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My husband and I are starting our licensing classes in the first week of April. We are wanting to only foster infants 1 year and younger. I'm wondering, is there a real need for foster parents that don't take in older children? I'm hoping since I'm a SAHM that I will be a good candidate for infant placements. We are willing to take in infants that have been born drug addicted etc but will the agencies skip over us because we're not looking for sibling groups and older kids etc. We have a small house and I don't think we'd have room for more than 3 kids (we have 2 bios) Just wanted opinions from those who are foster parents and may be more aware of how everything works.
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BestMomEver
It depends where you live. Generally, if you will take kids from a metro area, there is a big need. In our MAPP class out of 6 couples that got licensed we were the only ones that would take infants. We had a placement of a healthy, white, non drug exposed newborn within 12 hours of licensing. In the time between getting the call and saying yes and physically picking her up (about 3 hours) we got 3 more calls for infants. There is a huge need here for infant homes. That is partially because they only allow 1 child under the age of 18 months (unless they are sibs) in a home which basically requires 1 home for every infant.
Not here!
Daycare is paid here if both parents work full time...being a stay at home parent is not necessary.
We recently updated our parameters to only infants and our LW said the only way that would limit us in any way was if we specified 'boys only' or 'girls only'.
So, I guess it really does depend on where you live!
There is a HUGE need for homes to takes infants/young toddlers in my area.
Our county doesn't care if there are 2 working parents or a SAHM, but they really need homes. In my area, most foster parents work.
I think the need for homes comes from the fact that, daycare here is subsidized, but it usually takes 6-8 months for the subsidy to kick in, so during that time, you are paying out of pocket for daycare for the baby. Daycare for an infant is over $1000/month here, so it is double the subsidy that we get for the kids. Many foster parents don't want to pay that, and the ones who do, don't take more than 1 placement.
I stay at home, and will do multiple infants/toddlers together because we don't have to worry about a daycare bill, just what I can handle during the day, lol!
Since we started taking infants, we have always been as full as we want to be.
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We have been fostering for 3 years..I am a stay at home mom and we only accept infants/toddlers. We have had 5 children placed with us so far. We love the babies! We make great foster parents (according to the case workers) because the baby does not have to enter day care and because we are not looking to adopt (so we can remain impartial). Good luck with fostering.
Clintonmom
We have been fostering for 3 years..I am a stay at home mom and we only accept infants/toddlers. We have had 5 children placed with us so far. We love the babies! We make great foster parents (according to the case workers) because the baby does not have to enter day care and because we are not looking to adopt (so we can remain impartial). Good luck with fostering.
There's definitely a need for someone to take infants in our area, particularly to take infants that are likely to reunify - many foster parents who want babies come at this wanting primarily to adopt, so I would think you'd be an asset to them. I would ask your county, but be clear also that while you may be open to adoption, you are also not focused on that - that really will add to how useful you are to them.
We are getting licensed in a very similar situation: we have two young bio kids and want to take babies under 2 years old. There is some need in our area, but it actually differed agency to agency. One was quite clear that they had many families licensed for infants already and wanted us to consider a larger age range or taking siblings. One said all their infant homes were full and they definitely had a need. All were willing to license us, but we didn't want to sign up with an agency that didn't really have a need for us.
It seemed to us that the agencies that didn't do transportation for visits (at least not on a regular basis) were the ones that needed foster parents for infants, because in my state children 0-2 years old have 3 visits per week, 1 hour each. I don't think that would be possible at all for working parents without a transporter. For me as a mostly-SAHM, it works out fine.
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I think it really depends on your location. Within the county in which i reside. there are many meth users and heroin has become just as big. I training we were informed there are quite a few infant placements that come in to care due to being born drug positive. However, we are certified for up to two children at a time, ages newborn-6 years old and are open to a huge range of "special needs." My home has been open for placements for a month today and we have had only one call a little over a week ago for a sibling group of 3, ranging from 4 years to 9years and we turned it down. (Mostly because we are not set up for three children, especially in an older age range)
I've heard of people getting placement calls before they are even officially open for infants!! Personally if we were not hoping to adopt again, we would prefer the older kiddos as they seem to be much easier! So I can see it being both ways!
Best wishes :)
In my area there is a high need for families to foster infants who will most likely be reunified.There is very little need for families for infants who are likely to be TPRed or who are legally free for adoption, because there are already lots of families in the waiting pool who are looking to adopt a very young child.That doesn't necessarily mean a family just getting started won't ever be able to adopt a baby - you never know when reunification won't work out. It just means that foster families may have to be willing to care for a lot of babies who will go home before finding one who will stay and be adopted if adoption is their goal. A family that primarily wants to foster would definitely be useful.
In my area of KY there is a huge need for infant homes. Everyone I know that has wanted to foster and even adopt infants after fostering has been able to eventually.
We didn't make it a full 24 hours from being licences before we got a cal for a 5 week old. Drug exposure is the biggest culprit where I am at. Here you don't have to have extra classes for drug exposed infants, but I recommend reading up on symptoms and care routines.
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meldamo
Here they like to place all little ones in homes that are also licensed to adopt. Even thought the goal is always reunification, they want to make sure the littlest foster children are in homes that could potentially be their forever home if reunification does not happen.