It took a while for 11-year-old Jarrett to find the right adoptive family.

With his biological mother deceased and his biological father in prison, Jarrett and his siblings had been in foster care since he was just 6 or 7 years old. Eventually, one of their foster families decided to adopt Jarrett’s brother and sister — but not Jarrett.

“It was traumatic,” said John Faison. “It wasn’t good.”

When Jarrett was placed in John and Audrey Faison’s foster home through Oakland Family Services more than a year ago, he was struggling with his emotions and behavior. Angry and hurting, he would have temper tantrums and run away.

“It was tough at first,” John said. “He had to learn new things and new ways, and he tested us for quite a while. … We stuck with him, stuck by him. We worked on the relationship, and we always kept trying to connect and then stay connected.”

When foster children first enter a new home, the foster parents have to “feel them out,” Audrey said. The Faisons knew that Jarrett was legally available for adoption from the start, but took things one day at a time as they got to know one another.

“You have to get used to them,” Audrey said. “They have to get used to you. The biggest challenge is making sure that they feel welcome. They still have doubts, they act out, and we just stand by them and just support them. … We knew that inside, emotionally, he was crying out for help.”

Jarrett hit it off immediately with the Faisons’ 16-year-old biological son, Jean-Luc, and gradually became more confident with his place in the family. The Faisons “just knew” that Jarrett fit in with the family and wanted to become a permanent member, and Jarrett’s adoption was finalized in November 2021. The family was overjoyed and threw a party to celebrate.

“When we found out that his adoption was finalized and we told him together, his whole demeanor and emotion was just so different,” Audrey said. “… It was so amazing. We could actually see and feel the relief that he had when we told him that his adoption was final. It’s kind of unexplainable. He was just full of joy. His whole demeanor was just relieved, like, ‘Is this really true? Is this happening? Is this for real?’ It was like he couldn’t believe it.”

Through therapy, Jarrett has developed better self-control, and the Faisons have worked to learn how to best support their son with the help of training, support groups and resources through Oakland Family Services’ foster care and adoption program.

“We tend to take a lot of training classes, and there’s a support group, and we attend that, as well,” John said. “All of that has helped. [We learned] techniques you can try, and in the support group we talk to other people that have been doing this for a long time and hear some of their experiences and their challenges and how they handled a lot of situations that you’ll come across as a foster parent.”

Although he still has his ups and downs, Jarrett is now thriving in school and has made plenty of friends.

“I think he feels wanted now,” Audrey said. “I think he was a little skeptical at first because he wasn’t sure. He knows now that we love him and we accept him no matter what he’s been through.”

Fostering Journey

Fostering was always in the back of John and Audrey’s minds. They had talked about it years ago, and finally made the leap to become licensed after Audrey’s cousin died in a car accident, leaving behind a 4-year-old son. They had hoped to give the young boy a home, but by the time their licensing process was completed, he had settled in with another family. Although the kinship placement did not work out, the Faisons still wanted to give fostering a try.

In addition to Jarrett, the Faisons have fostered three other young boys in the two years since opening their license. John works from home, which gives the couple the opportunity to provide their foster children with a steady routine, plenty of structure and time to connect.

“The first foster kid we got, I spent a lot of time tutoring and teaching him how to read,” John said. “He was 10 years old and he couldn’t read, so I started trying to teach him how to read and do arithmetic and how to write. Even though it was difficult, it was rewarding because he was learning. … We also jogged every morning, and he went from not being able to jog around half a track, … as time rolled by, he was able to run 12 times around. He’s got a talent for running.”

Their newest placement is a 7-year-old who was removed from his mother’s care due to neglect. He arrived at the Faisons’ home about a month ago with nothing but the clothes he was wearing. Each new placement brings new challenges, but as Audrey puts it, “nothing worth doing is ever easy.”

“Even if you just help one child, that is amazing,” she said. “The more you help, the better the community as a whole.”

John said the couple wants to help as many young boys as they can through fostering, and even short placements can have a big impact on the life of a child.

“They’ll always carry that with them,” Audrey said. “Because a lot of these kids, they don’t have any type of discipline or support, love, they don’t know anything about that. And for someone to give them just a little taste of it, it’s something. … You know that they have a taste of what reality can be like.”

Interested in becoming a foster parent? Oakland Family Services licenses foster homes in Oakland, Wayne and Macomb counties. Click here to learn more.