better than where they were. And I've had people reach out to me and saying what? That's snobby. All new stuff. No, by the way, my kids have had hand me downs.I've gone to thrift stores. I'm not saying that. What I'm saying that the constant crap that we're giving these kids is not acceptable.

I really could not agree more. I did see on your website that there's a way to, to sign up to do a ten dollar continuous donation. Like ten dollars a month.Can you tell me about that? Because I, I think I'm gonna do that. That sounds amazing.

You know, and most people spend that amount of money at that overpriced coffee shop. And by the way, I visit that coffee shop too. I just don't say the name of it because they don't donate to us. But what I is at once a month, $10.And by the way, most of us don't miss that. We put it on our credit card. It's $10 for a young person in foster care. That's a different you in a trash bag and dignity. $10.Go to comfortcases.org Become a Bag Buster and join that movement. Because every time you give that $10, you are empowering the youth.

Yes, I'm gonna do it. And also, I'm somebody. At Christmas time or at the holidays, I like to give a gift to clients. I'm also a voice actor and audiobook narrator.And I decided a couple of years ago, like, instead of buying some junk that nobody really wants or candy or this or whatever it is, I'm going to do a donation in their name forward. That. Yeah. And so this sounds like this is my new holiday plan.

I love the fact that, you know, give things to people that truly let them know that, you know what we're investing in, all of us. And by the way, we don't need another coffee cup. We don't need another piece of chocolate. What we need to do is empower our youth.

Yes, I totally agree. Another thing, speaking of empowering youth, I noticed on your website that you do have a scholarship fund and tell me about that.

So most people need to know statistics when it comes to foster care. Right now we're hovering close to 400,000 children in the United States foster care system.That equals out to one child every two minutes that enters foster care in the United States. States. These kids enter because of a choice someone else made. The statistics are so dark. Only 54% of them graduate high school.

That's insane.

Insane. Only 11% get a four year degree. 70% Of all kids in foster care talk about they want higher education.So at Comfort Cases, we decided that, you know what, we're going to give them that opportunity. So we give scholarships out those scholarships, we have an application process. This year we had 59 applicants.And I was heartbroken because I only have five scholarships. And so listen, everybody, if you want your legacy to be a scholarship, reach out to me at Comfort Cases. And we would love that.But we give them $2,500 the first semester, 2500 the second semester. This money can be used in, you know, everyday life because these kids don't have anybody.

Sure.

But the things that I love is that we, we have communications with our scholars.They get hope boxes from us for the year that the first year they're in college, they get a box from us every month that has all the, that you would send your kid in college, but then hire them. We give them a mentor.That mentor will follow them through their years when we also give them financial literacy people to help them with their fafsa, all of those things. But for Reese and I, the thing for us is we let every scholar know we're always here for you. You will never be homeless.You'll never not have a team and just reach out. And matter of fact, we had one scholar who actually came and lived with us for a little bit because their college had closed. So we walk the walk.We truly want to make sure that our kids know that, that we're there for them. And by the way, not everybody's meant to go to college.So what we do is we open up that to trade schools as well, because we do need people to go to those schools.

Absolutely. That's so wonderful.

You know, you don't have to do a complete full scholarship. You can do a partial scholarship. You can donate to the scholarship fund. You will then be recognized and all of that.So again, if you have an interest in that, which I see we all could. Let's get some more scholarships out.

Yes, yes. Another good donation opportunity. And obviously it's tax deductible because you are a.

We are a 501C3. Yeah, we are. We are non profit.And as non profits, our responsibility is to make sure that when you give me a dollar, I make that dollar go as far as I can. And by the way, look at people's 990s. When we get a $96 sense of that dollar goes to our mission. That is unheard of. Yeah, unheard of.And so the reason for that is I run my organization like I ran my companies. Lean tight, making sure that we're impacting.

Yeah, that's so important because some of these places you don't even know where the money is going to. It's going to more, you know, flyers and nonsense to reach out to people more. And you know, it's not going to the thing you wanted it to go to.So I do appreciate that. I want to ask you about something. This has been on my heart a lot lately. There's a growing movement, anti adoption movement.A lot of people feel that it is. They'll even go so far as to say you're stealing children and it should be stopped and there should be no more adoption.I have my feelings about that. I would love to hear your feelings about that.

