Sunday’s Child is a weekly column featuring a child currently in foster care awaiting adoption.

Ruth is a playful and fun 9-year-old girl of Hispanic descent. Ruth has a great sense of humor and she loves to play games both inside and outside.  Ruth loves to dance and has taken dance lessons in the past. She has also participated in horseback riding where she was described as a natural. Ruth has a cleft palate/cleft lip, and will potentially require some surgical procedures in the future as she grows. 

Ruth is described as a very bright student. She benefits from the use of an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) as well as participating in therapy.  Ruth can struggle at times with social difficulties, but does well with the structure and support she receives in her current program placement. 

The ideal family for Ruth is a two parent or single parent family with no children or children who are significantly older than Ruth.  Ruth would do best in a home without pets. Her future family should also be open to helping Ruth keep in contact with her adult sibling.  

Who can adopt?

Can you provide the guidance, love and stability that a child needs? If you’re at least 18 years old, have a stable source of income, and room in your heart, you may be a perfect match to adopt a waiting child. Adoptive parents can be single, married, or partnered; experienced or not; renters or homeowners; LGBTQ singles and couples.

The process to adopt a child from foster care requires training, interviews, and home visits to determine if adoption is right for you, and if so, to help connect you with a child or sibling group that will be a good match. The process to make a match that will be “for keeps’’ can take a year or longer.

To learn more about adoption from foster care, call the Massachusetts Adoption Resource Exchange (MARE) at 617-54-ADOPT (617-542-3678) or visit www.mareinc.org. The sooner you call, the sooner a waiting child will have “a permanent place to call home.’’