Bishop
Birth date: November 1995
Ethno-Cultural Background: European/North American

Cyndi
Birth date: June 1998
Ethno-Cultural Background: European/North American

How about a wonderful brother and sister team to complete your family? At 12 and 9 these two have met many milestones and bring their own interests and abilities with them. They still require the ongoing love and support of a family to continue their growth and prepare them for their independent lives.

Bishop is the older brother. His interests are diverse and include cars, prehistoric animals, aircrafts, weather and arts and crafts. He is currently working on building a hot rod with his foster parent and very excited about the prospect. He also is preparing to join Cadets and is very excited about the uniform and marching aspects. Bishop is lots of fun and loves to laugh. He loves many sports especially soccer, swimming and running. He has done very well in his current foster home where he and Cyndi have lived for the past two years. Bishop has had some problems with school and socialization but the stability and firm limits of his foster home have shown very strong encouraging results for him. Bishop loves to read which is a quality that will serve him well through out his education.

At 9, Cyndi is described as a “girly girl” who loves hair, fashion and make up. She loves to do puzzles, finger painting and arts and crafts. She also enjoys physical activity, especially soccer and also loves to laugh and have fun with her brother and foster family. Cyndi loves school, especially the social aspect of it. She loves to make friends but generally does better with younger children. She does great one on one but sometimes has more trouble with groups.

Both children are clear that they want a family to grow up in. They both express their unhappiness with the numbers of moves in their lives and want one solid place where they know they won’t have to leave.

Both these children have had a rocky road thus far. They display some behavioural concerns, emotional issues and educational special needs that will need to be discussed in depth between perspective adoptive parents and their social worker. They have both improved a great deal since their placement in their current foster home and have benefited from the experience of having fun with the family.

Adoptive parents should be prepared to provide firm limits with little “wiggle room” along with a loving, fair approach to issues as they arise. The family should have an awareness of the potential impact of a chaotic lifestyle, abuse, neglect and possible alcohol/drug exposure prior to birth on these children’s lives.

The children have had contact with their maternal grandmother most of their lives and ideally, some form of contact would continue.