Why haven't we heard?

I've written about this before (sorry, too lazy to create the links for you), but we have passed the six month point from the date that Evan moved out. The agency has known that I have been willing to get calls about GLBT kids for eight months.

Eight months and there is no one.

I got calls about five different boys in 2003. (One I wouldn't take because I didn't want to work for the state. One that got sent back home against his expressed wishes. One was David. Two whom I was asked to help find homes for.)


Are they are going back into the closet?


Has the new training for foster parents worked well enough that homes are safe, even if they are mostly not nurturing?


PFLAG increasingly gets calls from parents who want information on how to support their kids. The ones who call are no longer devastated by the news. Is this change also happening in other families, including foster families?


Are the kids getting enough support from friends, that they are able to just keep their heads down and stay closeted, or nearly so, at home?


I don't know. In previous posts I have tried to theorize, but I get caught up in pointless speculation and can't finish the posts. In the end, I know one thing, and I feel one thing.


If I am not hearing about them because they are safe where they are, then that is probably a good thing. Being moved is traumatic. Even if my home would be more nurturing, that benefit has to be weighed against the badness of yet another move in their lives.


If I am not hearing from them because they are closeted or because they cannot imagine that coming out to their social workers could result in a change for the better, then I am sad. I wish I knew what I could do about it. I wish I knew away to communicate with them.


Oh...and one more thing ... the social workers are not reporting to me that they are not calling me because all the GLBT youth are doing well. They are telling me that they don't know any GLBT youth right now. (Except for that one guy who "everyone" believes is closeted even to himself.)


And I am having trouble painting a picture to myself in which that is not a bad thing.