- One in five youth aging out of foster care become homeless immediately.
- Connections and relationships are crucial for preventing homelessness.
- Teen pregnancy among foster youth is often a desire for family.
- Generational foster care perpetuates cycles of disadvantage.
- Mentorship can provide essential life skills to foster youth.
- Foster care is a significant predictor of future incarceration.
- Housing alone does not solve the problem; connection is key.
- Support for foster youth should include practical life skills training.
- Community involvement can make a difference in the lives of foster youth.
- Wisdom and worth are essential in preventing teen pregnancy.
TRANSCRIPT:
Courtney (00:01.976)
Hello and welcome to the Foster Friendly Podcast. My name is Courtney Williams interviewing co-host Brian Mavis today. Brian, how are you today?
Brian Mavis (00:12.022)
You know, it is a gorgeous day out here on the front range, about 70, sunny, beautiful. And so that helps, except I’m inside. All right. How is it over out in the west, western side of the mountains? All right. OK, nice. All right.
Courtney (00:21.002)
Yeah, it does help. Maybe we can get outside after this. I always have high hopes for my days. Like, I’m going to go for a walk. It’s beautiful. Almost 80 today. So yes, I’m itching to get outside. So yeah, there we go. It’s very easy. Four topics today.
Brian Mavis (00:40.448)
Yeah, all right. Let’s make this a fast one. Everything’s fine, people. Yeah, that’s right. Yeah, four topics, not three.
Courtney (00:51.466)
Well, today we are, yeah, yeah. So we’ve got a big feat ahead of us continuing our side series here on your book, Go Upstream. We’ve done previous episodes on the social wounds one through six and today we are doing seven through 10. So.
Brian Mavis (01:04.181)
Yes.
Yes, homelessness, incarceration, teen pregnancy, and generational foster care.
Courtney (01:12.302)
Awesome. And again, your book. I want to give just a brief snob that if anybody hasn’t listened to the previous episodes, tell us a little bit about the book.
Brian Mavis (01:18.274)
Yeah, the book was born out of this, well, realizing that kids who age out of foster care without being connected to the family are kind of the leading demographic into these 10 other social wounds. And unless we help these kids be a part of a family, we’re likely to see them with these services later in life dealing with.
what, you know, incarceration, like we’re talking today, or homelessness or teen pregnancy, those kinds of things. The other reason to write it though was when people who care about the community, church leaders, community leaders, you know, the average person who just cares, when they look around, they think, what, what issues are there? Well, let’s solve, help solve homelessness or mental health or human trafficking. And it was like, but nobody really thinks foster care.
And foster care is the root of these other things. And so the whole idea was, how about go upstream, help these kids have a family so that they don’t need some social services in these other issues 10 years from now. And so trying to elevate foster care so that people think about it when they think about these other issues.
Courtney (02:39.788)
Yeah. Okay. So let’s dive in then. Let’s dive into the first one for today’s homelessness. Yeah. Tell us the story that you kick off that chapter and the connection there.
Brian Mavis (02:43.958)
Yes.
Brian Mavis (02:47.82)
Yeah. So let’s kick off that story, a chapter with the story of Deandre. He was 17 and a half when we met him and he was, if people are familiar with our work, one of our key signature programs is the I Belong Project where we have filmed kids and we’ve upped them like 4,000 now. They’ve never turned a kid away. And Deandre was 17 and a half and desperate for a family. And, but his story ends sadly because
Uh, he was 17 and a half. He was a boy. He wasn’t white, those kinds of things. Uh, but he had a great reputation in child welfare, super kind, good grades, good student. Um, and so people were like, he’s a great kid and, um, but he didn’t get picked. And so, uh, we, after he, we kind of kept that, you know, in internal clock in our head of like, Hey, DeAndre, think is aged out. He’s turned 18. So within a week of him turning 18.
We reached out to Child Welfare to see if we could check in on him. And they said, we have no idea where he is. We’ve heard rumors that he’s living on the streets. And so he just personifies that he did everything right, even though, but within a week, and that might have been the very next day of aging out, he was homeless.
Courtney (04:13.811)
yeah, so sad and does seem like it’s a common thing for kids who age out. What is how common is it?
