Continuing with the article describing various parameters child welfare professionals (and families) should consider when they are matching a family with a child, the next question asks:

Are the parents willing to learn more about caring for this child's needs?

The vast majority of parents with whom I have worked have been sponges, soaking up information on how best to support and assist their children to become the best they can be. The problem, in my opinion, lies not with most parents, but with a system that often doesn’t have the resources available and affordable for those parents. Again, I think our society does a much better job of meeting the needs of physically challenged people than we do in meeting emotional or mental health needs.


The next question asks:

Does the family feel that this is the right child for them and that their existing structure can grow and adapt to meet the child's needs?


Often families make decisions with their heart and not their head. It then becomes the responsibility of the placing agency and social workers to help families determine if this is, indeed, the right child for them.


My family attended a July 4th party given by a social worker that created and managed her own placing agency. We had added a very disturbed 9-year-old one year prior to this time; we had moved 6 months prior, from 600 miles away; my husband had taken on a new job; we had built a home in the midst of all this change; and we already had 4 children at this time. The social worker placed the “waiting kids” book in my lap because I had sucker for kids written on my forehead. In November, we added a 14-year-old girl who had been in eight placements before us. (We didn’t know what we didn’t know.) We disrupted birth order as well. Six months later we disrupted the placement.


We should NEVER have been allowed to add this child. The social worker should never have shown me the book! Of course, it could be argued I could always have said no… but as I said, my heart was way overruling my head. Has your heart ever overruled your head on big decisions?