First of all, every single young person needs to have a foundation. So just very much like our kids, we waited for the bio families to get their act together.

Right.

But I have reminded people all the time it is not fair for kids to sit on the sidelines waiting for adults to be adults. That is not why they were brought into this world. And so for me, I have reminded everyone, each one of us fall, Rachel. All of us.It all depends on how we get up. So I'm sorry to say this adoption needs to happen. Permanency needs to happen. But. And mind you, I say but. Yeah.When a child enters foster care, we've already failed. We've already failed. We need to support those families so they don't lose their children.64% Of all kids who enter foster care enter because of one word. And that word is called neglect. Neglect is no More defined as poverty. Mom can't afford to pay the electricity.So for two weeks, kids don't have electricity. They're outside at all. Crazy hours. Hours.Neighbors walking over, doing the neighborly thing, which is saying, is there something you want to talk about? You need instead what they do call CPS.You know, mom leaves her 5 year old with her 12 year old because she's working two jobs and can't afford daycare. So instead of the neighbor coming over and saying, can I watch the kids for a couple of hours to help you out? Neighbor calls cps.That is not why our forefathers built communities. They built communities for us to take care of each other. So we have to stop and realize that what affects our neighbor affects us.Let's be more neighborly.

Yes. I love your passion. I really do. I feel it. Yeah. I think that there's reasons why adoption can be not a good thing. Right.Like, but there's so many reasons why it's a necessary thing. And I think we have to just. On all sides, people need to broaden their scope a little bit and say, look, it's. Yeah, it is a tragedy. It's sad.It is an absolute tragedy when somebody can't be with their bio. Family.

Family of origin is family of origin.

It is, it is. But you can still have an amazing life and you can get what you need, which you wouldn't get if you were stuck in the system. You know, it's.It strikes me because I was just reading this part in the book. Had you not gotten the.The okay from the judge and to go ahead to adopt these children, they would have been moved to a different foster family, which to me was. I was like, what? Why would they ever do that? They had already been with you for what, like a year or something?

Over a year the kids have been.

Here and they're gonna uproot those children and put them with a different foster family. That's because we.

Because we push the system. Because we said, this isn't happening. On my watch. I couldn't sit back as I. Here's an example.Our daughter, my beautiful, beautiful daughter and I only have one girl. And by the way, I've raised her as a princess because she will be a queen one day.

Absolutely.

My daughter, she would. We would take her after school to see her mommy and we would go to this place to. Because it was supervised visitation.Week after week, they required us to show up. She never did. So every week our daughter would be so excited and then let down. And that just happened. For four straight months.

Yeah. Yeah.

Acceptable, Rachel.

It is.

And also I want people to know is that kids have a life story before we adopt them and keep that life story going. We have amazing relationships after. After all of these years with quite a few of the biological family members.

That's wonderful.

You know, I say this to each and every person who adopts. If your table's not big enough, build a bigger table, because everybody deserves to come to the table to lift up these young people.And the thing that Reese and I get to say to our kids, you can never look at your dads and say, we kept you from your bio family. We never changed our phone number. We made all of our stuff public.And what we said to each and every one of them at the court, listen, we might have been able to adopt your kids. You are still their mom and dad. And so come break bread with us. Enjoy those milestones that we're gonna have.But always remember, we are their parents. You must always respect us. And we've been very lucky. We've had relationships with some bio family, even a bio mom. And so, um. Yeah.

Did you ever. Was there ever a situation where that felt unsafe or like, it was?Because I know a lot of foster parents are like, it just doesn't feel safe to, like, open that door that wide.

I. Well, no, I never felt unsafe under that part of it, but I did.You know, there was a moment where our daughter had had relationships with one of the family members, and it just wasn't healthy. And so we had to step in. But other than that, you know, everybody has stayed within their lane.And our kids are the ones that benefit from all of this. And, you know, as I say to our kids, our kids broke the cycle. Like I broke the cycle.

Yeah.

