One-hundred twenty-seven. That's how many questions my young adult son asked me during a recent three-hour drive. Yes, I counted. I enjoy conversations and tend to answer his questions, which range from reasonable to nerve-wracking. "How much snow do you think we'll get this winter?" "What if I ate four packs of Ramen noodles for lunch?" "Can I buy a $40,000 tractor?" Answering leads to trickier questions. "Would you be mad if we got ten feet of snow in one day?" Maybe. "If I die from eating...

Scrolling through social media can be especially discouraging this time of year. Our feeds are filled with celebratory posts of teens dressed for prom or proudly donning caps and gowns for graduation. We may genuinely feel happy for the smiling faces in those photos, but deep inside, many foster and adoptive parents feel disheartened. For various reasons—whether the impacts of trauma, learning disabilities, prenatal substance exposure, or other challenges—our children’s hard-fought...

Curled up in my favorite chair, I pulled my knees to my chest and sobbed. My heart was crushed by the critical words of a close family member. One of my biological children—now married with children—felt compelled to create and review a list. An actual printed list. A list of my parenting failures. There is a sixteen-year age span between my oldest biological child and my youngest adopted child. But age isn’t the only difference. The five children who were engrafted into our family came with...