After college, my speaking calendar grew . . . as did I. This picture shows me at my very heavy stage.
With Erick, at our wedding. We had no idea how many waves our cruise wedding would create.
Albert, our foster son, loved his first visit to Disney World.
Erick, with Dakota, one of our most frail foster children.
Often we had children that were close in age. Here are two of our “twins.”
Our foster children Lillian and Denver playing piano.
Skyler was four months old when he came into our foster home. He had been nearly killed by his father.
Friends and volunteers waved signs on street corners during my run for Florida’s state senate.
A photo of me with Erick taken during my first pregnancy. (Photo by Nathaniel Wagner)
We took our firsborn son, Ethan (four months), to a friend’s wedding in St. Augustine, Florida.
Brothers Micah and Zachariah heading to preschool.
Me with our foster son, Zachariah.
Skyler, Erick, me, and Ethan at a local park. (Photo by Andrea Walls, Off the Walls Photography)
Left to right: Erick, Skyler, Gay, Phil, Ethan, and me on Skyler’s adoption day. (Photo by Susanne Ravn)
Baby Andrew, our second biological son.
Our foster daughter, Millie, had fallen asleep reading my first book. Almost a year and a half later, we learned she was returned to relatives she had been removed from. Millie, age nine, was brutally murdered by her mentally-ill uncle, who was also living in the home.
NOTE TO READER
My first memoir, Three Little Words, chronicled my life as a foster child up until my graduation from high school. After spending almost ten years in state care, I had few expectations for my future. I never believed that I was destined to be happy.
Today child welfare, foster care, and adoption issues have become the cornerstone of my professional and personal life. As an adult, I felt a strong pull to be a part of the very system that had failed me, and I was determined to prevent other children from being exposed to my miserable experiences. As a motivational speaker, I promote organizations that strive to protect children and I thank parents, volunteers, and professionals who work tirelessly for the same goals.
Once I was called a troublemaker and was removed from a foster home for exposing their cruel abuse. Not only I am still “causing trouble,” but my voice is finally being heard. There is so much more to be said and done—and this book is part of my effort.
I graduated college, received a master’s degree in social work, and also became a Guardian ad Litem (or CASA) volunteer advocating for children in court—just as someone had done for me and changed my life. Along the way I’ve also become a wife, a foster parent, an adoptive parent, and a biological mother.
Nationally I am exposed to service providers, social workers, agencies, and groups who use best practices to transform the system to benefit children and families. Today’s innovative laws and policies could have helped reunite me with my family and prevented years of heartache. Yet the same misguided case management that damaged me has endangered many of our foster children, and as a result, one of them was killed. There is a bizarre disconnect between my professional advocacy and my role as a foster parent. While many audiences have been inspired by my speeches, at home, my expertise was often completely ignored, or I was bullied by the very workers, professionals—and even other foster parents—I spend my career defending and supporting. Now we are being chastised by our agency for eulogizing Millie and speaking up on behalf of her and other children who have lost their lives under preventable circumstances. Our agency tried to have us sign new documents that accused us of breaking the law, outlined our media involvement, and would have acted as a gag order. We chose to give back our foster license to the state rather than have it revoked, which would have a negative impact on our future plans to foster or adopt.
I wish this book was more of an homage to the exceptional parents and providers who positively change the lives of children and families. However, I can only tell the story we lived. While some of the people are composites, and certain names and situations have been changed to protect identities, every incident detailed in this book happened. Aside from the Courter and Smith families, almost all names and identifying characteristics of the youths and adults have been changed. Children do not end up in foster care for insignificant reasons, so the specifics about their abuse might be difficult to read. It’s even harder to comprehend how people can be so brutal to the little ones who depend on them.
I hope my readers will be inspired to take action. We need so many more good foster parents, adoptive parents, volunteers, mentors, and community support to create positive change. Agencies need to be financially equipped to provide the best training and resources to their workers, and they must operate with child-centered practices. Powerful stakeholders—chiefly the legislators who control budgets and the judges who run our family courts—need to understand the daily sorrows and long-term costs of these tragic cases.
