Being a foster parent is an enormous responsibility. As a foster parent, you accept other people’s children into your home and look after them so that their parents can have the opportunity to fix things in their lives and eventually look after their children again. Seasame Street summed it up best when it described foster parents as “for now” parents.
Communication with the biological family is important
When we first started foster care, my wife and I were advised not think of the child’s biological family as the “enemy”. If you want to help this child transition into your home and then back again, you need their parents not to think of you as the enemy either. You have to form a relationship with the child’s biological parents as best you can, which often means communicating with them, with permission and guidance from your caseworker, outside of visitations.
The parents are not the only family members you will work with either. When I first became a foster parent, I went in with expectations of working with caseworkers and the biological parents. I quickly realized that often extended family members, like aunts, uncles, grandparents, and even great grandparents, are just as vested in these special kids’lives.
Your privacy is also important
At the same time, you need to keep yourself and your family safe. Being able to maintain your privacy is important. Great lengths are put in place to make sure no one knows where you live or work. But giving out personal email and phone numbers to family members runs contrary to that rule. It can be very frustrating when the thing you need to do for the kids is also unsafe for you and the kids.
MySudo lets you communicate and maintain privacy
With MySudo, I have been able to communicate with a foster child’s family and still maintain my own family’s privacy. I create a Foster Care Sudo for every child we look after, and that Sudo has its own dedicated email and phone number (plus plenty more). I put all my communication with the kids’ biological families through that dedicated channel. Via MySudo, I have shared memorable experiences, like holidays and milestones, with the biological parents and other family members so they don’t miss out on these experiences while they’re getting their life back in order.
Another great benefit of MySudo is that contact lists are unique to each Sudo. I can organize everyone who is important, such as caseworkers, grandparents, and biological parents, into a specific Foster Care Sudo for each child, instead of in my phone’s general contact list. This has saved me from texting the wrong grandparent on more than one occasion!
The best part is that MySudo has allowed our family to stay a part of our foster children’s lives long after they have left our home. A few weeks back, the great-grandpa of two of our foster children sent us pictures of their recent vacation. If we hadn’t had the confidence to share our Sudo phone number with him, chances are we would have become a forgotten memory in their lives. Now we can keep in touch and continue to see how they are doing.
MySudo is certainly worth checking out for foster parenting.
Photo By SewCream
