Sometimes, foster youth can tend to feel alone, and sometimes, it feels safer to operate that way. But I promise there’s a life outside of that — a chosen family. Often, as foster children, we are separated from biological family members or may be mistreated, abused and neglected by the ones closest to us. Because we are accustomed or conditioned to certain treatment, either from our foundation or our experiences, we tend to seek out relationships or nurture “family” relationships that mirror our experiences or similar treatment. For a lot of us, that can be very damaging, especially when a lot of us are programmed to feel like we aren’t good enough, something is wrong with us, or other people deserve more than what we get.
Often, we stick around these deplorable conditions, constantly looking for ways to prove that we belong. When we do this, we silently and quietly kill our own souls and suppress and depress our levels of consciousness. We dim our own light. We don’t allow ourselves to self-actualize and reach our full potential because we are around people that take from us and never fill us up. While there’s a power imbalance that comes into play within most familial relationships, it is imperative to protect one’s self from unnecessary and repeated harm that can not only just be damaging to our psyches, but to our overall path and life choices as well.
Someone in one of my old placements taught me when I was younger that “you pick your friends like you pick your fruit.” For us, we can also tie that to our concept of family and chosen relationships. We only want to surround ourselves with those who are the best to us and are the most appropriate. That’s not to say that people are perfect. It is to say that how you feel around the people closest to you matters. How they treat you matters. The things they say and the way they pour into you all matters.
If they’re doing more taking than giving, you may need to reevaluate. We, as former foster children, tend to hold spaces where we overcompensate to be accepted. From now on, we choose people that choose us, that love us for us, and that accept us for us. Just like when you’re picking out fruit at a market, you don’t pick out spoiled fruit because we know the likelihood of that fruit coming in contact with other fruit will contaminate it with its poison. Treat yourself like you would treat fruit at the market — only surround yourself with the best of the best.
The misconceptions surrounding family include often taking treatment from people because of a title or a weight that they hold in our lives. While I may honor someone as my mother, father, sister, auntie, uncle, or brother, I am allowed to set boundaries and guidelines to how I want and expect to be treated. If these types of relationships don’t exist, then chosen families come into play. The better you treat yourself, the more you’ll align yourself with people that will feel familiar enough to fill these roles without you even noticing. Sometimes, surrounding ourselves with good energy and getting rid of detrimental energy is the key to our survival. We don’t have to be alone, and we don’t have to be around those that constantly hurt us. You can surround yourself with the people of your choice and thrive.