Brian Mavis (04:19.16)
It is. Yeah, it’s so roughly one in five are homeless within the day. You know, they turn 18, they’re out of the system, they’re homeless that day. A quarter experience homelessness within the first year and up to half experience it within the first four years of aging out. so and then overall compared to their peers who aren’t in foster care.
Kids who’ve been in foster care who’ve aged out, not connected to the family are 10 times more likely to be homeless than their peers.
Courtney (04:54.378)
Hmm. Yeah. And like you mentioned, like just not having that connection with somebody to help them through this next phase of life. And that’s probably why, I I guess a lot of these social wounds are probably why they’ve increased the age limit on foster care. Like a lot of states it’s 21 or 22 now.
Brian Mavis (05:08.024)
Yes, and what’s interesting is extending those services. I looked into that because the whole idea of extending those services is give them a few more years in the system so that they can become more stable. And I think it’s a good thing and it’s a good idea. But the reality is they end up being homeless at 21 instead of 18. And it just delays homelessness.
Not unless they do get connected to family.
Courtney (05:42.358)
Yeah. And also in our experience, they have to choose that, right? They have to be in foster care, many places, till 18, but they often will choose not to stay in the extended. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (05:47.224)
That’s right. That’s right. Yeah. And so, and sometimes they feel like, that was a mistake. And then they like want to go back and like get some more support. then it’s, you know, at one time in Colorado, they couldn’t even change their mind. I think we helped change the law on that. So one of our interns did that once. Yeah.
Courtney (06:14.158)
Okay, awesome. So what drives that link between homelessness and foster care?
Brian Mavis (06:18.616)
Yeah, yeah, what drives it is, you know, there’s no, obviously, there’s no family safety net. And again, just think about kids in general, or if you’re of the age and have kids, lots of 18 to 21 year olds, 99 % of them are still getting a lot of help from their family. And so they lean on them. And these kids don’t have that kind of help. So family safety net.
Another one would be limited access to job training and budget helps. Again, just kind of those normal things that family can provide. The other one is prior homelessness with their birth family. It kind of feels normal to them. You know, they as a kids, you know, with their birth family, living in shelters or cars, some of them. And so this is what they know. And then the other thing is just repeated moves. If they’re moving a lot,
in foster care from home to home, they get this feeling of I have a house but not a home. And so it’s easy for them not to have a home, easier.
Courtney (07:28.62)
Yeah, yeah. I’ve noticed in a lot of kids that come, quite a few of them have come into our care and like with this one boy that came in, he was like, your house is just too clean for me. I’m not used to cleanliness, know, and like stability. Like some of those things just don’t feel natural to them. Cause if they weren’t raised that way, it feels uncomfortable.
Brian Mavis (07:32.725)
Thank
Brian Mavis (07:37.782)
Yeah
Brian Mavis (07:45.112)
Yes, that’s true. so even if when you’re trying to help in those ways, you’ve got to realize what their normal has felt like. And some of them have an unusual amount of familiarity with chaos and things that aren’t secure. And somehow they feel safer there until they don’t.
Courtney (08:15.106)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So what prevents homelessness best? How can we help in this area?
Brian Mavis (08:20.79)
Well, kids who are either reunified or are adopted or have a connection with some sort of family, their foster family, are dramatically less likely to be homelessness. So it is relationships. That’s the thing that changes outcomes. So when you see people who are homeless on the street and you would
if somehow you were to discover they were in foster care and again, many, of them were, they weren’t the ultimate bottom line isn’t because they’re poor or because they’re starting to, you know, take drugs or not employed. It’s because they didn’t have relationships that kept them from all those other things as well.
Courtney (09:16.43)
So as foster parents or communities, people listening that aren’t fostering, what can we do right now to support this cause?
Brian Mavis (09:24.056)
Yeah, so if you know a teen that’s in foster care or one that’s aged out is one, being their life, be a mentor. A lot of kids at that age, some will want a family and some not until later life, but some are so sick of being rejected or being in the system they don’t want a family, but they do.
do want connection, they want mentors. And so you can help them by mentoring them with life skills that they probably don’t have, like understanding how credit cards work and debit cards and how not to use credit cards and having a budget and how to sign leases and how to cook, those kinds of things. And so many of those things though, they need so much that it might be too much for one person.