No other child should have to live in deplorable foster homes. No other child should be returned to unsafe conditions. No more children have to die—especially those already under the “watchful eye” of a child welfare agency. Every child deserves a happy ending—like mine.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
“Ashley, I don’t know how you do it all” is something I hear all the time. I couldn’t do any of it without the unwavering love and support of my husband, family, and loyal friends.
I am thankful to still be so close to many friends, some who have traveled long distances to be there when I needed assistance. A few went through an invasive background check to become official babysitters for our foster children. Others simply put up with my venting. There was a time in my life that my only relationships lasted a few months. It feels amazing to still have these people in my life after so long.
Graduating from college shows that you have mastered the academic standards set forth by your school. It also means that you survived campus life, classes, clashes with professors, inspirational turning points, failed projects, exasperating group assignments, and life-changing discoveries about yourself and the world. I never could have navigated the waters of my seaside college without the patience, tough love, and forgiveness of my Eckerd friends and faculty—particularly in my early years, when I made classically stupid mistakes. So many Eckerd College faculty members and administrators influenced and steered my academic direction, but I want to specifically thank President Donald R. Eastman III, Dean James J. Annarelli, Assistant Dean Marti Newbold, and professors Anthony Brunello, Cynthia Totten, Eric Haak, Jeff Howard, James Janack, Mark Davis, Julienne H. Empric, and William (Bill) Felice.
The University of Southern California allowed me to complete a graduate degree when my schedule and home life would have prevented me from succeeding in a traditional program. I am grateful for their pioneer work in virtual academics, which allowed me to connect with fellow social-work students and professionals worldwide. During my MSW program, I was challenged, engaged, and stretched to my limits. I could not have asked for a stronger graduate experience.
As I stepped into the world as a professional, I still needed much guidance and advice. Lou and Jonellen Heckler have been invaluable mentors and supporters of my speaking career. Agents Joëlle Delbourgo, Irene Webb, and Donna Buttice have developed so many opportunities and had faith in me. Special thanks to Simon & Schuster and my editor, Caitlyn Dlouhy, for giving me the opportunity to inspire others again through my writing.
I am constantly motivated by the creative professionals who dedicate themselves to healing children in their schools, courtrooms, communities, and homes, especially the honorable Karen Gievers, Andrea Moore, and Robin Rosenberg. I am grateful to the struggling youth and families who reach out and share their concerns and stories with me.
Thousands of children turn eighteen and age out of foster care each year and are expected to take on th
e world alone. Although I am in my late twenties, I need family more than ever. Both the Courter and Smith relatives surround us with the kind of love and support that we need to thrive as a family.
Erick’s team of family and friends has been welcoming and supportive since the beginning. His mother, Sharon, has a calm grace about her that puts everyone at ease. She can soothe the most frightened child, and our sons can’t wait to crawl on her lap the minute they see her. Erick’s dad, Rob, is always on hand to help with house repairs or babysit when we are in a bind. Nothing seems to rattle either of them, and they are—literally—just around the corner if we need them. Mostly, I thank them for raising such an incredible son for me to marry.
I thought Gay and Phil took their role as my parents seriously—but then I saw them in grandparent mode. Because of them, I have always had a place to go home; someone to call for advice, guidance, reassurance; a father to walk me down the aisle; and a mother to hold my hand as I welcomed my first child into the world. Knowing they are in my life gives me the greatest sense of serenity.
With Phil, Gay, Rob, and Sharon, our children will never be without love, security, and encouragement. Erick’s nephew and niece, Austin and Breanna, are two very special young people who are always quick to lend a hand, and they have been superb role models for our many children. Special thanks goes to Aunt Robin and Uncle Josh Madden, both skilled pediatricians, who have fielded many medical calls and texts and have always been there for us and our foster children with loving advice and support.
