Wonder: Fostering and My Child’s Backseat Role

I watched the 2017 movie “Wonder” last night about a little boy entering middle school with a facial deformity.  It’s a story about bullying, perseverance in the face of hardship, and the effect of one child’s special needs on his entire family.  Your heart goes out to the main character, August Pullman, who gets used to studying people’s shoes rather than facing the judgment on their faces.  But as I was watching, I was more drawn to the character of Via, August’s older sister, as she navigated a universe in which she played second fiddle to August’s needs.

In the film, Via describes her world by saying, “August is the sun.  My mom and dad and me are planets orbiting the sun.  But I love my brother and I’m used to the way this universe works.  I never needed my mom to help me with my homework.  I never needed my dad to help me study for a test.  I just did most of my studying in waiting rooms and hospitals.  Mom and Dad always said I was the most understanding girl in the world.  I don’t know about that.  I just knew my family couldn’t take one more thing.”

Watching the film made my heart sink a little… because that’s my son.  My nearly 5-year-old little boy is almost always secondary to the needs of his younger foster siblings.  The younger kids have their weekly therapies, staffing, appointments, and visitation.  Our schedule revolves around them.  People are in and out of our home because of them.  Their needs far exceed my son’s, and if I was honest, those needs occupy the majority of my thoughts and prayers.

I planned on getting a jumpstart on my son’s schooling this year.  He’s a year too young for starting school, but he’s bright and motivated to learn.  I’m a teacher by trade, so I figured it wouldn’t be too difficult to give homeschooling a shot.  We’re 3 months into the school year.  Ask me how it’s going.

We’ve essentially put the whole thing on hold to spend time with his younger foster siblings before they go home.  Even before we got the news the kids were leaving, our school day was always dependent on what appointments we had that day or put on pause because a bored toddler managed to wedge herself behind the couch and needed saving.  Of course as soon as you finish consoling that child, the baby wakes up and you can just forget addition for the next hour.

Yesterday, we had a homeschool field trip to a confection shop.  The owner was a foster parent and asked that the kids bring in a toy to donate to foster children for Christmas instead of charging us a fee for the trip.  At the end of the tour and a lot of sugar later, she gathered all the kids around and explained that the toys they brought in were for kids who won’t be able to spend Christmas at home with their moms and dads.  This is a message my child has heard many times, in many different forms: we give whatever we can to people who need it.

I watched my son look down at a cookie he had made as part of the field trip.  He had just asked if he could eat it as soon as he got home, but now he studied it for a second and handed it to the shop owner.  “Here.  They can have this,” he said and turned to talk to a friend sitting next to him.

I was proud of him.  I love his generous heart, which he definitely gets from his dad and not me.  A part of me also felt a twinge of sadness for my boy who so often voluntarily, and involuntarily, comes in last.  This is a character trait I prayed he would develop, but it also hit on something I’ve been lacking in my parenting: making him feel like he also deserves good things.

Last year sometime, I wrote a post about how fostering has positively affected my son.  I still agree with what I wrote back then, but I suppose  I’m now realizing how my own parenting has changed.  I’m more aware of how my son’s universe has changed to revolve around our foster children.  It may still be a net positive, but I need to take a good, hard look at our universe and what we’re orbiting around.

When I am on my knees praying and pleading God for these kids’ safety, where is my son?  Do I pray as hard as I do for them and their obvious, demanding needs as I do for my own child?  Does he have as many people in his week who are focused on him, intent on his well-being, and who are there to support him, hear him, and lift him up?  Or in some ways, is he the one falling through the cracks?

If he is, it’s entirely on me to change that.