So it would be something where, either something like in your church, start kind of like a success team and you’d have like 10 people surrounding a youth. And so that kind of thing of like, get a team of people together and help that youth over the next couple of years get to where they are connected and moving toward independence.
But it’s the connected part that really matters.
Courtney (10:52.334)
Okay. Well, before we move on to our next one, close us out on homelessness. What can you leave us with?
Brian Mavis (11:00.152)
I say, yeah, housing ends the crisis for a night, but family ends the pattern of homelessness.
Courtney (11:13.08)
good. Yeah, housing versus connection.
Brian Mavis (11:16.15)
Yes. And that again, you’re going to hear connection and family and relationships the whole way through. It’s it. Yeah.
Courtney (11:19.022)
Okay.
It’s the key, yeah. Okay, let’s talk about incarceration a little bit. Kick us off with this again, the story of, is it Kisa? Kisa.
Brian Mavis (11:31.139)
Kisa, yeah, and Kisa, yeah, in that story, she was in foster care, now an adult, and is in prison. And it was interesting that I was tempted to have a male represent this one, because they’re more likely to be in prison. But is.
I don’t know, kind of joked people like it’s not just guys, women too. the key thing that she said is as a kid in foster care, she said she felt like a throwaway. And it was that feeling that kind of led to her own feeling of I don’t matter. And so why should I care about my life? Nobody else cares about my life, which leads to.
risky choices, which leads to, you know, kind of things that are now becoming illegal. And one thing leads to the other. And so it was this feeling of being not valuable that kind of led to what they felt like was inevitable. They were like they had the who cares attitude until again, they get older and they’re like.
They’re sad that they have felt this way and it’s led to this.
Brian Mavis (13:07.926)
Yeah, a large share of people behind bars have had foster care histories. so it might be something that doesn’t surprise people. Again, statistics, sometimes they really vary by quite a bit. And I can’t really figure out why one place might say it’s 20 or 30 % of their prison population, and another place says it’s 80%.
It’s again just like homelessness a lot of people in prison have had a foster care history and the other part of that is It’s group home so that that one’s also seems to have More likelihood if that’s been how they’ve been raised is in a group home more likelihood into prison I do want to say
Courtney (13:53.314)
Okay.
Brian Mavis (14:07.436)
There are good foster homes and there are bad foster homes. There are good group homes and bad group homes. But I think that what really makes the difference is group homes, even good ones, still don’t feel like family.
Courtney (14:21.494)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. it’s been, mean, there’s been a push nationwide to close down group homes and there’s reality of why kids do better, youth do better in a family, but we need more trained foster families that are able to equip to handle the big things. So yeah, it’s like.
Brian Mavis (14:29.399)
Yeah.
Brian Mavis (14:33.6)
Right. Yeah. So yeah, that was kind of what, yeah, that’s a catch 22 because there is that push, but there aren’t enough families. So they probably needed to build up one thing before they close the other thing and they did it in reverse order.
Courtney (14:48.396)
Yeah. So Brian, is it fair to say that foster care is the cause of incarceration?
Brian Mavis (14:52.568)
You know, yeah, that is one of the, I think, conclusions you can make. this is something I wanted to like is foster care the reason that these kids go into care? it, know, that and there so I wasn’t the only one to ask it because I did find a study that showed like if a kid is in.
foster care versus say have two kids in foster care and then one is reunified with a bio family but it’s kind of ill-advised. So one child stays in a stable safe home and foster care one is in the bio family and it’s not stable or safe. The kid in foster care is far less likely to have
problems with the law than the one who was reintroduced unwisely to their bio family. So foster care actually can act as the interruption of what might be what feels like the inevitable path. kind of this contrast of a little bit of what we were seeing earlier, what they’re so familiar with. Some kids, though, do react really positively like, here was normal.