See, my mom. My mom did exactly what her mom did. And people said to me as I was growing up, oh, your mom is a product of her environment. BS.My mother was a product of her choices. And that's what I try to remind people. You can sit here and say, all of your product of your environment, all my poor.You are a product of your choices. Now, I'm not saying those choices are always easy, but we are all products of our choices.

Yeah. And I wonder if sometimes the circumstances or the.The makeup of the person, just by virtue of who they are as a person, might make it more difficult or a little less difficult to make those choices. Right.

There's.

There's addiction. I mean, you. You talk in your book about substance abuse and that kind of thing, but for you were able to get out of that.

Yeah.

What did you attribute that to?

I. My grit. And by the way, my grit. My heavenly father.See, I have a faith that people can't even realize because my heavenly father loves me unconditionally. So he didn't put anything in front of me that I couldn't get over. I had to constantly remind myself of that.So between the drugs and all the stuff that I had done, trying to abuse myself because I felt I deserved it, I realized that. No, I. It's okay. I forgave people. And I realized that this system wasn't defined me. And I'm not blaming this. I'm here to change the system.

Nice. Yeah. Talk to me about the transracial piece. I. I know that you. You were in touch with the grandmothers, and that was a wonderful support.

Grandma passed away several years ago, and she was a very big part of our life. Like, we're talking weekly dinners. She was grandma wise, never missed anything.And by the way, so people will know, Grandma treated all four of the kids like they were hers. She didn't treat Aayam Makai differently than she treated Tristan.But, you know, the thing that I want people to understand is that Reese and I are two white men, and we've raised four black kids.And for all those people that thought we were going to take their blackness away from them and all those people that made me get bonding study experts, and I actually had to hire somebody that would say that I wouldn't change my boys to being gay. Our kids, none of them like the theater. None of them like show tunes. None of them know who Barbara Streisand is.

Oh, my God, that's so.

So where did I go wrong? But what I tell people, people have walked up to my family and they're. They've seen us on the Ellen show or in People magazine.They're like, oh, my gosh, there's that family there. You're such a beautiful family. We don't see any color. We see love. I look at those people and I say, well, then guess what?You don't see my four black kids because my kids are black and my kids are treated differently than I am. And when my sons go into a Macy's or Nordstrom's, they want to know what they're going to take.For me, they want to know how much is on my credit card. And I have seen that firsthand. So let's all understand the fact that we are treated differently and my kids are black.

Yeah. And how has that have you discussed as they've gotten older, have you discussed that with them?

Well, having five kids, one being white, we have raised our white child differently than our black kids.When my, all of my kids drive now, so we have to teach our boys, you know, when a cop comes behind you, you better, you know, and I hate to say that, but we have to be that.And yesterday we were being interviewed and the person on the TV asked my son, 17 year old son, so you've grown up with the, with your family and you know, your dads are gay and you know, do you get picked on or is anybody seeing negative things? And our son said no, no, our, my, I've never had negativity. I've never. And my, their siblings say the same thing.So I think that generation gets it compared to our generation where we had all the issues, our kids say it all the time. We don't care. We have two dads. What we love is that we have two parents that truly care for us.My husband gave up his entire career to be a stay at home dad. He's been raising our kids for the last over 15 years. Being a stay home dad. He's got the hardest job in the world.But let me tell you, he's never missed a track meet, never missed a football game, never missed a volleyball game. He's never missed a field trip. He's, that is what he wants to do. And by the way, our kids love that.

Yeah, I really felt your love for him in the, in the book too and I really enjoyed that. It's, there's nothing like having a partner to do this with, like to do child rearing with because wow, it is.I, I, when we became parents, my husband and I were like bow down to single parents. Like, oh my God, doing it all by yourself. Like how do they do it?

It try to get four, four in diapers all within three months. Yeah. Being a parent is the greatest gift.

It is, it is such a trip. It really changes your life.And like you were saying in the book, like you went from being like you were two dinks, you know, immaculate house and all the nicest things and you know, whatever, to all of a sudden like just insanity as you walk in the door. And yeah, my kids are 10 and 5 and we're like, when is this gonna end?

