Listener Picks: When Foster Kids Become Adults

1A

NPR

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4.3 • 4.5K Ratings

🗓️ 9 January 2023

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Around 25,000 kids age out of the foster care system every year in the U.S. What happens when they do?

In the years immediately following their 18th or 21st birthday (depending on the state), these young adults are likely to struggle in poverty.

The effects of growing up in the system last decades into adulthood, too. We heard from one of our listeners, Priscilla Molina, who told us growing up in foster care has affected how she relates to others and herself.

We talk to a panel of former foster youth about what happens when foster kids become adults.

This episode is part of our Listener Picks series.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Around 25,000 kids age out of the foster care system in America annually.
0:14.0	What happens to them in the years and decades that follow?
0:17.7	Every January 1A dedicates a week to topics suggested by you, our listeners, starting today.
0:24.8	Priscilla Molina tweeted us, she's 62 years old and lives in Philadelphia.
0:30.0	She wrote, I was raised in foster care from 5 to 19.
0:34.2	Never had family, a home, parents, grandparents or history.
0:38.8	Do a show on adult foster children.
0:41.3	It's a brutal, existential ache.
0:43.8	We called Priscilla to learn more.
0:45.8	I was listening to the program one day and I was feeling the stress of my life.
0:51.8	Everybody goes away for a holiday.
0:54.8	There's just so much vacancy in my life.
0:57.8	It's just a huge void.
0:58.8	You can't even talk about it.
1:00.8	You've got to protect people because it's so intense.
1:03.8	And you're not even allowed to really tell people the truth.
1:06.8	I asked Priscilla to explain what she met when she wrote that life as a former foster youth,
1:12.8	brings a brutal, existential ache.
1:14.8	And 62, she's exhausted.
1:16.8	I'm a gardener.
1:18.8	I'm an animal rescuer.
1:20.8	I worked in the IT field.
	...

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