Courtney (15:57.775)
That’s it. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (16:17.108)
Here’s what I thought normal life was chaos and danger. And now I’m in a different home. That’s like, I didn’t know it could be like this. And I’m wanting to lean into that kind of life and values and culture versus what I was first raised in. And that ends up interrupting that path towards prison.
Courtney (16:33.358)
Yeah.
Courtney (16:44.62)
Yeah. Yeah, we just interviewed on the podcast, two former foster youth in the last couple of weeks and both of them said that very thing. Like they got exposed to somebody or some situation, not even necessarily living with them, but they were exposed to a situation where they’re like, this could be reality. This is what normal might look like. And then realized they didn’t want that for themselves. So yeah, I could totally see that being.
Brian Mavis (16:52.388)
really?
Brian Mavis (16:57.622)
Mmm, mm-hmm.
Brian Mavis (17:02.017)
Right.
Brian Mavis (17:06.252)
Yeah, yeah.
Courtney (17:08.558)
So what breaks this, what we call foster care to prison pipeline?
Brian Mavis (17:12.052)
Yeah, that’s a phrase that I saw over and over again. It’s funny because there is a foster care to everything pipeline, foster care to homelessness, foster care to addiction, but it’s always foster care to prison pipeline that’s the one that’s used in that phrase. And so first of all, there have to be enough foster families, again, just like we were saying earlier.
Overuse of group homes, it doesn’t have near the effect of family, family life does, to help have a kid see a different kind of future for themselves. So there aren’t enough foster families and we need more. Educational continuity helps too. Again, that is all part of it, getting bounced around if you’re going from one place to the next or group homes, education, just have too much, too many disruptions.
Also just that they are getting, it’s interesting because the social wounds aren’t essentially siloed. And so they also need like healthcare and mental healthcare and counseling and those kinds of things that you might say, hey, that fits under social wounds of physical illness or something like that. It’s like, yeah, but.
It all kind of intertwines. then a true, you know, kind of a launch support similar to homelessness of like have a team that says here’s here’s the path to success. Graduating from high school, getting a skill, some sort of trade, getting married before you have babies. I mean, it’s like that’s the that’s the that’s the plan.
Courtney (19:07.47)
Yeah. Okay, so.
Brian Mavis (19:09.364)
And that’s something that they probably like, we didn’t know that that’s, that wasn’t, you know, the kind of path that you need to have to thrive.
Courtney (19:17.656)
Hmm. Yeah, yeah. And we can show them that. I mean, we can support them in those areas for sure. Close us out on this one too, Brian. What’s your one-liner here?
Brian Mavis (19:22.05)
Yeah.
Brian Mavis (19:26.774)
Well, yeah, the word connections going to come out again. It’s huh. Cages don’t heal kids connections to.
Courtney (19:28.942)
Surprise!
Courtney (19:35.598)
Okay, let’s move into the, what is this, the ninth social wound, teen pregnancy. And you start this off with Kaylee’s story and that story of being very tender and complex. What does it show you about teen pregnancy?
Brian Mavis (19:42.464)
Ninth one, yes, teen pregnancy.
Brian Mavis (19:48.727)
Yeah.
Brian Mavis (19:52.119)
Yeah, Kaylee, again, in foster care, and she had a child young. And it’s just what I say about this. It’s a common thing. in her particular story, the great thing was she kept the child. And there was a f****g
a family who said, you know, we’re going to help you the best we can that you help raise this child. so, it, you know, in the few paragraphs I give it, you can see when you read it that it wasn’t easy and it was complex and there was a lot of twists and turns. But to this day, she does have her child.
Courtney (20:50.414)
That’s great. So how different are the odds for youth within foster homes and the history of foster care of teen pregnancy?
Brian Mavis (20:58.74)
Yeah, so kids in foster care have a much higher sexual activity than their peers. And they’re far more likely, like three times more likely to be pregnant by the time they’re 19. And then, of course, there are boys involved. so it applies to them as well. There are much more.
Courtney (21:21.27)
Yeah. Surprise. Another surprise. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (21:27.272)
likely to be sexually active and to impregnate compared to their peers. And I said three times. Yeah, so this man, this was one of the more interesting ones when it comes to reasons why. The first one was they wanted their own family. They were like, I’m going to my family is going to be different. I’m going to be different. I’m going to have someone who will love me and someone I will love.