During the fostering and adoption process, we’ve made lifelong friends and received help from dedicated professionals. Their stories and passions remind us what we’re all fighting for. Our respect and admiration go to Nate and Caroline Wagner, Claudia and Mike Bachmann, Graham and Becky Myers, Robyn and Kyle Matthews, Tammy Curtis, Ashley Capps, Martha Cothron, and Carrie and David Wildes. I must also thank the Pinellas County Foster and Adoptive Parent Association, and fellow foster parent, Marc Silver, for the hilarious, “I forgave her” line and other funny foster-parent coping strategies and resources. Having support from other foster parents has been essential.
I will always be grateful for so many fine mentors, professionals, and workers—particularly Darlene Averill, Kelly Brenner, Ron Anderson, Jesse Miller, Jillian DeMarco, Rebecca Day, Connie Going, Shannon Albert, Brandice Corriveau, Terri Chirstensen, Elaine Hollingsworth, Desiree Crounse, Lisa Jayson, and Laurallyn Segur. Many of them touched our lives, influenced our decisions, or positively affected the outcome for one of our kids. These—and so many more—family, professionals, and friends have been the real secret to our success and sanity.
In some ways recounting the last ten years of my life has been more emotionally draining than reliving my childhood. Special thanks once again go to my mother, Gay Courter, for helping me to create cohesion and make sense of my endless notes, panicked phone calls, stories, accounts, memories, and impassioned ramblings—both on and off the page.
Additionally, I’d like to thank Phil Courter, Erick Smith, Sharon Smith, and Esther Mandel for their painstaking proofreading. I have a great relationship with my older brothers, Blake and Josh. Their wives, Amber and Giulia, are some of the most creative and passionate women I know. It’s an incredible feeling knowing that we’ll always be there for one another and that my children have such awesome aunts and uncles. A very special welcome also goes out to the littlest Courter, Josh and Giulia’s newborn son, Zephyr. How exciting it is to be an aunt!
Finally, I must expose the wizard behind the curtain: my brilliant husband, Erick. I have tested and pushed you away so many times. Thank you for not giving up on me. We have spent the last ten years growing together as individuals, friends, partners, and now parents. I hope our sons grow up with your integrity, honesty, patience, thoughtfulness, and commitment to all that is right and good with the world. You are my best friend and my number one fan. You have given me everything I could have hoped for—even if it took me a while to realize what a treasure you are.
Like my brand-new baby, Andrew, my story is growing and changing every day. I no longer fear the unexpected. I was once the motherless child, lost and alone. Now I know for certain that I always will have people in my life to help me with any hardship I may face.
It is my wish that all children grow up to one day know such security, love, and happiness.
Author photograph copyright © by Pamela Hanson
Born in 1985 to a teen mother, ASHLEY RHODES-COURTER spent almost ten years in the Florida foster care system. A nationally acclaimed public speaker and child welfare advocate, Ashley has been featured on Good Morning America and in USA Today and Glamour. Married with three young children, Ashley has also been the foster mother to more than twenty children to date. She lives in Florida.
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Text copyright © 2015 by Ashley Rhodes-Courter
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Photographs on pp. 299–311 courtesy of the author
Names and identifying characteristics have been changed. Some individuals are composites and certain events have been compressed and/or reordered.
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The text for this book is set in Bodoni Twelve ITC.
First Edition
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Rhodes-Courter, Ashley, 1985–
Three more words / Ashley Rhodes-Courter. — First edition.
pages cm
ISBN 978-1-4814-1557-6 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4814-1559-0 (eBook)
1. Rhodes-Courter, Ashley, 1985– 2. Adopted children—United States—Biography.
3. Foster children—United States—Biography. 4. Foster home care—United States.
I. Title.
HV874.R56A3 2015
363.73092—dc23
[B] 2014035385
Ashley Rhodes-Courter, Three More Words
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