SAN ANTONIO – Three-year-old Brooklyn sat on the floor playing with a Minnie Mouse makeup kit, with her moms behind her, laughing at every move.
“The house is filled with happiness and a bunch of toys,” said mom Stephanie Siller.
Siller and Rosalie Riojas always put Brooklyn front and center in their lives.
In their house, it’s easy to see that through their love is immense gratitude.
“We had wanted to start a family for a while, and we looked at different options,” Riojas said.
During that search, the couple saw Courtney Friedman’s story on KSAT about foster and adoption organization SJRC Texas.
“It’s full circle,” the pair said. “The story was really heartwarming. And so we got the information down, and that got us over to SJRC.”
The licensing process was long, but once it was done, the call from Child Protective Services came quickly.
“They were like, ‘You’ve been placed, come to the hospital and bring a car seat,’ and we were like, okay, we’re literally parents now,” Riojas said.
“I was getting on Pinterest and looking up ‘What is a newborn need?’ It was crazy,” Siller said.
Since Brooklyn was born outside of a hospital setting with no witness to her birth, the process was long, but the couple finally adopted her a year ago.
They said it was worth every second, especially because they had help from their SJRC contact, Rica Banks.
“She was with us the entire time. She was just amazing. She was always there for us. We would call her, vent sometimes, whatever we needed,” Riojas said.
“It shouldn’t be scary because we are holding your hand the whole time to make sure you get through the process and whatever it is that’s needed,” Banks said.
Banks wants people to know about that support, so they’ll consider fostering or adopting.
Foster homes are desperately needed, now more than ever.
The South Texas Alliance for Orphans reported in South Texas’ Region 8 that there are more than 3,318 children in foster care — 2,486 of those kids are in Bexar County.
The region still needs more than 500 new foster homes to get these kids out of emergency shelters and sometimes even CPS offices.
“It continues to increase,” Banks said.
“It was really eye-opening to hear that Bexar County had such a massive amount of kids that needed your homes,” Siller said.
Siller and Riojas are a small part of that solution, and they wanted to document that journey for Brooklyn to see when she’s older.
“We wanted to do a video, and we thought, ‘Why don’t we make (it) documentary style, something that shows a little bit about her background, our background,’” Siller said.
The talented team that shot it was so proud of the product that they submitted it to the San Antonio Film Festival, which accepted it.
The couple said it hasn’t sunk in yet the reach their film will now have.
“We’re still kind of in awe that it’s even out there!” Siller said.
The film walks through their “foster to adopt” process, and they hope it will clarify questions and concerns other families have.
“Maybe it’ll inspire someone to do foster care, and maybe it might lead to an adoption,” Rosalie said.
They said there’s tons of help from SJRC and other families in the same positions.
“Support groups that were available through SJRC. We got to work with other families and hear their stories and maybe what they were struggling with, and that really helped,” Siller said.
As for families who aren’t quite ready to foster or adopt but want to help, there are a lot of ways to do that.
“Whether that’s mentoring, whether that’s helping an organization. There’s a lot of organizations that support the foster community,” Riojas said. “The Vault, I love (it) because we didn’t have in the beginning that we needed to take care of a newborn because it literally happened overnight. And so we were able to utilize their services.”
“If you don’t have the ability to take a child in, then see if maybe you can provide respite or provide a meal for a family,” Banks suggested.
Another way to support families like Brooklyn’s is to go and see the film.
The film “Brooklyn’s Forever Family” will premiere at the San Antonio Film Festival on Wednesday, July 31, at 3:00 p.m. at the Tobin Center.
Not ready to foster? There are a bunch of other ways you can help foster families
If you have any other questions about fostering, adopting or helping out, contact SJRC at (210) 592-1156 or visit their website.