Buzzards Bay family encourages others to welcome foster children into homes

BUZZARDS BAY – May is National Foster Care Awareness Month and in Massachusetts, more than 1,100 children and teenagers are wishing for the love and support of a permanent family.

It is a big challenge. But a family in Buzzards Bay wants you to know there is help to become a foster family.

"It's been exciting, yeah, been a lot. I mean, because I'm not really used to like a big family like this and like doing all the things they do," said Lonnie, who moved in with his foster family in Buzzards Bay about a year ago.

"Getting adopted as a teenager, getting to that point is scary because you don't know what they're going to be like, because now that you're a teenager it's different," he said. "They're going to be more like hard on you but it's really not like that. It's like it's easy and like, they care about you."

Mary and Jose Nogueras have five children, two biological - Jaden and Abigail, who are 16 and 9. They have two by adoption, brothers Julian and Emmanuel, who are 17 and 9 years old. And this year they added Lonnie, who had lived with Julian in a group home.

So what was the biggest challenge?

"Getting used to everyone.  Everyone was different and like, they all had like, their different way of expressing themselves," Lonnie said.

Mary and Jose met as teens in Hawaii. Jose's job in the Coast Guard brought them to New England.

Foster care had always been in the plan for them as a family

"It's always been an ongoing conversation with Jose that adopting from foster care has really been important in our marriage, and just seeing that there are not many people of color being adoptive parents," Mary said. "We wanted to make sure that we represent our community that we can be adotive parents, we can be foster parents and kids of color can thrive in families like ours."

Lonnie agrees that when teens need a home, a transracial family like his can change a life.

"We're all human. … We are different. We're different in our own way. You either like to learn someone or you don't like to learn someone," Lonnie said. "It's not a reason not to foster someone because that person could be hurting and you like helping them could help them out big time. And they change the way they look on life and everything."

Jose wants people to know that they can embrace children from a different culture.

"It's not as difficult or as off-putting as some people might think 'Oh if I'm a white family, you know, I don't know anything about Black culture or the Black child," Jose said. "So you guys are learning together, you now, going out to different festivals going to a Black-owned bookstore to get books, reaching out to other Black members of families. You know, you can be an Asian family and want to adopt a Black child or a maybe a Black family wants to adopt an Asian child and not know about those cultures. But it's a great opportunity to learn together about those cultures."

Their devotion is so great that Mary has become the outreach and support coordinator for Black and Latino adoptive families for Massachusetts Adoption Resource Exchange (MARE).

"Jose and I we have modest incomes and we just want people to know that it is free," Mary said. "It's free to adopt from foster care.  And there is a wide variety of resources available to support foster parents and pre adoptive parents."

"DCF or many other organizations will help assist you in getting resources you need whether it's bedding, a bed clothing you now playing places that can help you get those resources through DCF, foster care it's free," Jose added. "You don't have to own your own home. Renting is perfectly fine. You don't have to have perfect success in life. As long as you have a somewhat stable home you can provide for yourself, you can provide for the child and that's all you really need."

For Lonnie, his family is the perfect success.

"I was looking for a family and I was like kind of thinking it's not gonna happen. And then one day they're like, you want to have an overnight with Mary? I was like, who's Mary? And then my mom comes she's like, are you ready?  I was like what is going on?" Lonnie said. "It was nice. Nice."