No. And we're, we're okay with that. You know, we moved to a farm from the city and you know, it just, you know, Reese and I just celebrated 21 years.I am still madly in love with him. And you know, I always laugh and say he doesn't always like me, but he truly loves me.And you know, we have a, we're, we're really excited about the next chapter for us. You know, our kids are, we're looking at a second book.We're, you know, we're doing some TV, but you know, we're looking some really one on one time together. You know, for the last 17 and a half years, my husband's focus has been on our kids and me.And so, you know, for the first time, our son Tristan got his license and Reese was like, I don't have to be an Uber anymore. And so I said to him, I said, so you think you're going to go back to work? You know, you haven't, you haven't. And he was like, no.He's like, this is my time.

Yes.

He's like the beach house that we've been talking about, the new color in the master bedroom. This is my time. And I look at it because he earned this time.

That's right. Yes. Oh, that's so great. I love him. I don't even know him yet, but I love him.Anyway, another thing I wanted to ask you about is I see a lot of people sticking on this in like online forums, foster parents, parents who are concerned about their foster kids calling them mom and dad or dad. And it's like, should I let them do that? Should I not? Tell me what you think about that.

We got reprimanded by that when the kids first came and I said, how do I tell them? No, I mean, I didn't tell them, you gotta call me daddy.

Right.

In a matter of fact, I wrote it in the book where my daughter was the one who looked at my husband and said, you're data and your daddy. And we were shocked. We didn't. She was calling me Mr. Rob and Mr. Reese.And so when she had that comfort level to do that, then why the hell would we ever deny a kid of that? And by the way, as a parent, if you're that insecure, if you're that insecure, maybe you need the therapy. Because a lot of kids call people my kids.They, they have a Grammy and Pappy, they're not blood related to this them.

Right.

You know, but that's their granny and Pappy and have been with them forever. Yeah. I think people need to figure out we have other things to worry about.

Right? Yeah, yeah. I think that they're so concerned about like the PC aspect of like. Well, they already have a, a mom or dad.So it's not right for them to calm. You know, I, I would be doing something bad to the birth family or whatever by allowing that to happen or something.I think that's part of the, the head space. But it's like, take the child's lead. Yeah.

This isn't about you. This is about the kids. That's what I tell people when I hear people say that. And I've said this on, on, you know, public forums.This is not about you. Okay. This is about the young you. How are they feeling? What do they. We forgotten that we need to sit down. We need to talk to them.Don't talk down to them. Sit and talk to them. The things that we worry about, they don't. The things that we feel are big picture are small to them.Other things that we should be worrying about their future, not who they call mom and dad.

Thank you. Thank you for that. Yeah. Yeah. There's these little things that people.I think it's the culture of online whatever that people get bogged down in these little details that take away from the actual. What's important to be focusing on all the time. Yeah. And I also think there's a swing in this direction of adoptees.And I absolutely appreciate and respect adoptees finding their voice, talking about their experience, like, you know, how it may not have been great for them in every way or whatever it is. They're sharing their piece. And I get that and I respect that. 100. But that doesn't mean it's everybody's experience. And so now people are foster.Potential foster parents are coming to me and saying, is it wrong for me to, like, hope to adopt? And I'm like, I know.

And that's the crazy part. So when we, when we got into this, there was a thing called foster care to adopt. Okay. And by the way, it's still there.They just don't say it anymore. You know, it's. It's okay. It's okay for you to come into a situation where you want to see permanency for a child.We all should want permanency for a child.It's okay that, you know, you can mourn if a child actually has to go back to their birth parent because you do have a loss, but you can also celebrate. Okay? So let's look at it both ways. I think so many times, so, so many times.As I said to you earlier, we're forgetting about the kids, about what they want, about what they need, and once again, permanency. We all want it.

They would Say, well, but it's not about what they want because they're too young to make that decision. So you're making that decision for them. You know, I mean, I just followed a fight online about this.

Well, let me tell you something. You and I both know as parents, kids are resilient. We also know the kids have their own mindset.And when they put their mind to something, you better believe they're going to do it. So you can all say that they're too young to make bs.If you raise your young person the way they need to be raised, they're making good decisions and you should sit back and be proud of them for that. So stop with the fact that they can't be a part of the conversation. It affects them even at a young age, Rachel, it affects them.We have to be more honest with our youth. We have to be more. Invite them to the table for the conversations because this affects the them.And if you want a different outcome, try something new because what you've been trying, not working. 80% Of our death row inmates in. Are touched by foster care. Wow. 80%.

