The Call . . .

It was my 30th birthday. We had spent the day relaxing, shopping and enjoying our family time. My phone rang around 3:30 in the afternoon. I answered, assuming it was my social worker calling to set up her monthly visit.

“Hey Alyse. We are looking for an emergency placement for a little boy.”

My heart started racing. I knew I had to refrain from blurting out

“YES! Yes!! We will take him”

I calmly said “ok, is he just coming into care?”

I waited for a response, even though no matter what the answer was, it wasn’t going to change my burning desire to blurt out “when will he be here?”

The social worker responded

“yes, he is just coming into care. We are looking for a long term placement so that him and his siblings can be together. We just need a place for him for a couple of nights.”

The butterflies in my stomach were officially fluttering. “How old is he?” I ask.

She replies “a year and a half”

“Ok, just let me talk to Jeremy really quick and I’ll call you right back.”

“JEREMYYYYY….. T (our social worker) just called! They need an emergency placement for a one and a half year old little boy”

He said “why was he taken into custody? How long will he be here? What is his plan of care? When does he need to come?”

Heck, I don’t know!! I’m thinking to myself…who cares? We discussed for a few minutes and he says “it’s fine with me, let’s talk to the kids.”

“Hey guuuuuys come down stairs we have to talk to you”

Kids: “Are we in trouble?”

“No you’re not in trouble. Miss T just called they have a little boy who needs a safe place to stay for a few nights, how do you guys feel about him coming here?”

The kids all started squealing “Yes! Yes! Yes!! When is he going to be here?”

I don’t know I will call Miss T back.

The phone rang, but no answer. I knew they were probably on the phone continuing down their list hoping to find a safe place for these kiddos to stay tonight.

I sent a text “Hey T, I talked to Jeremy and we can do it!”

I sat holding my phone, pacing back and forth, thinking about all the things we need to be doing, but waiting in case they found another home before we called back.

My phone buzzes “great, when can he come?”

“Anytime, we will be here”

Now the panic had set in, we needed to put sheets on the crib, pull out our bins of clothes. What size is he going to be? Is he big for his age or little for his age? Does he take a pacifier? Does he still drink bottles? Formula or milk I wonder? Will he have any clothes or diapers with him? What’s his name? I need to remember to ask if there are any medical conditions or allergies.

Oh no! The living room is a mess. “Come on guys, mommy needs help cleaning up.”

The doorbell rang. That was quick, I thought to myself. The social worker entered, holding a precious little boy. Immediately, my heart went out to him. God only knows what this child has been through and how terrified he must be. As excited as we were to have a new baby in the house, my heart broke wishing he never had to endure all that he has. “Hi buddy, how are you?” I said rubbing his back as he he nestled his face into the social workers shoulder. The social worker handed me a Walmart bag which contained all of his possessions. There was a mismatched pair of socks, a long sleeve shirt (it was July) and 2 diapers, along with some smashed up baby puffs in a ziplock bag. The social worker walked into our living room and put him down. He didn’t cry. He didn’t make a sound. He just looked around terrified. Mom mode had officially kicked in. I would do anything I could think of to make sure this child knew that he was going to be safe and loved in our home. I had my oldest daughter run to his room to grab a stuffed animal I pulled out for him. The social worker handed my husband a placement letter and had to rush out as she had two other children she needed to take to other foster homes. I said to my husband “wait, what’s his name?” He ran out the front door to catch the social worker. The kids immediately started trying to make him smile with their silly antics. They all went to find toys for him to play with. They could all empathize because each of them had been in his shoes.

As much as I just wanted to let this little boy get acquainted and decompress, the overwhelming aroma of cigarettes, along with dirty diaper and stinky clothes was enough to make anyone gasp. I checked his clothing size and rushed for my bins to see if we had anything that was going to fit. Thankfully, we had a onesie and a pair of pants.

We had plans to go to Mellow Mushroom for my favorite pizza in Charlotte that evening and my husband insisted that we still go. I told Jeremy, I am going to bathe him, you can go ahead and put a car seat in the car for him. He had started to warm up and had already smiled at my daughter. I took him upstairs and got the bath tub ready for him. I bathed him and I quickly figured out he loved the water. Thankfully so, because after his bath I wrapped him in a towel and I couldn’t help but notice the smell of cigarettes was still permeating off this precious little boy’s skin and hair. After 3 more times of soaping up and rinsing off, that was going to have to do.

My husband kept rushing me to get him dressed and ready, which is not like him. Usually, when we have a new placement, we spend the evening at home just allowing the child to get acquainted with us and with our home. Little did I know, when we arrived at Mellow Mushroom, my husband had planned a surprise party for me with about 20 people who were all waiting our late- almost an hour late- arrival. I had to laugh because this is the life of a foster family. Thankfully, everybody understood why we were late and welcomed this precious little boy with open arms.

This one phone call changed the course of our afternoon but there have been plenty of others that changed the rest of our lives.