In Retrospect: The Acquisition of a Foster License – Part II

The Story continues:

     
     My wife calls the foster licensing agency, which has chosen not to recommend us for a license through the State of Arizona, searching for hope. She is mad at the unfounded rejection and wants some answers. We both have many questions that need to be addressed: how can you give hope for 10 weeks and then break someone’s heart? How is this decision made in one day after we have been told we will be great foster parents? Why subject us to the entire course if you already had an agenda for people suffering infertility? Is there anything that can be done to change the decision? Do you think it is inappropriate as to the manner by which we were informed of a decision? And the list goes on....

    My wife demands that someone give her a valid explanation of their decision. After 3 attempts, a meeting is finally scheduled. Our dedication to the cause and my wife’s ambition has earned us this seat for discussion. Unsure that it will change the current assessment of the agency we still have a small amount of hope to sway their decision. It is December 22, 2010 when we arrive at their establishment. Eager and early we wait in the lobby silently. We have talked and mulled over the information we wish to share many times before arriving here and there is nothing left but to wait for the chance to share our feelings. We have already decided to use another agency no matter what the outcome of this gathering produces.

     As we meet the supervisor for the first time we are thanked for coming in to meet with them (like it was their idea), but it was fully instigated by us as they would have never spoken to us again after that unprofessional "dumping" had my wife not pressed the issue. 

Backing up for a minute here (yes, I do that a lot):

     The person assigned to us as our licensing agent was supposed to perform three or four visits at our home near the end of the course to have a “home study” completed. It would not necessarily have to be finished by the time we graduated PS MAPPS training, but it would speed up the process if it was completed early on. My wife was aware of this, and attempted to reach the agent who we will call "A.B.". After numerous unanswered calls, A.B. scheduled the first home visit on an afternoon that I would be at work. I arrived at the house a few minutes early, and my wife and I compared notes on things we would like to bring up with her.

     As we noticed that the time had come and gone for the meeting (45 minutes past, in fact), my wife called the office. A.B. answered the phone, and was shocked to realize that she completely forgot our appointment. She gave my wife no excuse other than, "I completely spaced our meeting." 

     “Not a great way to meet our licensing agent,” I think.

     After attempting to reschedule the meeting, and my wife resisting (as I had already left work for this appointment), A.B. said she was leaving the office right away. 15 minutes later, A.B. arrived at our house. She unloaded a stack of paperwork and apologized for her mistake. Frustrated, my wife was as nice as she could be under the circumstances. 

     Thinking that we will be starting our interviews, we are both shocked to realize that all we will be doing at this meeting is signing paperwork. Some documents include rules about disciplining foster children, notice of inspection, and our preferences of what age, race, gender, and background of the children we are willing to take in. During the signing of the paperwork, my wife brings up the conversation she had with a couple outside of the office during training (about not being able to afford their home without the reimbursement check for foster care). The agent said, "I don't want to hear anything about it, don't say any names." My wife and I are completely shocked. She has to be joking, right? No. She quite literally turned her head to this indiscretion.

More lead-up information:

     You would think if there was a doubt in the agency's plan for licensing an individual that they would address it directly. We are told to be as direct and truthful as possible; however, it appears that the preacher is not practicing what he (the agency) is preaching. Nothing is mentioned at our home interview nor ever before in PS MAPPS class about infertility being an issue in foster care. We already know that it is not a known issue through the personal experience of friends in the same situation (previous infertility) as us fostering children without the trouble we are currently having here.

     At the beginning of the PS MAPPS course everyone has a chance to share the reason for wanting to foster and the story of how each ended up at this juncture in life. We were totally honest from the beginning and still nothing was ever mentioned to support their reasons for not licensing us at the end of the course. The agency should share this concern from the beginning, if it is as substantial as they are now claiming.

     My own thoughts on their decision for no license recommendation includes: we turned a couple in for saying something inappropriate about finances and fostering, we spoke to the agent's supervisor about our licensing agent's failure to show up on time, and we let our instructor know of the agent's non-caring attitude towards a concern of ours. Perhaps this type of honesty is frowned upon in this agency’s organization. Whatever the reason, my wife and I decided this agency was not a good fit for us. All through the class we were told that we needed to choose children that fit into our lives and not every child that comes our way will fit. It is the same of the organization we chose to represent us in foster care apparently because we are currently licensed to foster children, but not through this agency. It could be that they figure we will cause problems because we address issues that are of concern as my wife addressed our agent’s failure to show up on time to our house. More like failure to remember an appointment at all.

     In my profession if I forget to meet with a client with whom I have scheduled an appointment at work I lose this client. This will cause me to lose my job. Why should these employees be any different? We were quite hurt in the moment, but now realize that this was a blessing in disguise. This lifestyle is full of stress, and if you do not have the full support and trust of and for your licensing agency, you will undoubtedly fail or burnout quickly.

Back to the main story:

     After meeting the supervisor of the agent we are led to a large conference room. There are 4 of us attending the meeting. Our licensing agent, her supervisor, me and my wife. We begin to filter through the room’s doorway. The chairs in the room suggest that it is used for conference meetings involving twenty or more individuals. They neatly align as they run around this large oval table. It is made of wood shined to a high gloss and their padded seats are comfortable enough. The agency supervisor asks us to sit where we like, and we choose the long side of the oval near one end. The two individuals from the agency sit directly across from us and the meeting is started by a simple phrase spoken by the supervisor.

Directly quoted at the beginning of the meeting:

     She asks, “Alright, tell me where you’re at?”

     My wife responds, “Well, I’m completely confused. I mean at first I was just like, I felt like somebody punched me in the stomach and I was sad and I cried and then I got upset, I got angry because… this is totally wrong. It’s not true. I mean I just don’t get it, um…. I understand where the agency is coming from if it were true. That wouldn’t be a good match, ya know but it’s not where we’re at…

Fast forward past the meeting:

     This meeting lasts just over half an hour. I will not, at this time, write out the entire conversation, but my wife and I go on to let them know that no one EVER said infertility was an issue, that we had mentioned it from the start, and if it was going to be an issue why hadn’t anyone sat down as we are now early on to have the conversation? The end result, after them back-pedaling and realizing that this was handled improperly, and my wife mentioning that they had no basis for their decision (such as a psychological evaluation) was to say, "Oh, we think you will make great foster parents. We just know how tragically this can turn out if the family has not resolved their feelings with infertility." My wife replied (in so many words), "You have no idea how we feel, because you never took the time to find out." They go on to say that they will definitely reconsider if we see a psychologist, and blah blah blah.


No thanks. 

     After two years of trying to have children and now 2 ½ months more of PS MAPPS classes we are far past the fragile point of our infertility. We have never given up hope of conceiving, and are NOT fragile or delusional about how foster care works.  Thanks for taking this bit of hope away from us as well. In the act of doing so they are compromising the system they work for, because they have a loving family that is equipped and ready to help out the problem of the lack of foster parents in Arizona. We see the commercials all the time about how desperate they are to find foster homes, yet they dismiss us without ever speaking to any of our references or doing a single interview with us or our children in our home.

     My wife and I are disgusted by the outcome, even after mentioning that we could see a psychiatrist on the subject. We do not have a lot of extra money to spend on this endeavor, so my wife locates free psychiatric help through a church. We meet with the individual who says that it will take many sessions to be able to determine if we are truly mentally stable enough to handle children being placed with us and then taken away as required for the reunification of their family.

     After this meeting we discuss our options and feel this is not the proper avenue for our progression towards becoming foster parents. We chose to seek out another agency to fulfill our commitment to help out in the community as well as parent children in our home. 

End of Part II