My son, Jeremiah, was in foster care for more than 10 years. Eight of those years were spent as a “freed” child - a child to whom no one had any parental rights… a child we often describe as “waiting.” He moved 33 times before he came to our house, and most of those moves were from one institutional placement to another. He spent his time waiting in places where he was hurt, inconsistently medicated and asked to repeat the ninth grade five times. He waited in places where there were no birthday parties, no stories before bed and no trips to the supermarket to pick out your favorite cereal. When I met him at age 16, he had a bruise on his face from a restraint at a residential facility. The restraint had happened months earlier, but the bruise was still visible. The staff person who inflict