Courtney (21:35.094)
So why, why do those happen higher?
Brian Mavis (21:57.089)
So at 16, 17, know, whenever they are, they’re like, I’m going to create my own family. And so it’s very intentional. It’s not recklessness. They’re wanting a new family. The other one that was really interesting to me was just social acceptance among their peers. This particular demographic, it’s not only
Courtney (22:06.711)
Interesting.
Brian Mavis (22:25.528)
would one person think that way that they want their own family, all the peers are thinking similarly. And so it’s encouraged. Then sadly, this ties also, when again talking about, they’re not all exactly siloed. This one ties to the human trafficking side is just what I call like relationship abuse or reproductive coercion.
So because they’re in relationship, it’s not a good relationship and there’s unsafe sex and coercion happening. And then lastly, because they’re in the system, even if they want contraceptive help, it’s hard for them to get while they’re in the system.
Courtney (23:20.142)
Interesting. Do you happen to know, I’m just curious with the rise of electronics, is this more of an issue now than it was before? Do you know the numbers like now versus 20 years ago or 10 years ago?
Brian Mavis (23:32.166)
Honestly, I don’t. mean…
Courtney (23:33.558)
Okay, I’m just curious if it makes it worse because they often are lowered into situations or exposed to things, you know, I don’t know. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (23:38.944)
Right, right. Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah. I don’t, yeah, I don’t know.
Courtney (23:44.795)
What can caregivers do and how can they respond wisely?
Brian Mavis (23:49.155)
Well, if you are a foster family, you gotta talk about sex. You gotta have that talk. so it’s giving them accurate information. talk about how to be safe. You can even have your preferences when it comes to abstinence. And you can introduce that, that might blow their minds, say you don’t know.
the also the reality of having a child, like it may sound, romantic to them, but that it’s like, Hey, this is actually a very having a child is the hardest thing you’re going to ever do. And so it’s just direct talk, setting goals and then showing them a future where they can have a child. But again, back to kind of,
in the right order at the right time. And then all that too sounds like we’re just talking to the girls. The boys need this talk too. And they need to see, know, role models of dad life.
Courtney (24:50.818)
Yeah, that’s great.
Courtney (24:56.61)
Hmm.
Courtney (25:03.215)
Yeah. And I just, as a foster parent, if you need help talking with those things, you know, bring in the caseworkers, bring in the therapists. It’s okay to bring other people if you’re not comfortable with it. I’ve also noticed we have to have these conversations with kids in care earlier than maybe we would have our biological kids because they’ve already been exposed to things. They come to our house talking about stuff at a younger age, you know.
Brian Mavis (25:21.814)
Get out.
That’s right. Yes, that’s right. Because you might think, gosh, I probably don’t need to talk about this until they’re 15. It’s like, whoa, no. Yeah. And so again, it’s so much of this talking too isn’t just like, hey, the birds and the bees and the facts. I want to say this. It’s speaking worth into their life. It’s like, you matter. You’re important.
Courtney (25:31.31)
Too late.
Brian Mavis (25:53.857)
You don’t need someone to sleep with you to tell you that you’re valuable. You don’t need to have a baby to be valuable. You matter.
Courtney (26:04.006)
Yeah, I would also add, just open up that door and make them know that they can come to you for anything. And I tell them, like, text me. If you’re not comfortable having a one-on-one conversation, text me the question or write it on a notepad and leave it on my pillow or whatever it might be. Because sometimes they’re not comfortable bringing something up that they might be questioning or thinking about. But we need to be the ones to initiate those conversations, but then open that door of like, you can come to me and talk to me about anything. And I think they just need to hear this when I’m too, like, this adult actually cares about all these areas of my life. So, yeah.
Brian Mavis (26:30.7)
Yes. Yeah, yes. Very good, yeah.
Courtney (26:36.398)
Okay, close this out on T-pregnancy brain.
Brian Mavis (26:38.296)
Yeah, this one is a little tougher on saying it well, but it had to kind of do where we just landed right here about this idea. It’s when wisdom, you know, we’re sharing, and worth are taught, prevention happens. pregnancy prevention happens. So give wisdom, give worth.
