ASQUITH, Sask. – Betty Love is busy as she cans peaches and bakes bread in her spacious kitchen. She needs to get a lot done before her sons get home from school.
This may sound like a typical rural household but the difference is that Betty’s sons aren’t her own. Seven years ago, after 25 years in retail management, she became a foster parent.
“I wanted to try and find something, some type of job where I could feel that I was really useful and contribute to society and also be able to stay home more,” she said.
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Love and her husband of 40 years have already raised three children of their own and now care for four long-term foster children on their acreage outside Saskatoon. The children will live with the family until they are adults.
“We requested soon after we started fostering to get long-term children. The reason for that is we felt we were able to offer them more on a long-term basis than three months at a time. The other side of it was, it was easier on our heart,” said Love.
The four boys are under the age of 11 and all come from difficult backgrounds. The children have yanked buttons off furniture and cut up the carpet on the stairs while acting out their anger.
All four have learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder.
Patience is key.
But Love said she and her husband Gerry are determined to “do our level best to get these little tigers to be adults.”
It has been beneficial to raise the children in a rural setting, she said.
“People in the city might have a totally different view (but) I can’t imagine a better situation in our circumstances with these children than where we are right now.”
The family spends a lot of time outdoors running and playing sports like baseball and hockey. Love said Gerry has built a large jungle gym for summer fun and in the winter, boards are put up and the front yard flooded for hockey games.
“We have lots of room here and it’s a lot different than you having to watch every two seconds out the door like when they’re in town. They have their baseball games here, and everything that you can imagine, they do outside,” she said.
“We’re a little old-fashioned and I suppose if you would ask the children, one of the disadvantages they would see right away is that you can’t phone for pizza.”
Heather and Rick Guard are also raising a foster family far away from pizza delivery, on a farm outside of Winfield, Alta.
“I live in the middle of nowhere and I think it’s better in some ways because the kids are able to go outside. We built a big cement pad for them to have basketball.”
Guard has been a foster parent for 13 years. She has adopted four of the children she has taken in and also has three beds for kids who arrive on a temporary basis.
With two older children of her own, Guard’s house can get full, but she said everyone works together to keep the farm running.
“Everybody has a chore. We get together after school and clean the house. I just think it’s better because we live so far away from trouble.”
Both women face challenges not dreamed of by most parents. For example, Guard has had to ask for two of the 13 foster children to be removed from her home because they were too difficult to handle.
The Loves aren’t able to keep pets because in the past the children have hurt them. However, Betty remains optimistic that as the boys get older, the family will try introducing a dog again. In the meantime, she has set up a fish tank so the children can learn the responsibilities needed when dealing with pets.
Love said the key to dealing with the difficult days is consistency in discipline and love.
“It’s real hard work. No one could ever imagine how tough it is.”
She said the children arrive at her door with no self-worth, love or respect, a void she and Gerry try to fill.
“The first couple of years we did this, I spent more time crying than anything. I just couldn’t believe it because the things that my own children and everybody I knew had taken for granted (like hugs and kisses), these kids didn’t have a clue and it’s not their fault.”
All three prairie provinces perform detailed background checks on potential foster families. This includes at-home studies, training before and during fostering, and constant support from social workers.
Marcia Bartley, president of the Saskatchewan Foster Families Association, said “part of the intake and training process takes a look at your family unit to decide if this is the right thing for you. What types of children would work best for your family unit, what age would work best?”
Love said people don’t hear enough about good foster families that make differences in children’s lives. She said a good example is the young boy who has been with them for more than seven years.
Love encourages people who want to be foster parents to first attend information sessions about fostering.
Provincial children services in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta can help direct a potential foster parent to more information.
“It’s hard to take someone else’s kids into your home and change your life to make a life for them,” said Love.
“But I would do it all again in a heartbeat.”
Foster parents fill children’s lives with love
“It’s hard to take someone else’s kids into your home and change your life to make a life for them. But I would do it all again in a heartbeat.”
