From a company newsletter:
[Insert woman’s name here] is quite a rescuer. She started with animals and now has six dogs, 13 cats and a rabbit. Last fall, she decided to extend her caretaking talents to children by becoming a foster parent. She and her partner, [Insert another woman’s name here], are foster parents to 7- and 9-year-old children and expect to take in several more soon. In fact, the two recently added on to their house to accomodate the growing family.
Therapists and readers of Catcher in the Rye are familiar with these kinds of rescue fantasies, which are particularly seen in people who were themselves mistreated or who ache for escape from loneliness and alienation.
This woman is in far greater need of medical intervention than of plaudits.
Also — keep in mind that foster children are not orphans . . . they’re children who’ve been taken away from parents deemed at least temporarily unfit to raise them.
That’s got to be quite a feeling as a parent: to be told that your children would be better off being raised in a menagerie by lesbians.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that . . .