My wife and I got foster kids on Saturday - a 3-year old girl and 4-year old boy. They're both very cute, and are sweet kids. The girl is actually quite good. The boy has some issues, namely he has a VERY short attention span. He has to be re-directed a lot. We need patience & perseverance with him, and we need to keep it positive. However, we're glad to have them in our lives now, and hope that if things progress on down the line, that we may at some point have a chance to adopt them, should the court move their case in that direction.

thats awesome dude.. ill sure be praying for you all.

Praying man. Good on ya!

My grandparents had a lot of foster kids when mum was young. You'll get a lot out of it, even if you only have them for a short time.

Will definitely be praying for you guys.

Just said a prayer for you

Praying for you guys

Thanks for the prayers and encouragement, all! Things are going well so far, though the kids are definitely still in the 'honeymoon' stage. We'll see after this weekend or so whether they begin to display more behaviors or not.

Well, the kids are out of the honeymoon stage and are doing frequent visits to their birth-mother. This is bringing out a lot of behaviors, especially in the boy. He's incredibly angry about his situation & doesn't know how to properly express his anger, so he hits/kicks/slaps/bites (I have the teeth marks & welt on my arm to prove it!). Pray that God will grant Lisa and I wisdom in dealing with his violent tantrums and that we will be able to redirect his energies into positive, healthy, expressive outlets instead of this raging. Also, I am unfortunately quick to anger with him, especially when he hits me, so please pray that I will be slow to anger & disengage emotionally when he goes into these fits - it's the recommended way of dealing with the kids, and shows that he only gets my emotional response (mostly positive) when he's behaving.

That's definitely not easy. Will still keep you and your family in prayers.

Yeah kids who grew up in hard situations can be tough to deal with. I actually used to be one of those kids. Now look at me...I'm pretty much normal adult now

I'm praying for you guys. I'm sure you guys can do it

Praying mang

Thanks, gang.

keep going dude, your doing a great things for these kids.

How is it going so far?

prayin for u and lisa,josh,i worked with specialized foster care as a child case worker.not easy from that end either.the rewards are endless when u get there! keep the chin up and heart open!!! god would not have sent these children into ur lives if he didnt think that u and lisa couldnt have handled it! god bless you and ur new additions and keep us posted!!

I need some serious prayer, folks. I am at wit's end w/ this situation. The boy is constantly hitting & kicking, and I take it way too personally & get upset w/ him too quickly. I need to learn to just walk away. I blew up at him today over something I shouldn't have got terribly upset about, and I blew up at the girl today when I was trying to get her ready for nite-nite. My wife is at wit's end as well, since she's with them many more hours of the day than I am. I have no idea how she's holding up. The doctor told her she can't lift the kids anymore because her arms are bruising (change in hormones due to a new regimen of meds, and migrating to a low-carb diet at the same time), and the kids just want her to hold them all the time. They don't understand that mommy doesn't want to hold them 5 seconds after they just finished hitting, kicking, or headbutting her.

In addition, I now have to tear my living room down & store all my video game equipment because the boy won't leave it alone (he's not old enough to use it yet), and we may end up having to take the TV out of the living room as well, which means our lives are going to suck beyond the telling of it, because no cartoons means we have to find other ways to occupy their time when they tire of playing toys by themselves (all of 5 minutes, maybe). We don't do cartoons for very long (may twice a day, 30 minutes or so), but when you have to remove a TV because he nearly breaks it in a tantrum, that's not something he can grasp at his age. For now, I'm just going to pare down to TV, VCR, DVD player, and satellite receiver & hope he leaves it alone. If not, we go completely Spartan, which will bring even more challenges.

I need prayer that God will quiet my heart in these times & make me slow to anger. I need guidance from the Holy Spirit as to how to deal with tough situations & how I can gently nudge them toward compliance. I feel exceedingly guilty about yelling at them, but when you have no real means of discipline (other than ignoring them when they disobey) and your hands are tied, it becomes frustrating VERY quickly. I am dealing with some long-term sin issues that complicate this as well, because it keeps me from having the prayer life I need, and this just exacerbates things. I won't go into detail except to say that I have an issue I've been struggling with since I was a youth that I've tried to surrender to God but apparently haven't completely laid at His feet, because the "same old sin" keeps coming back to haunt me. I need deliverance from this issue so I can get back to the business of being a new daddy. In short, I need help.

josh and lisa,my heart goes out to u in a big way.i am praying for you!! wish there are words to say,things to tell you to try..you sound like great parents.i pray this gets easier.is there maybe a support group for foster parents.it could help..thanks for the update,i will def,keep praying for the new mommy and dad!

Thanks sherri, I appreciate it very much

I'll be praying lots for you guys

Hey man will be definitely praying... I have looked after many children who have suffered and experienced things they shouldn't and their behaviour can lead us to become quick with anger because they have such extreme moods and behaviours that it hurts and tests you beyond what your used to.