Courtney (26:56.302)
Hmm.
Courtney (27:02.018)
Yeah. Yeah. So worthiness, that’s such an important thing. Okay, then we’ll close out with our the 10th social wound.
Brian Mavis (27:07.852)
Yeah.
Brian Mavis (27:12.52)
Yes. And this one, again, I want people to understand it’s the 10th one and doesn’t kind of like end. It’s the one that loops you back in a circle back to where we start all over again. It’s generational foster care. The idea of, hey, my mom was in foster care or my parents were. Now I’m in foster care. I have a child and now they’re going to be in foster care. And so it’s.
It’s the never-ending cycle.
Courtney (27:45.815)
Yeah, this is a little personal to me because you start this off with story of Melissa, who was somebody very dear to me. She just recently passed away, which was very hard for her family to hear. But yeah, share a little bit about Melissa and her losing her kids after being in foster care herself.
Brian Mavis (28:02.39)
Okay, yeah, I interviewed you on this issue and you just shared some with me. I didn’t know.
Courtney (28:08.846)
Yeah, we just found that out. It’s interesting because, not interesting, it’s really sad, but every time we do something and we’ll get more into this of just what foster parents can do, but we have rallied around Melissa. loved her so much.
Brian Mavis (28:21.612)
Yeah, you tell this story. It’s your story. It’s not mine to share for you. So tell the audience about Melissa.
Courtney (28:29.258)
Yeah, so we were introduced to Melissa as foster parents, got her two kids placed in our care. And right during COVID, it was literally the day the world shut down, March 12, 2020, is the day they came to our house. So we started getting to know her because we had an infant baby and two-year-old child, and all visits were online. So we would, you know, I have a baby and a two-year-old that I’m trying to get them to interact with her, so I had to be there for every single visit. So we really got to know her pretty quick, way quicker than we usually do. And then once visits got opened up in person,
I’d go meet her at downtown Denver and she’d wait for me outside. We’d show up together. She’d help me get the kids out of the car. We’d go take the long elevator up this big building and she would just open up. And she told me at the very beginning, one of the first times we met in person, that she was in foster care. And she just shared her story and said, you know, this was my story too. She shared that she had her care when she was, I believe it was seven, was in care for many years, ended up being incarcerated her last year and then had her first child. That child goes on to be adopted.
And then her next two children come along and they’re in our care. And we tried really hard to just open our hearts and homes to her as well as her kids. And unfortunately, I think a lot of it had to do with COVID and just not being able to see the kids at first and kind of fell back into substance abuse. And then we got a little bit better and then kept on falling back and they kept giving her time. And eventually they terminated her rights. And so we went to adopt them. And I will say,
If people don’t know, one of the worst days of my life was what it’s called the goodbye visit. They’re supposed to have this goodbye visit to be like their last visit with this parent whose rights were just terminated. And we sat there and she wasn’t sure, like, are they going to close themselves off to me? Is this like, is this goodbye? And we looked at her and just told her like, no, this is not goodbye. There’s no way me as a mom could say, I know your history. I know you were raised in this system and now your kids are in the system. And you’re just never going to see her talk to them again.
Brian Mavis (30:19.618)
Mm-hmm.
Courtney (30:27.362)
And so we chose, there’s no such thing as open adoption and foster care, which that’s my, I think that’s ridiculous. It’s my own opinion. But we chose to have that openness and it really was a beautiful thing. And so I have, you know, it’s been, boy, five years now since we adopted the two. And we have, we send pictures, we have visited her. She’s been to our home. We’ve done holidays together. We’ve done birthdays together and just seeing what she has been through in her life. And she recognized that she has thanked us.
She did thank us over and over and over again. so I would, anytime we would take a picture, I’d go to take a picture of the kids and I’d send it to them. And just most recently, I went to go take a picture at a wedding, super cute picture of the two of them. I’m standing here at this wedding and I go to text it to her. And as I text it to her, I see a message from her mom telling me that she had passed away. Like as I’m in process of texting her a picture of the two kids. And it just, I mean, it broke us. We ended up leaving the wedding a little early and just, but yeah, it’s.
