“Family for Life” Sets Foundation for First Casey Kid

When Ginny Stephan brought her fourth child home from the hospital this summer, Jake was welcomed by his grandmother, Brenda Lydecker. For Brenda, Ginny’s former foster mother, making the 1,000-plus mile trip from Connecticut to Missouri was just what you do for family.

As one of the first children ever served by Casey Family Services when it opened its doors 30 years ago, Stephan’s experience is an illustration of the intensifying trend in child welfare: family permanence. For Ginny Stephan, who is 38, permanence has meant a lifelong family relationship with her former foster parents, Brenda and her husband, Garret, who treat Ginny’s husband Scott, and their children as members of the family.

"I am very close to my former foster family, particularly mom and dad," Stephan says. "They do everything you would expect from a parent; they just aren’t my biological parents. They are open and supportive. My mom and I talk quite a lot and we are good friends."

Entering care at age 5, Stephan moved through the foster care system for nearly six years. At age 11, Casey Family Services' Bridgeport Division placed her with the Lydeckers in Stamford, Connecticut. For Stephan, this was the beginning of her personal journey to accept another family as her own.

"When I was a kid, I rejected ‘permanence’ with my foster families," Stephan says. "I certainly didn't know what the word meant, but I knew I wanted to be a normal kid with a family. I wanted desperately to be reunited with my birth family. I think all kids have a fantasy of their parents coming to get them, to be rescued from foster care."

However, having worked with her Casey social worker and realizing the Lydeckers’ commitment to her, Stephan came to understand her birth family’s mental health challenges made them unable to raise her.

"When I was age 19, my foster parents told me that they would always be my mom and dad. I was not adopted, since that wasn’t the goal for foster youth 20 years ago. I admit that I felt insecure for many years without that legal connection, so today, I think the efforts toward legal permanence are a wonderful thing for kids to make them feel secure emotionally.”
 
That apprehension about her place in the family, however, melted away five years later when it was time to start her own family. "When I got married, I had been with my boyfriend for many years,” says Stephan. “I was pregnant and my foster parents were really there for me, even though I was 24 years old. They paid for the entire wedding, and my dad gave me away. It was a huge revelation for me knowing that my parents would be there for me even when I made mistakes. That was when I truly experienced the unconditional love that a parent has for their child.”

As an adult, Stephan has come to have a relationship with her birth family, which remains a stressful situation, but one that is supported by the Lydeckers. “I’m always talking to mom about what’s happening with my birth family, to help me process it,” Stephan says.