If you find yourself reacting to something rather than being proactive... take a quick breather in the next room, gather yourself up, pray, tag team with your wife so you both have brief periods to regroup.

If you show the kids what they can do rather than what they cannot do it will help, provide things in place of tv so they can have something to do. Sit with them and play with them for a block of time so you can model appropriate play. If they start to misbehave, warn them that you may stop playing or may put the game away. Then follow through with those warnings if it happens again. If they start wrecking things re direct them to another toy, if they still are doing so, give them a short time out, tell them why in a short sentence why they are getting one and ask them to apologise after the time out.

Kids love using their hands.. get some wooden toys - like puzzles, blocks, hammer and ball, pull along animal on a string....that encourage building, problem solving, ball games- to encourage hand eye co ordination and motor skills, cars and dolls to have imaginative play.. get some playdough and some play dough tools, put a plastic table clothe on the table and let them have a go, play with them first if they have no idea what to do.....they will not be able to go play and use their imagination if it has never been encouraged or demonstrated to them before.

Set up things they can play with until they figure out how to entertain themselves and get used to doing things properly and get used to being around you. God bless you.

therockismighty wrote:

If you find yourself reacting to something rather than being proactive... take a quick breather in the next room, gather yourself up, pray, tag team with your wife so you both have brief periods to regroup.

We try to do this, but when they're both in full-on tantrum mode it's difficult to do this. But yes, we get "breaks" when we absolutely need them.

therockismighty wrote:

If they start wrecking things re direct them to another toy, if they still are doing so, give them a short time out, tell them why in a short sentence why they are getting one and ask them to apologise after the time out.

The big problem is that timeouts escalate behavior. There's no such thing as a "short" timeout in our house. Especially the boy, who then flails his arms and legs around & screams like you're ripping his limbs off when you carry him to the timeout corner/spot. He runs away & you have to carry him back to that spot over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over (ad nauseum) again. He has had tantrums that were 3 hours long. I know we're not supposed to "power struggle" with them, but when he won't stay in a timeout spot & refuses to sit their for 4 minutes, it becomes exhausting. I'm not sure what else to try.

therockismighty wrote:

Kids love using their hands.. get some wooden toys - like puzzles, blocks, hammer and ball, pull along animal on a string....that encourage building, problem solving, ball games- to encourage hand eye co ordination and motor skills, cars and dolls to have imaginative play.. get some playdough and some play dough tools, put a plastic table clothe on the table and let them have a go, play with them first if they have no idea what to do.....they will not be able to go play and use their imagination if it has never been encouraged or demonstrated to them before.

We do have wood blocks that he likes to play with, and we try to do interactive things with him when we can, but we aren't in the habit of rewarding bad behavior with fun activities. So when he starts the day misbehaving, usually it just goes downhill.

Thanks for all the prayers, everyone. I was in a pretty low place last night. I'm feeling better today than last night. I'm hopeful that with renewed focus I can get back on track.

Re direction.... so when he is mucking up in one area try to redirect his attention to something else. He obviously feeds off negative attention if that is what he is used to getting.

Give him time to go mental in the morning, do not give him any attention AT ALL, do not try to correct, talk to him, calm him down, just let him muck about for a short time with in reason- talk to him about what he would like to do each day.., sit down quietly whilst having breakfast and if one of the children is behaving talk to them and thank them for coming to sit down to eat etc . Read books at night that talk about behaviour and ask questions while reading it.


Sit down, do not even talk to him and start playing with stuff... make comments about what your doing etc.... if time outs do not work... ignore him until he calms down. Do not talk to him or give him attention whilst he is misbehaving..... when he is behaving give him attention and mention how much you like this.

Repeat over and over until it sinks in. Positive reinforcement- when he is listening and interacting well, mention so " I love it when you play with your toys and sister nicely" etc. If he gets a huge reaction from negative... well what is going to happen?.

I used to do this when I had to look after difficult kids..... I would go silent, if they were hurting others or me, or wrecking toys, I would move them away and say " I do not like it when you smash the toys and hit people". No reactions, looking at them or raising my voice and quietly go about doing things, talk to everyone but the difficult kid... they would watch what was going on and if they interacted positively I would respond and ask if they would like to join in, and they promise to listen and behave etc.

Thanks for the suggestions, all good stuff! Some of it we're doing, it's just easy to get caught up in the tantrums in the "heat of the moment", so I'm trying really hard not to do that. I had the boy in timeout when I got home from work and remained calm/cool/collected the whole time, which surprised even me. Must have a few extra prayer warriors on the task!

will keep praying, good on ya man, fight the anger stuff... so much easier for you! bless ya, your wife and the kidlets mightily.