Brian Mavis (31:22.264)
I’m so sorry, yeah.
Courtney (31:25.422)
It’s hard as a foster parent not to be judgmental, but when you do think of this generational cycle, that is so rampant. mean, it’s common. I don’t know if it’s true. I heard at one point that this is the number one predictor of whether a kid’s gonna be in foster care as if their biological parent was. Is that true?
Brian Mavis (31:41.187)
Right. Yes. And so that was what I learned too. So there are other factors, of course. And so one of the ones that we bring up and believe is that substance abuse is a big reason kids are in foster care and untreated mental health and housing insecurity and those kinds of things. So there are those reasons. But the most predictable factor
is like, is this kid going to end up in foster care? Find out if their mom was in foster care. If they were, that’s the best predictor that it’ll just repeat the cycle.
Courtney (32:21.742)
And again, it goes back to, you when you meet these people, look at them as human beings and not just judging. Because if we get to know their past, you could often see the reason behind it.
Brian Mavis (32:30.104)
Yeah, you’re like, gosh, this was their life. And now this what they know. And again, back to what they know feels familiar and they repeat it.
Courtney (32:34.702)
Hmm.
Courtney (32:39.916)
Yeah. And often if they don’t have like these other things, incarceration, and if they don’t have those supports to not have those things being their reality, then they’re going to likely be incarcerated or pregnant or homeless and then starts to cycle again.
Brian Mavis (32:51.678)
Mm-hmm. Or addicted and yeah, that’s, mean, I guess I won’t guess on what, how Melissa died.
Courtney (33:00.842)
Yeah. So what interventions help most before removal happens?
Brian Mavis (33:06.904)
Well, it’s pairing young moms with other moms and people in just saying, here’s how to mom and making sure that, you know, part of that is like just pediatric care or prenatal care if it’s before. And it’s just having what you were just saying, a grace-filled relationship.
Courtney (33:18.318)
Hmm.
Brian Mavis (33:36.894)
It’s getting past like you’re blowing it and just saying, trying to be understanding, showing them grace, showing them how to mom. I don’t know what the success rate is on that, but it’s the right thing to do and the success rate is better than zero.
Courtney (34:02.072)
Yeah, I’ve often said that I wish as a foster parent that they would let us foster their mom sometimes as well. We actually asked during COVID, we said, could she move into our basement? Like, we’ll welcome her into the home. She can mother these two and we’ll show her, we’ll teach her. And of course, they wouldn’t allow that. But I’m like, that’s one of those cases where I could have seen, we had such a sweet relationship. I could have seen that working.
Brian Mavis (34:09.304)
Yes Yeah
Brian Mavis (34:20.554)
Yes.
I the way that, I love the way you said that, yeah.
Courtney (34:30.222)
Okay, so what’s your take on adoption in these situations?
Brian Mavis (34:32.16)
Well, yeah, you beat me to the punch. I agree. think, I mean, you said it that in this in the world of foster care, even private adoptions, you can have an open adoption world of foster care that is not allowed or certainly not encouraged. But you you’re kind of using your own discernment, own judgment. And if you believe it’s a safe, healthy
connection then that can be a good thing for the kid to help them know that their mom didn’t reject them or doesn’t love them but she’s just not capable of raising them but she’s still in their life.
Courtney (35:23.886)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. And I feel like, you know, our two are young still, but we have older kids that we adopted and that’s what they want to have. Even that validation that the birth mom or dad thinks is okay that they’re in our home. They don’t love that that’s their situation. And so you shared a couple of the text messages in your book of the quotes that Melissa shared back and forth with me. I have the, I I went, as soon as we found out she passed away, I went and I saved those text messages and did
Brian Mavis (35:43.223)
Yeah.
Brian Mavis (35:49.144)
Hmm
Courtney (35:49.703)
secret, you know, multiple places that I want our kids as they grow up to see those messages to know. She wasn’t happy this was the outcome, but she was okay with you guys being here because she got to know us and loved us and felt comfortable with you being in our home. Yeah. Okay. Tenth one, Brian, what’s your one-liner for this one, this generational foster care? Okay. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (35:54.455)
Yes.
