Even though you may not be in the living situation to be a foster parent right now, you still have tons of ability to be a really important part of these and other children's life in a positive way.

I remember the 2 people that had the biggest positive impact on my life while in foster care, neither of them were people that I lived with.

When I was about 14 I was dumped (yet again) into the children's shelter after a family that I had been with for 2 years had given me up. I pretty much totally shut down at that point. I hated that county children's shelter, it was referred to as "the kennel" by us kids (sadly, a lot of the staff as well) because it was where we were taken when a family had grown tired of us or couldn't take care of us.

One weekend at "the kennel" a women's group come to visit us and take us out for pizza. As usual, all of the ladies latched on to the youngest children there and payed them pretty much all of the attention. Myself and another teen girl sat there in silence timidly eating our pizza.

This younger woman (mid 20s) came over and sat beside the 2 of us and was chatting away with the other girl and I. She was totally interested in us and only us. I was unmoved by the attention and just sat there as quietly as I could.

When the evening was over, she told the other girl and I that she would come back to visit us soon, even though she didn't have to. The women's group had done their good deed and was not scheduled to come back.

The other girl became all excited about our new friend. I kept telling her that we would never see this woman again and that she didn't give a damn about us. A week later on valentine's day this lady showed up at the shelter with candy and gifts for the 2 of us.

Long story short is that she very slowly won me over and we become really close friends for quite a few years till I grew up and went away to college and we lost touch. I credit her with me going to college at all and not doing some other really bad stuff.

Even if you never do take in foster children, you can still make a huge difference. I'm so glad that you are there for this boy.