A Happy Surprise . . .

The other night while at Wal-Mart I heard this man's voice calling my husband's name. When I rounded the corner to see who it was, I saw a teenage boy. HOLY COW! It was a foster child that we had a couple years ago. (Side note, I will NEVER be a part of the "system" again, I've unfortunately seen it ruin too many kids lives - but that's a blog for another time) This child - let's call him Pete - was wonderful child who had many anger issues about living in a" system" that didn't seem to care about his needs or wants. He and his 3 sisters were bounced around from home to home while the "system" decided which placement was best. Eventually the kids were split up and we had Pete and the younger sister. At ths time they were 11 & 8. They hated the world most of the time, they hated us half the time. We were after all the "system" in their eyes and thus part of the problem. We loved, we nurtured, we helped. They were failing school miserably, both being in danger of being placed in Emotionally Handicapped classrooms - least restrictive envrionment my foot! Both could hardly read and kept getting passed to the next grade due to our fabulous (gag) president's "No Child Left Behind Program" .

The kids finally were yanked out of our home and placed with a new family. Thankfully about 1 month later they were placed in familial care with an aunt. They came to visit us about a year ago and were looking great.

Back to this weekend. . . "Pete" is going through puberty and has this manly voice. He looked SO good. After giving me a hug, he said, " We are going to get out of the court system next month." My heart sank . . . I did not want him to go back to his mother . . . however, he informed me that his aunt is getting permanent custody. YEAH! Then he said, "I have made the honor roll the past 2 semesters and I'm not angry anymore" I wanted to jump up and down for him! What a turn around. He said his sister is doing well also. He promised they'd visit us soon.

There are happy endings . . . .