Brian Mavis (36:03.473)
important. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (36:12.8)
changing it and I’m stealing yours foster the mom and the child.
Courtney (36:20.084)
Yeah. And it’s interesting, we actually have a boy coming to our house tomorrow who’s being placed with us. And we just met his dad this morning at an icebreaker meeting. And my husband said to the comment, this is like the first time we’re working one-on-one with a dad. It’s actually the second time the first one he was in. We couldn’t really have a relationship with him. But this will be the first dad that we’re working with. It’s usually the moms, but it could be the dads. Yeah. There you go. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (36:36.056)
yeah.
Brian Mavis (36:41.24)
So, okay, I may adjust, yeah. Yeah, foster the parent, we’ll say, yeah, yes. Or parents, yes. Uh-huh. Yeah, that’s a great one-liner, all right.
Courtney (36:52.878)
Okay, what actions do want people to take this week as we consider these things?
Brian Mavis (36:57.664)
Yeah, so as we kind of wrap up those 10 wounds, just continue to think what could be my next thing, next way to help. And so one is, see, you know, do you know a foster family? And do something to show appreciation, do something practical for them, and don’t just go up and say, hey, how can I help?
Start just by doing something kind, a kind word and a kind gesture. And then maybe you can say, how can I help? So support them. If you have a relationship with a teenager, mentoring would be a part of it. Again, that could be part of the wraparound thing of just mentoring.
that if you have an opportunity where you are a manager of a business or own a business, you’re hire them, hire a teen to start looking like, have their first job, and give them a safe place to fail. I heard a story once where this business intentionally hires aged out foster youth.
And they will, the foster, you know, it’s inevitable almost that they’ll do something stupid. And so this business will fire them and then rehire them the next day and say, that was fireable. So we fired you. Now we’re showing you grace and giving you a second chance. so, you know, so anyway, just hire, hire them, help, help them with driver’s ed and getting just that kind of independence.
Courtney (38:39.47)
Yeah.
Brian Mavis (38:54.06)
and then just stay connected. Again, it’s my friend Pam Parrish, she uses the phrase connected independence. And so we so often we’re like, we got to help these kids be independent. And it’s like, that’s only half of it. It’s connected independence that they need.
Courtney (39:10.594)
Yeah.
Yeah, and going back to our biological children, our adopted, our children. I mean, I have four to the house now and they all, I spend as much time with them now as I used to like on the phone or how do do this? Today I’m sitting in a Bible study, like I needed the past, I’m filling out this form, I need this, this, this, can you call me right now? I’m like, well, can’t call you right now, but you know, it’s just time and I can’t imagine that age, know, brain’s not being fully developed until around 25. So your brain’s not even fully developed.
Brian Mavis (39:17.046)
Yes. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, they’re connected. Yeah.
Courtney (39:42.476)
you don’t have the connections and now you’re supposed to do all this on your own. It’s just not realistic. yeah. Okay. And we’re going to close this out, Brian. We got a last episode in this series, closing out. Tell us about it. Yeah.
Brian Mavis (39:46.732)
Right? Yeah. So.
Brian Mavis (39:53.528)
Yeah, we’re going to do one more one more episode. Yeah. So you’re like, I thought you guys would be done because you finished all 10. There’s a part two to the book and it’s the kind of the solution side. mean, each chapter ends with a bit of advice and hope. But the part two of the book is what it takes and what it looks like to become a foster parent and kind of the how to step by step, how to to adopt out of the foster system.
how to have your church be foster friendly, how to have a business be foster friendly, how to have a whole community be foster friendly. So next episode is kind of that, all the solutions.
Courtney (40:40.651)
Awesome. So if you’re listening on a Thursday, that’ll come out two Thursdays from now. These side series is coming out on Thursdays when our typical episodes are still coming out on Wednesdays. So tune in. And if you haven’t listened to the previous ones, I encourage you to go back and listen to those as well. So, okay. And you’ll go enjoy some outdoors. Yeah. Okay. We’ll see ya.
Brian Mavis (40:55.032)
Thanks Courtney.
Yeah, you too. Bye.
