Season 1 Episode One All Things Foster Introduction

Episode Transcript

Hello and welcome to season one, episode one of All Things Foster, a place for coffee, connection and community. Thanks for tuning in as we launch this new podcast that we hope really provides a place of connection for foster and adoptive families and the community at large. So I thought I'd start this first episode by kind of explaining who we are, what we do and why.

Why a podcast? So the organization that I run is called Panhandle Handle Orphan Care Network.

I started it in 2017 when we were faced with a situation where some kiddos came to us and we didn't have anything. They came with nothing. We didn't have anything. And the community around us, our friends and our church and things like that, they just brought us things. Diapers and clothes and shoes and just all the things that you need for some kiddos. And we just...

We just didn't have any of it. oldest daughter was married and gone. My younger daughter was getting married in a few months. And we just didn't have any of the things that we would need for these two, four, and six-year-olds. And so when the community stepped up around us, we felt supported. We felt seen. We felt valued. We felt like these kids saw value. And so we decided, we worked a couple of years on things, tried to figure out, and we

decided to start this organization and provide placement packages. So what's a placement package? A placement package is there's no specific thing that comes in a placement package. We provide six things in every placement package. One is a Suitcase a Bible and a teddy bear, and we got those from Focus on the Family.

And then we put with that a blanket, a toy, and a book. And then other than that, it's whatever they need. Each placement package costs us about $430. And so it's a lot of stuff. I mean, it can be formula, car seats, high chairs, diapers, you name it. If a kiddo needs it, we've done it at some point in the past. And so we started out, we were just providing placement packages. And I ran it while I worked full time, June of

last year, we decided to take the plunge and follow after what God was calling us to do, and I left my job and started running this organization full-time. And so, our mission is to walk with families, work with churches, and wake up the community to better carry out the biblical mandate of caring for orphans. And so, I've

thinking and praying and felt like God was putting on my heart last January, so that's January 2024, to start a podcast. And so, I just kept thinking about it and I kept thinking about it, praying about it, trying to figure out, what's the point of a podcast? Why should we have a podcast? And so, the state put out a survey last year, and one of the things that foster families asked for was

list of available resources to foster and adoptive families in this community Because there are a lot of resources out there But folks just don't know where to go how to get them and that kind of stuff and so so we decided that we would start this podcast and there's a few a few reasons For the podcast what we kind of hope to accomplish during this podcast. So the first thing is that foster families

This is a difficult, lonely journey. If you're not doing it, you don't really understand what it means. What is it? What's the cost? What do you how do you deal with with these all these different things that you're facing? And and so foster families are desperate for connection. So our our hope in this podcast is to provide a place to connect with other foster families, foster and adoptive families.

connect with them and hopefully hear some of the stories and some hope and things like that. it's a place to provide that connection with others.

Also, as I said, there's a lot of resources that are available to foster families that they just don't know about. We're going to have a lady on the podcast here in a couple of weeks. And she works for a pharmacy company that's a mail in pharmacy. And every medicine that you need that's on the monthly thing, they'll just take care of it. If you have a kiddo that's on ADHD meds, you know

that it is difficult to keep up with getting the referral, getting the prescription to the pharmacy, finding the pharmacy that has the right one at that particular time, and getting it sent to them, and going and picking it up, and all the things. this, this, this,

this pharmacy does all the work for you and bam, the prescription just shows up in the mail when it needs to. And so we're gonna have people on here that provide some sort of support resource for foster and adoptive families. And also, we're gonna try to answer some questions like what is permanent managing conservatorship? What is that? A lot of times the state wants to do that

And so what is it and is it beneficial? Is it good? What are the pros and cons of having permanent managing conservatorship? Things like that. Questions that...

are confronted with that they have no clue what in the world it means and how does it work. So we're going to hopefully answer some questions like that. We're also going to have on foster and adoptive families who want to share their struggles and just connect and give stories of hope and encouragement and things like that. so lastly, the community at large

doesn't understand this journey of foster care. And so our hope is that we can have a place to point the community to say, listen, this is what it's like to foster.

this is what it's like to adopt some kids from trauma. And these are some ways that you can support them and help them, encourage them, and things like that. And maybe it's a place where people can go to learn about how do you foster and what does it look like? Who do you talk to? What do you do?

things like that that hopefully answers some questions for the community at large.

The reality is fostering and adoption is hard. That's just the reality. There are so many things out there that cause difficulties and challenges and struggles. And so, we wanna provide that hope and that connection that, hey, there are things out there that can help you. There are people out there that can help you.

We want to be able to answer some questions and really just, as I said, our mission, walking with families, working with churches, waking up the community to better carry out the needs of kiddos in foster care.

