CLEVELAND — Playing games as a family is something many kids may take for granted, but not the Chance siblings.

What You Need To Know

  • More than 400,000 children in the U.S. are in foster care

  • Nearly two-thirds of the children in foster care have siblings and many of them are separated 

  • A nonprofit in northeast Ohio is on a mission is to keep siblings together

James, 10, Arielle, 8, and Javier, 5, were born in New Mexico. They spent two years in foster care, separated from each other the entire time. In 2019, Becky and Eric Chance adopted all three of them and became their mom and dad. They said one of their biggest goals for their children is for them to feel safe and loved and that they have a forever home. 

“I just want them to be happy,” said Becky. “I want them to not have to worry about anything anymore. I don't want them to worry about where their next meal is coming from. I don't want them to worry that they're ever going to be abandoned again. I don't want them to ever think they're ever going to be alone, because between us and our family and friends, our children will never ever be alone ever again in their life.”

Children in foster care often come from broken homes. Mental health problems, extreme poverty and the opioid epidemic are some of the reasons more than 400,000 children are in foster care in the United States, according to Adopt U.S. Kids. 

“They want somebody to cheer them on from the sidelines, whether it's baseball or soccer or their dance recital,” said Jackie Smigel, founder and CEO of Open Arms Adoptions. “They want somebody to be home for them when they get home from school, tuck them into bed at night, read with them. They want to finish growing up, being able to be kids.”

Smigel has worked in adoptions for more than 30 years. She said the system is overburdened and the COVID-19 pandemic has made bad situations worse. 

“We'll be picking up the pieces for a long time,” said Smigel. “When we had all the kids at home, with families who were already struggling with violence issues, with substance abuse issues, with depression, with anxiety, with poor parenting skills, with poor coping skills, and then we smashed everybody together for months at a time with no real outlet what we know was happening and couldn't do anything about was we knew that bad situations were getting worse.”

Smigel tries to be a light in the dark for the nearly 16,000 children in foster care in Ohio. 

“Cuyahoga County has an exceptionally large number of children in their system,” said Smigel. “Right now they have over 800 children in permanent custody, meaning that they are not going to be able to return to any family, not their parents, not grandparents and aunts and uncles, and they need to be adopted. So that's over 800 just in one county alone in Ohio.”

More than of children in foster care have a sibling, yet many get separated due to space and other concerns, according to Adopt U.S. Kids. Smigel’s passion is bringing siblings back together. 

“That's my personal passion is these kiddos who have already lost everything. They've lost their parents. They've lost pets. They've lost teachers and classmates and everything that they knew, and they should not lose their brothers and sisters to the system, too,” said Smigel. “There's nobody in the child welfare system who would tell you that it's a good thing. It just happens because of the reality of the system.”

Every year, over 23,000 children in the United States age out of the foster care system and are left with nowhere to go. Smigel said many of those children will never get their high school diploma or GED. She said youth in foster care are at significant risk for using substances and many will end up convicted of a crime or find themselves as young moms.  

“One way or another, we as a society are taking care of these kids. Wouldn't it be better to take care of them on the front end, than to take care of them through the prison system to take care of them through the homeless shelters? Wouldn't it be better to take care of them on the front end?” said Smigel. “If not you, who? And there's really no time like the present. We are just so passionate about what we do whether you want to adopt one child or six.”

The Chances met in 2015 and got married in 2018. They were at Open Arms Adoptions a week later. 

“I found a notebook of Arielle’s, and she wrote in it, 'Mom and dad chose James, Arielle and Javier, and Javier, James and Ariel chose mom and dad,'” said Becky. 

“I love my family a ton,” said Eric. "They are the reason I live and breathe.”

Their children have been through a lot but now they get to be together.

“It means more to the kids than you could ever know,” said Becky. “I can't tell you how many times our kids have said to us we get to be together. We get to grow up together. So you are fulfilling a dream of there's that they should have never had to worry about in the first place.”

Now the three of them can build a life they love, in a healthy home with their forever family. 

“They give us food and water and shelter,” said James. “They love us. They take care of us, and I love them. I'm happy that they're my mom and dad. They're just good parents.”

“God did exactly what — He knew what He was doing. He placed all of us together as our family,” said Becky. 

Open Arms Adoptions does training for parents to prepare them for adoption and talk about bringing siblings back together and adopting more than one child. For more information you can visit here.