Many parents in the foster & adoptive community say, “I don’t know the difference between my biological and adopted kids.” This is a sweet sentiment, and I know where their heart is. They are trying to express that they love all their kids equally, and I know they genuinely do. This is the warm and fuzzy thing to say to convey that message.

The truth is, they are very different.

I think saying they are the same dishonors their challenging experience of transitioning into a new family, as well as the difficulty of it for their family of origin and the new family. It’s hard. It often doesn’t offer that warm, fuzzy, lovey feeling, but it IS love. In fact, I think it’s the true test of love. It’s easy to show love to someone who shows love to you in return.

On the other hand, when your child is traumatized, has another mom, keeps pushing you away, yells at you, destroys things, and makes life harder…

To keep pressing in rather than listening to your nervous system’s initial reaction to recoil is hard. THAT is love.

Love isn’t a feeling. It’s an action.

You see, attachment takes time and nurturing to develop. Sometimes even biological parents struggle to attach to their babies, especially in the case of post-partum depression. Even under entirely normal circumstances, sometimes, when the baby is placed in the mother’s arms, the baby feels completely foreign for Mom. Dads struggle with this too! The good news is that their bond is strengthened over time as they hold, feed, and make eye contact with their newborn. This is all missed when taking in an older child. Either they’ve bonded to someone else in those early years (ideally), or they never developed that attachment with their biological parents, which makes it even harder for them to develop it with future caregivers.

When trauma and mental health are involved, there are more barriers to developing attachment, sometimes on both ends. Many foster and adoptive parents take kids in because of their own difficult childhood experiences. They want to give back and be the person they needed as a child. This is wonderful and beautiful! However, then you have an adult with trauma and attachment wounds trying to connect with a child who has trauma and attachment wounds. It can happen, but it’s not easy! It takes hard work on both sides. It’s not always an instant bond.

I bet there are foster and adoptive parents out there who truly felt an instant bond that came easily. I am thankful that it happened that way for them. Personally, I struggled with the feeling of shame for years because it wasn’t that easy and simple for me. In fact, we almost didn’t proceed with adoption became of my deep shame. I felt like I wasn’t good enough for these kids. They deserved someone who easily gushed with love for them, who didn’t feel like there was a disconnect, who didn’t struggle through it every day. I did and still do deeply care for these kids. I love them. It took me a long time to realize I was defining love wrong.

Love is showing up every day, even when they say they hate you. Even when they threw a rock through a windshield. Even when you get regular calls from the school about behaviors. Even when they throw a tantrum so violent, you need to protect their little head from the floor. Even when you’re guarding your heart because they might not live with you forever. Even when they’re crying because they miss their first mom. Even when they say they want to go live with someone else.

Love is not a feeling.

Love is showing up.

Love is action.

I love those kids deeply, even though it doesn’t feel good all the time.

Some people say foster parents do it for the money.

Let me tell you, if you remove the factor of genuinely caring for the kids and wanting what’s best for them and solely look at it as profit, it’s not worth the money. They don’t pay enough. It’s hard work 24/7. If I didn’t love the kids, I’d rather go to work at a demanding job and come home to a quiet house to make even more money than foster care pays. Foster care is a work of passion and love.

So, yes, I do know the difference between my foster (soon to be adopted!) kids and my biological kids, but I chose to show up through all the hard stuff, even when I didn’t have to. If that’s not loving them, then what is?

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