The reality is this journey is hard. It's lonely. People don't understand what you're going through. having been in this journey for 11 years,

We don't have all the answers, but we have some experiences and we're gonna have people on that have experiences that know what this journey is like. And our hope is we do better in community. Whether you're a...

a family with a kiddo with autism, you do better in community with families that have a child with autism. Because those other families, understand what you're going through. so foster families are no different. Adopted families are no different. We have experiences that we can share with each other that those that are in the community, they really don't understand.

And so we do better when we have a place to connect. We do better when we have people around us that encourage us and support us and love on us and know what we're going through. And so our hope through this podcast is really to provide that sense of community. You are not alone.

There are so many families across this community that understand what you're going through and that hopefully you can turn to and just get that sense of support that you're not alone. Other people are doing this and it is hard, but.

It's good. It's good. We see redemption stories all the time. Times when kiddos have been through so much trauma and they're lashing out and they're struggling and they don't understand what's going on around them. So we do, we see stories of hope. see...

generational curses being broken. The reality is trauma begets trauma begets trauma. And so what we're called to do is to provide a safe and loving home for kids once they've been through this really difficult situation. They're coming into this system because of brokenness.

And the way that you overcome that brokenness is by connection and love and support and encouragement. The reality is, we have seen in our walk with our kids, we've seen generational curses being broken.

We've seen it in our friends who are going through the same struggles that we're going through. We've seen that the cycle can be broken. And our hope is to provide that connection, that encouragement to you foster families that are out there that are struggling with this whole thing and provide some hope, some encouragement.

some places to turn to when you don't know what to do. You're facing this struggle and you don't know how to help, how to encourage these kids, how to get the people around you to understand what you're going through, because that's a real thing.

And so, you know, we've had folks in our community that have just said some things that they really didn't understand what in the world they were saying. And it hurt. And it was like, my goodness, you have no idea what you're talking about. And so, our hope is, again, to provide that sense of connection and community to foster and adoptive families and also a place for the community to turn to to say,

This is what these families are going through and this is how you can help. Here's some organizations that you can partner with to wrap around these families. We need volunteers. You can't have a nonprofit function without volunteers. We need folks that work at the Moses Closets. We have three Moses Closets around the panhandle handle. Our main Moses Closet is at Pleasant Valley Methodist.

I'm gonna post some pictures of our Moses closet there. You'll be able to see kind of what it looks like. We have a Moses closet at First Baptist in Claude, and then we have one in Pampa. And we need volunteers to work up there, organize. Everything's laid out with outfits, so we can just walk in and grab outfits, or grab a blanket, grab a Bible, and those kinds of things. And so it takes volunteers to work at the closet to make it

organized, have, we need volunteers to run placement packages. We cover the 26 counties of the Panhandle. So that's the size of West Virginia. That's a whole state and we cover that area. And so, you know, we have to run placement packages to Perryton or Plainview or Dalhart or Dumas and all over the 26 counties. And so that's a huge area.

So we have volunteers that once we gather up everything for a placement package, we send it out to them and we say, is anybody available to go to this place or that place? And so it takes volunteers to do that. It takes funding. takes volunteers working fundraisers. We're selling raffle tickets right now for a pistol. It's $5 a piece or $5 for 20. And we're setting up at vendor shows and stuff all over. And so it takes volunteers to sit at the table and say,

I'm sorry.

Would you like to buy a raffle ticket? So it takes volunteers. And so we hope that we'll have organizations on that says, hey, this is the kind of volunteer that we need. This is what we do. Court appointed special advocates, CASAs, we need CASAs. And they have a voice in court only for the kids. And so the community will have a place to say, OK, I want to serve. How do I serve? are some different things that I can do to support those families and those children.

that have volunteer opportunities and places for the community to turn to. We'll have organizations on that provide some service to foster and adoptive families. And we're gonna have foster and adoptive families on here to just talk about their journey, talk about the things that they need and that other people that they know need, right? And so again, a place for coffee, because I'm all about some coffee, a place for

connection with others, other foster and adoptive families, other resources that are out there and a place for community. We do better when we're around people that have similar beliefs and thoughts and things like that. so, so, so again, our hope and our desire in this podcast is to really provide that

that connection, that sense of community that foster and adoptive families desperately need. And so if you're interested in our organization, you can go to our website, it's pahandleorphan.org. You can go to our website, our Facebook page. If you just search for Panhandle Handle Orphan Care Network, you'll find it. If you're interested in learning more, you can shoot me an email at panhandleorphan@gmail.com.

email.org. If you're interested in being on the podcast, shoot me an email. Send me a message on Facebook. We would love to have you on to tell your story, to get to know you and what things benefit you and help you. So thank you for tuning in. This is kind of a short intro episode and thank you to our sponsor again. And so guys, if you're interested,

and learning more, check us out, follow us on Facebook. We have an Instagram account and check out our website. Again, thanks for tuning in to All Things Foster, a place for coffee, connection, and community.