How old were you when you moved into your first apartment? Eighteen, nineteen, twenty something? Did you have room mates or maybe a spouse/partner? Do you still go “home” for the holidays? If you lost your apartment tonight who would you call and where could you stay for as long as you needed to?
The reality:
Over twenty five thousand young people between 18-21 are put out of foster care every year with no answers to the aforementioned questions. For many discharged from foster care means literally not knowing where they will sleep, eat or how they will support themselves. These are not bad kids only kids who had bad parenting.
Our mission:
Written into the mission statement and corporate identity of You Gotta Believe! The Older Child Adoption & Permanency Movement, Inc. is the concept that You Gotta Believe (YGB) is a Movement. A movement of people resources, and a common energy dedicated to achieving real time permanency for every child leaving the foster care system. Permanency as defined by the only proven measure that we know to be essential/instrumental in the physical, emotional, psychological and overall well being of every human being alive. That permanency plan is called a family system. A family system comprised of functioning adult care givers dedicated to the task of supporting a young person throughout the course of their shared time on earth.
What you can do:
Learn about adopting older children living in foster care. Adoptive parenting is not for everyone but all of us can play a role and simultaneously help build strong families. If you know a foster parent talk to them about how and why they got involved. If you’ve thought about adoption make some calls, get the answers you need and find out what’s right for you and your family.
Now is all we have: family never gets old but foster children do. www.yougottabelieve.org