Wow. Are you involved in policy making? Like, do you like, lobby Congress and do all that kind of stuff?

You know, I'm a. I am one of these people who believe that if I pick my low hanging fruit, my tree grows taller. And so I really don't spend a lot of time in the minutia. There's a lot of talk. I need action. I need action.And so if they invite me to the table, I come to the table. But Rachel, I'm going to tell you something and you should have learned this by now. I don't get invited often because I, I'm not a yes person.I'm not a person that's going to sit here and tell you what you want to hear. I'm going to sit here and tell you what you need to hear. And with that, it's the whole reason of child welfare.See, child welfare is an industry that makes money on the backs of children. And they don't want people like me because I'm going to call the wrongs out.I'm not going to point fingers because that's not how things get done and solved. But we cannot change something without accepting what we did wrong. And that's what we need to do.And nobody wants to do that, because if you start doing that, you're going to see waste. And when you see waste, people get cut, you know, and people don't lose their jobs. They need to lose their Jobs.Because our statistics are not acceptable in doing the same status quo year, century after. It's got to change.

Yes, I totally agree with that. I actually appreciated that in your book, too, about how you drew upon that grit a lot when you were going through the.The system part of fostering and adopting to fight for things and to stand outside or wait in the lobby and wait for the head of DCF to come down and then, like, talk. And, you know, I have to say, I mean, I tell that to parents all the time. It's like, you have to be the squeaky wheel. You have to be. You can be.You can be polite and, you know, and you shouldn't be, like, overly combative because they don't like that. And it's like the dmv, and then they won't do you any. You know, I say that, but it's like, you know, you.You watch what you do, because then they'll make it like 10 billion times harder for you if you're not, like, tread lightly.

No, I agree.

You can never give up. You have to be one of those people, and I think we share this in common, who's just like, I am not gonna stop until this thing happens for my child.

That needs to always remember, we attract more flies with honey than we do vinegar.

Yes.

So you kill them with kindness. And you. You. You go to them with facts, not emotions. Okay?Because emotions is what gets us in trouble, and we all have them, but we have to come to the table with facts. The fact that they didn't give Makai speech when we needed to get, you know, that's what we need to do.

I like that. That's a great tip. That's why I documented everything. That's why I attended every court session just like you did.Even though they don't really even want the foster parents there. I was there every time. Talk about not understanding what they're saying. They're speaking in jargon.They're speaking at, like, this volume that's, like, really low. And you're.

I know.

What are they even saying? Like, what's happening? But I appreciate that as a tip. Yes.

Listen, Rachel, this has been amazing.

Yeah. It's so great to talk to you. I really appreciate what you're doing. I appreciate your heart. And I'm gonna get all my listeners on board.They're gonna visit your website, they're gonna sign up, hopefully for the $10 a month. You waste that on the coffee place every week.

Come on. You know, and by the way, Rachel, I'm in New York quite often. So you and I are gonna have to grab that coffee out, my treat.

You know, let's do that. Yes.

I. I really hope that your listeners and viewers understand that not everybody in this world can foster, not everybody can adopt, but every single one of us can volunteer. We can donate. And people say to me, I don't have any money to donate. You have the most valuable thing in the world. That's your time. Your time.Donate your time. Become a casa. You know, there's so much that we can do. And always remember, we are all put on this earth for one reason, and that is to serve.To serve. And I, it took me many, many years to learn this. Many, many years to learn this.But I have to say that your life is always should be about your legacy. And your legacy is what you give and not what you take. And that's what we need to understand is our legacy.

That's beautiful. That's a beautiful place to stop. Thank you so much. We're gonna get that coffee. Absolutely.

Let's do it.

This has been the Foster to Forever podcast. Happy stories of non traditional families. Bo Born through Foster to Adopt Produced by Aquarius Rising.Original music composed by Joe Fulginetti for more information or to stay in touch, visit from foster to forever.com. That's from foster the number2forever.com and stay connected with us on Instagram at foster2forever podcast.That's foster the number two forever podcast. We'll see you next time.