Suppose one of your kids takes forty dollars from your purse and lies about it for a week. You forgive him quickly. What you shouldn’t do is leave your purse open on the counter again. Global Forgiveness Day fell last week on July 7, and every…
The men who signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, had no idea how it would go. They were committing to a revolution whose outcome was genuinely uncertain. They could see what they were fighting for. They could not see whether it would…
If you are my friend in Kansas and surrounding states, you get this…literally. Many, many days we see multitudes of continual rain engulfing much of the roads and fields we see each day. And, even though today glared the light called sunshine, overflowing rivers and newly…
Tom Rawlings and I recorded a six-part podcast series for YSO Academy, and all six episodes are now available. The series is called “Cultivating a Culture of Safety,” and it walks through the full arc of building a child protection program from the ground up….
I spent more time than I’d like to admit trying to figure out what my foster children were doing wrong, and what I was doing wrong, before I started asking a different question. The question wasn’t why they were behaving badly. It was why their…
Recent revelations that a Maine US Senate candidate had an account on Kik, described by NBC as a “notorious chat app,” once again highlight the need for adults to protect children from the very real dangers of social media. In particular, Kik —where users can chat anonymously…
Juneteenth is one of those holidays I am never quite sure how to honor. On June 19, 1865, Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas, and told the last remaining enslaved people that the war was over and they were free. It was a remarkable moment…
May I remind you—–it’s okay! Whatever it is that you are feeling, thinking, fearing, hating, or loving I want to offer you a reassurance in the fight towards resilience by saying–it is okay! We all need to hear this. May we all read it, speak it,…
Walking down that jam-packed aisle in a waving, senior gown with a dancing-tassel and blue, tilted graduation cap awkwardly angled at the side, wearing probably mismatched socks and semi-formal, semi-cool attire, I will see my son. In less than ten short years, he will be…
Somewhere in the stack of training materials, agency handouts, therapist recommendations, and well-meaning advice you’ve collected as a foster parent, adoptive parent, or stepparent, there is research. Some of it has shaped how you think about your child. Some of it has shaped what you’ve…
National Aging Out of Foster Care Awareness Day falls on May 31, and it is one of the observances I find hardest to let pass without saying something. Not because the statistics are new to me (though they remain stunning), but because the question underneath…
Teaching life skills to teenagers is something I started thinking about far too late. I had a foster teen in my home who was smart, capable, and genuinely likeable, and I noticed much later than I should have that she had no idea how to…