Find room in your heart to welcome a child in need

My son saw my husband give me a kiss and he broke into the elementary singsong taunt, “Mom and Dad, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes baby in a baby carriage.”

And then he asked, “Isn’t that right, Mom?”

“Um-hm” is all I muttered, because truthfully I cannot validate his response. I could tell him it was true for his sister, but you, dear son, no.

My son is adopted, and though his almost 5-year-old self knows that, he doesn’t fully understand what that all encapsulates. In his case, there was kissing involved, but I am pretty sure that there wasn’t any love nor was there a marriage, but there was a baby boy.

From the beginning of human existence to this day, there has been a quandary about family relationships.

Interestingly, in the state of Washington, the same thing is being asked – especially for those babies who are conceived out of sync with the song and are then in foster care or put up for adoption. Recently the state cut 6 percent of the foster care/adoption budget and is looking to cut about 6 percent more. If the state continues to cut back, who is going to step up?

My husband and I had always hoped to adopt. Upon returning to the states after living in Costa Rica, a closed country for expatriate adoption, we began looking into adoption agencies.

Each “baby in a baby carriage” story is unique. Ours could be categorized as easy and carefree, even though it included having to buy a house so we could have a home study and an address to put on the official paperwork. Even the required classes with the state Department of Social and Health Services were engrossing.

The only exception was the creation of a picturesque family profile so that prospective birth parents could visually peruse our lives helping them choose a “forever family.” We put this off for two months, but after our family profile was completed and turned in (yes, it did feel like an overdue take-home test), we were called within two weeks and told us that a teenager was looking at our profile.

The next thing we knew we were chitchatting awkwardly with a birth mother. Ten minutes into our conversation she handed us a photo album. We assumed it was of her life, but as we opened the album, our first choice of a boy’s name was written very beautifully alongside “Congratulations.”

Wow . . . we were chosen! We were having a boy!

But sometimes it does not work out that way. Parents all along the socio-economic, race, age and mental stability spectrum think and hope that they can take care of their precious children. But because of unforeseen circumstances or sometimes because of their own choices, kids are in need of care, a safe refuge, a home.

After meeting our son’s birth mother, we fostered a friendship that continued for a year. We cherished this time, but when my son turned 1, she no longer wished to see him or us. She had told us that from the beginning, but we had hoped that she would want a longer relationship.

Leaving her that last day, my husband and I wept with empathy for our son and for her, feeling rejected, a sense of loss, let down and morose.

According to www.adoptuskids.org, more than 10,000 children in the state of Washington need homes. Do you have room in your carriage? Or more importantly, do you have room in your heart to kick that elementary taunt to the curb and consider foster care or adoption for a baby, child or teenager – maybe even become a forever family?

Kristalyn Simler lives in University Place with her husband and two children. She is one of six reader columnists whose work appears in this space. She blogs at www.kristalynsimler.com. Email her at ksimler@hotmail.com.