09/03/2026
Foster care is not convenient, it is not convenient, it is a child navigating through the trauma they have experienced and hoping to land in a permanent place they can call home and call their own.
Every kid in foster care has a track record of adults who said they'd be back. Testing you isn't defiance — it's data collection.
Somebody said they'd be back. Somebody said this placement was permanent. Somebody said things would be different this time. And then the car pulled up again.
So when a new adult says "I'm not going anywhere," the kid does the math on the evidence available and concludes, reasonably, that you're the next one. Testing you isn't defiance. It's a hypothesis he's running because he's been burned enough to need data.
The only way through it is boring: show up, do what you said, repeat, for longer than feels necessary. You're not arguing with him. You're outlasting his evidence.
Save this if you're in the testing phase right now.