Empty Stocking Fund: Lutheran Family Services works with the vulnerable
Kayla and Justin Fillinger have four beautiful reasons to praise Lutheran Family Services Rocky Mountains: Zyla, 8, Phoenix, 7, Riker, 3. and Theo, 2.
Kayla Fillinger related how in 2011. after several emotionally and physically wrenching miscarriages, she and her husband decided to foster and possibly adopt a child. They called several private agencies, but no one would answer basic questions by phone. “It just didn’t feel right.” But finally, during a call to the Lutheran Family Services office in Colorado Springs, Kayla received support and answers. “I was struck by how friendly and caring they were.”
The Lutheran organization provides adoption assistance, foster care, caregiver respite, short-term crisis child care, help for unaccompanied refugee minors, disaster response, older adult and caregiver aid, and other services.
The agency’s mission is to “walk with the vulnerable and hurting through services that can heal, strengthen and provide hope,” said Jennifer Swan, program director. “Not addressing their needs perpetuates the cycle of trauma and weakens our community.”
Lutheran Family Services accepts parents to be foster parents, or adopters, but it is the county that refers the children who are neglected or abused to be accepted into particular homes. “Every child deserves to feel and be safe. We provide that,” Swan said.
The Fillingers went through foster care training with LFS and became state certified. They fostered 13 children over time, and, have adopted three, with another in process.
“We met our first daughter in June 2012. She was 18-months old,” Fillinger said. “She smiled at us and said, ‘Hi, I’m Zyla.’ It was the biggest moment of my life.” Seven months later LFS called, and the Fillingers opened their arms to another child, 5-month old Phoenix, and then eventually 10-days-old Riker. Theo, who they began fostering as a newborn and who is now 2, will be their fourth adoptee.
The journey was not always easy. But Lutheran Family Services staff have been with them every step of the way, Fillinger said. One child, at age 1, had to be returned to a demanding birth parent, but was soon returned from that failed situation. (Foster parents have to wait six months before adopting a child.) Another time, they had to take legal action against a distant relative to keep a child they had fostered since birth and were poised to adopt, she said.
The Fillingers have no problem allowing their children contact with birth relatives if it is safe for the particular child and the person makes the request to be a steady part of the child’s life.
It was faith that got them through the many ups and downs in their quest for family, she said. “God showed us that even in our sorrow over our lost pregnancies, that it was these children who were meant to be our children. They are not stand-ins or replacements. They are the children God planned for us.”
The Fillingers have retained a portion of each child’s original name. “It’s a way to show we love them for who they are.”