Another painfully honest guest blog from John, who tells it like it is when it comes to adopting older children from the foster care system. John is a retired commercial airline pilot who has adopted five boys from domestic foster care as a single parent. John and his family live in southern California.

‘Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall, and all the King’s horses and all the King’s men couldn’t put Humpty back together again.’ Is a sad story about hopelessness and the need to quit. My story has sadness and pain, but it is not about hopelessness and giving up. This story is about my son Tyler, he is 12 years old, indeed, he had a great fall.

Tyler came home in adoption one year ago, after five years of foster care. On October 15, I placed him in a group home. It is hard to describe the pain of realizing that you are going to have to place your child in a facility. This is your child, someone else will be raising him now, and for a long time you will be a very small part of your child’s day-to-day life. Failure? Yes, it feels that way. Surely, there must have been something I could have done differently? Yes, the first time you have to place a child that feeling is very strong, two of my older sons had to have placements in a residential treatment. I knew that I had tried everything with Tyler that I was capable of doing. The pain is difficult to describe, it is so bad that it is difficult to breath, very much like the feeling of someone dying that you are very close to.

Our guest blog is from John, a retired commercial airline pilot who has adopted five boys from domestic foster care as a single parent. John and his family live in southern California.

Michael, (aka Califdads), brought out an important issue, the view that Dads are usually seen as auxiliary parents to Moms. Michael and his husband would tend to get the most disbelief on being the only parents due to the age of their sons, one only a few weeks old, and the other just entering toddlerhood. Surely, men are not suited to raise children without a Mom to be the primary parent, especially with very young children. Why? Other than breast-feeding, what unique talents do women have that automatically makes them a likely better parent than a Dad? Let’s look at this.

Hi, my name is Tyler, and I’m 12. I came home two months ago from foster care. I am adopted with my Dad. These are my feelings on adoption.

I was feeling a little scared at first like any kid would be. Yes moving from foster care is scary. Yeah, you get used to legal documents for everything, but then you don’t because its adoption, no more paperwork. I’m still in the adjustment period but I’m getting use to LA. I’m used to hearing a lot of bad things about the city of LA. Like downtown gangs and drug dealers, but our city isn’t like that at all. It’s very quiet, I mean If you go to a nearby city there’s some parts anybody would want to avoid but others that are fine. Yeah, it is scary with an adoption, so if any kids are reading this you are not the only one. Trust me millions of kids have been adopted and yes it is scary that is my conclusion. So far adoption has been hard and easy, but my Dad and brothers have dealt with it, and helped to put it behind us. I think adoption can be a wonderful thing, but you need to be matched up with the right family.

My new, soon to be son, Tyler, called me this morning as he and his worker were driving south to Sacramento, where they would catch a flight to Long Beach. He started off with, “Hi Dad...” That was the first time he had called me that. They were on schedule. The worker had MapQuest directions, but the streets leading to our home are confusing. I talked Tyler through the route, there was the car, and my son was coming home for the first time. This is an unusual visitation, he would be with me for four days, on day five we would fly in my airplane to his city, where I would sign the adoption placement papers and then we would return home. Once he was out of the car, we would not be separated again.