Today is one of the most luckiest day of my life.

Where's your smile?

I know you got National Adoption Day, right?

National Adoption Day.

You're totally right.

How do you feel about that?

What do you think is going on in here?

A lot of people getting adopted.

I feel very proud for them because people went through hard things a lot.

How do you feel about your mommy?

It's very okay.

You've been through a lot.

Even in a hard day, she still gets me love.

How is she when she loves you?

Does she kiss you?

No.

Does she love you?

It's hard to say that, isn't it?

That's what a mom's supposed to do.

I am excited.

Louise was placed with me I want to say maybe two years ago.

Then I stopped fostering for a while and when I renewed my license, he was the first kid I looked for.

I asked Lacassa.

She worked very closely with us that entire time.

Did everything we asked of her to show that there were no safety concerns as far as her ability to parent, her ability to be a foster parent.

um and she was able to get her license restored.

So when Louise came into our care and was placed with Robin, he needed somebody to be able to adopt him and he was lucky to find Robin.

So I work with families while they have children in their care, making sure that the foster parents have their needs met, whether that's additional support, help advocating for things like school or transportations.

And then I also make sure that the kids are okay in the placement.

So a lot of people think like I have to be married, I have to own a house, I have to have my own kids, but none of that is true.

You know, you have to be over 18, but you can rent your home.

You can never have had kids before.

You have to have enough space for a foster child.

There are certain requirements you have to meet.

In juvenile court, we do see a lot of negative things.

We see families who are going through really difficult times, but today is an opportunity to focus on building families and that's really special.

Being able to adopt him, to give him permanency so that he knows what happened to him before that was in the past.

Now we have to move forward.

The most important thing is that Louise knows that I love him and I know that he loves me.

He loves science as well.

So, he's been really into non-fiction recently.

So, he'll read a non-fiction book and tell me a fact about space or the moon or all types of things.

And so, that's something that promotes conversation between foster parents and kids.

Louise is a jokester.

He is a comedian.

He's a soontobe scientist.

We love science and space.

Really?

Um, Louisie is a he's a kid that's full of like um Yep.

and imagination.

We work really closely with schools.

So, we help advocate either myself or the foster parents.

He's been through a lot as a kid and I couldn't imagine what he's been through.

We talk about it.

If my mom if my real mom is hearing this, I'm I'm thankful for you um really helping me through my whole life thing pretty much my whole life.

But some things have to go some things have to um pass and some things have to go um some things have to go back like some days have to be bad days.

And like I got tooken away from my mom.

I was like six.

So I normally didn't I normally didn't know what was going on.

So my real TT she got in a car accident the like while I was five.

So like she had some like body issues.

So after that, I got taken away from my mom cuz my my one of my best friends ever, one of my first ever friends got taken by the CPS.

And um and that was kind of sad because I didn't know where she was going.

And yeah, I haven't seen her since that.

And I wish my mom was here so I could really see her because the last time I seen her was my brother's birthday.

he is.

One thing that stood out to me is that he loves to play video games.

And the reason that stood out to me is this is just an opportunity for him to have a normal childhood, play video games, spend time with families.

I heard that you like video games.

No, only some days if I get in trouble, she really won't let me some.

If she feels generous, she probably let me play my game if I got in trouble.

Yeah.

But that's only sometimes if if she feel generous.

But normally if I get in trouble at school, he ain't going to be playing my game.

He loves um he loves playing.

He loves playing with his now brother, his official brother, and that's one of the things he really enjoys doing.

Her son was one of her big motivating factors.

He kept bugging her like, "Mom, I really want a little brother.

I really want a little brother."

And I would joke with her like, "Come on, you've got to do it."

So just how much the whole family loves him and and really like wanted this to come together.

It's just been really really cool to see.

I would normally just try to help people.

And normally I think about my mom or family member that I really love.

I normally just keep back my tears because I normally don't like to cry.

Y'all see me right now.

Y'all can see that pretty um I'm held I'm held back in my tears a lot.

Louis I know is hyper.

He likes to run around.

He likes to play soccer.

And I don't know if that's the Louis you saw today.

And I think that's because he's just very emotional.

Um trying not to cry.

And especially in times where you read headlines and they're really heartbreaking.

It makes you happy to see like, okay, there's still good things happen in the world and and you can do your part to try to facilitate those.

I know not everyone is going to be able to be a foster parent.

I know not everyone is going to be able to adopt a child, but you can mentor, you can donate, you can try to be a positive role model for the kids in your life.

So, every single person in our community has the opportunity to make a difference in some small way.

Other people are going to see me and and especially the bullies, they're going to really see who I really am.

I look angry in the outside, but I have a cold, deep heart in the inside that I really love because I'm also a Christian.

I love God because God made me for for a reason.

But Louise immediately had this connection with Robin.

And from the get-go, Robin was mom.

Louise has been asking for this day for a very long time.

My emotions are all over the place.

um because I got to do it for him.

Like people that like do bad things to other people, they're gonna figure they're gonna one day they're going to find out how it feels to lose somebody that you love very bad like what happened to me.

Not cover your