# Foster Success...Blues?



## Magwart (Jul 8, 2012)

For those of you who foster, can we talk about the bittersweet emotions of the day you hand over the leash of your foster to the amazing, wonderful family that you _know _will be a fabulous fur-ever family?

I'm feeling _it _today. That weird feeling that is ninety percent joy and ten percent of something that almost feels like...I don't know..._grief? _My darling foster-girl went her new home today. This is a _good _home for her -- far and away the best home out of at least eight applications (a few of which were rejected based on the home check...she's a shelter dog, but I'm a tough gate keeper for my fosters). This family has all the right pieces in place to be a truly excellent home, including prior GSD experience, and they are ecstatic to have her. 

And yet...I feel this twinge of sadness at her absence. I didn't cry when we were saying our goodbyes--I've promised myself to _never _do that as I remember a foster sobbing once as she handed me the leash the day I adopted Simon from a GS rescue years ago, and I felt _so bad _for that stranger, that it was hard to embrace my own joy in that moment. I want my adopters to be able to ride that joy, as it's a special moment.

Does anyone else go through this? Any thoughts on how to banish that niggling sense of loss and focus on the enormous joy of a job well done (as this _is _the point of rescue work)?


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## llombardo (Dec 11, 2011)

I don't foster, I've thought about it for in the future, but I'm positive I will be a foster failure. I had a golden retriever that I found a good home for and I cried after he left..not in front of the new owner. He went to a Pastor and belongs to a church and I see him a few times a week. I can see he's happy and well taken care of and yet I still wish I would have kept him So I understand the emotion that one can feel, its almost an uneasy but satisfying feeling(hard to imagine those two things together), and then it becomes a argument between your heart and brain. All you can do is hope that you made the right decision and if you got good people I'm sure they will give you updates and that makes a difference too.


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## CassandGunnar (Jan 3, 2011)

It happens to me every time. It helps to have someone to talk to about it, hopefully someone else who has been through it.
I tell myself that I've helped a dog to have a great life and now I can move on and help another one.
Of course, some dogs take longer to get over. 
You just have to keep reminding yourself why you started out.
I'd like to say it gets easier,, but it all depends.


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## San (Mar 22, 2012)

I know what you mean, when the three previous fosters found homes, we were happy but sad at the same time. We never showed our "grief" in front of the adopters. It was hard. We have to remind ourselves that there are always more dogs in need, so we have to focus on our goal of helping as many dogs as possible 

Hubby and I are on our fourth foster, I can't really say that it gets easier. I am very very fond of our current foster, and we've only had him for 2 months. I know it will be extra hard to see him go  (but keeping him means we won't be able to foster anymore, too many dogs, sigh, so we just have to find him a good home).


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## Gharrissc (May 19, 2012)

I always worry about my fosters and miss them even when I know they are going to a great home.On the other hand, I am glad to see them go.


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## LuvShepherds (May 27, 2012)

I go into it knowing I won't keep the dog, so it's like babysitting and training for someone else. I have a twinge of sadness, then sheer happiness at doing something good for someone else. Then I get another dog as soon as I can and start over. I got burned out and quit after the last one. We don't have any fosters right now, although I'm thinking about taking in another one.


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## Elaine (Sep 10, 2006)

Most of the time I don't have too much trouble adopting out my fosters because I know they aren't mine and I'm not going to keep them so I don't get too attached to them. There have been a few that I miss terribly and one that I still get to visit on occasion. There's only been one that I openly sobbed when I handed over the dog - that was awful.


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## rooandtree (May 13, 2012)

i went thru that everytime. And i still have some regret over a few that i wished i would of just kept. I think for me it would be easier if i could somehow get inside their heads and let them know i wasnt giving them away and that i did love them. and i did cry everytime one left..but i waited until they were gone. i always tried to keep in touch thru emails that helped me


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## LifeofRiley (Oct 20, 2011)

I, like you, have never shown tears with the adopter but have shed several after they left. However, for me, the joy is in receiving e-mails and photos from the new family. I love updates! And, encourage all my adopters to e-mail the rescue or me with how things are going. To me, this is also part of re-inforcing with them that WE ALWAYS TAKE OUR DOGS BACK so even if you are having problems... COMMUNICATE WITH US. A couple have been returned, but the majority are oh so happy in their forever homes and I love receiving those updates. 

Fact of the matter is, you have to learn to let go if you are going to foster. That is why, for me, it is so important to foster for an organization where I have a lot of control over approving any applicant.

Anyway, right now I am fostering a cat. This is a first for me. I think I will really miss the little bugger when he gets adopted! Riley, will too... while he still hasn't really figured out why cats don't want to play like dogs, he has learned that the cat really likes to play with his tail so he will sidle up to the cat with tail wagging... Absolutely adorable!


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## sitstay (Jan 20, 2003)

I have fostered a lot of dogs over these past 12 years, but that feeling of sadness when a foster leaves has never gone away. I still feel it.

I mean, I enter into it knowing that each of them are here temporarily. I know that. But I still get very attached to them. 

We open our homes to them, and our hearts. We put so much effort into helping them feel better, look better and act better. Fosters become a part of my family, and it is always a really sad day when they leave. I am happy for them and their new family. I am proud of my work, and I am always blown away by how hopeful and forgiving these dogs are. But I am also sad. 

It feels the same way I felt when my oldest son moved out of our family home. I was proud of him. I was proud of me. I was covetous of his bedroom (I had been harboring visions of a craft room/home office). I was pleased at how quiet everything got without him. And I had to lock myself in the bathroom and cry once he left with that last load of stuff. It is the way things are supposed to happen, just like how our fosters are supposed to get adopted and leave, but that doesn't make it any less sad.

I think it does help to talk to other foster parents. 
Sheilah


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## Magwart (Jul 8, 2012)

Thanks, everyone! 

This one has hit me a lot harder than some of the others who've come through my home on a shorter-term basis. We actively thought about foster-failing with this one, but it would have meant the end of being able to foster. We live in a city with no GSD rescue group, a high-kill shelter that _always_ has adoptable GSDs in need of a bridge out of there, and I'm the shelter foster coordinator's only "GSD hookup." In the last 6 months, I can credit myself with 5 GSD lives that made it out of the shelter directly through work I did (fostering, taking to adoption events, getting a GSD-loving friend to foster for the first time...). I can't say "someone else should save these GSDs" because, right now, there is no one else in my community advocating for this breed at the shelter. Letting this dog go to her new family was the right result.

I think it is especially hard because of the great gift she brought to my pack in helping me rehabilitate Fiona, my shy 10-mo.-old rescue. Fiona came to me shut-down and terrified of other dogs when we brought her home, and it's been slow but steady progress socializing her, and helping her find her confidence around other dogs. This well-socialized, friendly foster dog accidentally spooked Fiona in the first few days by trying to play, and then actively used calming signals to draw Fiona out from where she was hiding to coax her to play--and it worked. They became good buddies, and the foster helped Fiona rediscover the sheer joy good doggie play. It was _so cool _to watch the foster dog help my girl. The real power of what was going on became clear when I saw Fiona use one of the signals she'd learned from the foster with another dog she was unsure of at our trainer's socialization field. She was imitating the behavior the foster had demonstrated. This foster taught Fiona something only another dog could teach her. The foster dog repaid her rescue with a priceless gift of her own. I think that makes it especially hard to say to goodbye to this one.

I keep reminding myself that she did what she came to my house to do, and now she's got a different gift that she will share with her new family.


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