Zoltar fortunetelling machines are a big part of Jules De La Cruz\u2019s life. Part of her business is installing and maintaining these novelty attractions at local tourist destinations.<\/p>\n
But Jules doesn\u2019t need a fortuneteller to predict her future. She has something better: a wife who is a meticulous planner. One night at dinner, Kimberly Saint Laurent casually mentioned to Jules that she would like to visit the Galapagos Islands. Jules remembers expressing interest, but also saying it seemed very far away. The following day, Kimberly booked plane tickets, Jules recalls with a laugh.<\/p>\n
The same thing happened when they considered fostering. \u201cShe told me that \u2018we\u2019 signed up for an info session at Angels. I think I may have gotten a Google calendar notice,\u201d Jules recalls. That\u2019s not to say she was less interested in fostering than her wife, just that Kimberly is definitely the planner.<\/p>\n
The couple came to fostering after three years of trying to conceive through in vitro fertilization. Kimberly\u2019s pregnancies ended in miscarriage, but they still wanted to play an active and nurturing role in the lives of children. Another couple told them about their positive experience with Angels Foster Family Network, which interested them in learning more.<\/p>\n
What surprised them most at the info session was how much emotional damage can be undone when traumatized young children are placed in stable, loving homes. They say that they\u2019ve seen great changes in \u201cTiny Human,\u201d an infant who came to Kimberly and Jules severely underweight and lethargic. Now he is a healthy weight and in the top 1% in height. He enjoys going to the zoo and playing with \u201cMedium Human,\u201d an 18-month-old girl who is also placed with the couple. (Typically, Angels asks foster families to care for one child or sibling set at a time, but in the rare cases like this, when children come back into the foster care system, Angels families are offered the opportunity to care for a child again.)<\/p>\n
The couple says one of the keys to their success as foster parents is the thorough training they received in the Angels certification process. There, they learned about how to care for children who have experienced trauma, what types of services children may access, how to manage visits with biological family, and work toward reunification, among other issues. They were also introduced to the variety of support services they would receive as an Angels foster family, such as their own clinical case manager, playgroups and meet-ups.<\/p>\n
A word of warning from Kimberly, who says, \u201cYou\u2019re going to have your heart broken over and over\u201d because most foster children are reunified with their biological families. \u201cYou have to foster because you want to make an impact, not because you\u2019re hoping to adopt.\u201d Jules adds, \u201cYou have to be settled and cannot think of fostering as a way to fill a personal need because the children are the ones who have the needs. Do this to fill a hole they have instead of one that you have.\u201d<\/p>\n
The couple says fostering has had challenges. They are always tired from the children\u2019s very full schedules and routines can be interrupted by circumstances beyond their control. But fostering is worth it because they have been able to witness great changes in infants and toddlers that they have fostered. \u201cYou can see there is hope,\u201d says Jules. As for Tiny and Medium Humans\u2019 reunification with biological parents, Kimberly and Jules have a plan for that too. \u201cWe let ourselves grieve, we let ourselves feel, we let ourselves cry,\u201d Kimberly says.<\/p>\n
They don\u2019t need to consult with Zoltar to know reunification will be hard for them, but they\u2019ll be OK. Kimberly and Jules simply need to check in with one another to know that they\u2019ve made a difference in the lives of two children who are better prepared for life because of the healthy attachments they formed.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Zoltar fortunetelling machines are a big part of Jules De La Cruz\u2019s life. Part of her business is installing and maintaining these novelty attractions at local tourist destinations.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":254953,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11555","_seopress_titles_title":"Hillcrest couple fosters infants, toddlers","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11547,11551,11555],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-254952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","category-news","category-uptown-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}