HOLIDAY NEWSLETTER [2012]
Foster Care Navigator Program Happy Holiday’s from the Foster Care Navigator Program If you’re a foster, adoptive or potential foster or adoptive family the holiday season can be both extra special and tough. Being a foster parent means you have opened your hearts and home to someone who truly needs more than just gifts under the tree. They need patience, understanding and security. This is the time of the year that we need to be careful about traditions and cultures of the children who are in our care. Be mindful of how you may inadvertently hurt the feelings of the foster children in your home especially if you have biological children. All children, especially some in foster care, tend to count gifts and this often leads to hurt feelings. We also need to pay close attention to children’s demeanors during this time. Children, when first in care, often go through depression and are withdrawn. So, being overjoyed and too festive during this time of the year can cause children to withdraw deeper in depression. As you can see, this is a double edged sword. We want the children in foster care to be happy and celebrate the season as part of our family while remembering theirs during this time of the year. In all, give hugs when needed and give space when warranted.
Best wishes for the New Year!
From our family to yours Happy Holidays!]
HOLIDAY NEWSLETTER 2012
Foster Care Navigator Program The Bear with No Name by Emil Baldwin, Jr. The Bear with No Name looked out of his cabin window and watched the heavy flakes of snow fall to the ground. It was Christmas, the bear's favorite time of the year. And, even though he didn't know it was Christmas, he did know that there was something special about this time of the year. He remembered when his family found him in the deep woods and took him into their lives. He remembered all the love and affection that had been shown him over the years and he felt good as he watched and waited for them to return. He supposed that some people probably thought he was silly to have such thoughts. Some people thought he was silly to have any thoughts at all, for he was a Teddy Bear, and such things were just not supposed to happen. Maybe it was because he was a Christmas bear, or maybe it was because of all the hugs he had received, he just didn't know. But one thing was for sure, he knew he was special and was not just a stuffed animal, not just a blind observer of life. He mattered to his family and they mattered to him. He was a result of all that they had given him. And he anxiously waited to be re-united with them. Even though the above story is fiction, isn't its moral true of all the "little bears" in our lives? They are, in the end, a result of all the things that we give them. Both the good and the bad. Don't hesitate to give hugs at Christmas-time and all the year around to help "your bear" realize that they can be more tomorrow than they were yesterday.
Happy Holidays to All! Look for our next Newsletter in January 2013! 3840 Judson Center Ste. 170 Ann Arbor, MI 48105 1.888.335.3882 phone 734.528.2060 fax
Page 2