Recording The Hard Stories With Jayne Amelia Larson of The Bonus Babies Podcast

00:00:02.350 - Speaker 1

Hi and welcome to CausePods, I'm your host, Mathew Passy. Here at CausePods, we have one simple mission to highlight the amazing folks who are using podcast as a way to raise awareness for good causes and make the world a better place, whether it's in their own local community or their taking on global issues. Please visit us at CausePods.org where you can learn about our guests, show their favorite charitable cause. Join our Facebook group of resources for CausePods podcasters and find a link where you yourself could be a guest here on CausePods.

00:00:33.970 - Speaker 1

Again, that's all at CausePods.org.

00:00:40.210 - Speaker 2

All right, everyone, we are going to take you out to the West Coast, Los Angeles, we are chatting with Jane Amelia Larson, the host and creator of Bonus Babies. And this is a show all about foster care. Jane is a court appointed special advocate or a CASA volunteer. You're going to hear that phrase CASA probably a few times in the show. So we're excited to find out all about what she does and her show and how she's helping children.

00:01:06.760 - Speaker 2

So, Jane, thank you so much for joining us here on CausePods today.

00:01:09.520 - Speaker 3

Hey, Mathew, thanks a lot. I'm really glad to be here and I'm really glad to be talking about CASA. And I know it's a mouthful. Court appointed special advocate, volunteer for kids in foster care who are dependents of the court. And it's a really important role. I'll give you an idea why. Let's say in Los Angeles, there's 35000 kids in foster care at any one time and there are approximately 200 cases. All the kids that we take care of are special cases that need extra special help.

00:01:44.770 - Speaker 3

And we need more cases, by the way. We need more men in particular. We need all shapes and sizes of CASA as there's a lot of women that do it because women so often step up as volunteers. But we're always looking for more volunteers in the country. There's approximately 650000 kids in foster care at any one time. There aren't enough people to take care of them. The people that are paid to take care of them, they're social workers, there's judges, there's therapists, there's attorneys, but they're all on the dime.

00:02:13.690 - Speaker 3

The states dime the federal dime, sometimes private agency dimes. The CASA is a volunteer position, so nobody owns the CASA. And the CASA's role is to act as the eyes and ears of the court to learn everything that they can about the kid, the kid's case, what's going on in school, what's going on regarding medication, and to make recommendations to the judge when that kid's case is called. A lot of people don't know this, but every kid that is a dependent of the court actually ends up in hearings throughout the year.

00:02:50.560 - Speaker 3

And they're represented by attorneys. And there are reports that are submitted by social workers. Social workers ideally have maybe 30 kids on their caseloads, but they more often have twice that. And there just aren't enough caring adults to go around. So there was a judge over 50 years ago in Seattle that said, hmm, I wonder if I can find some volunteers that will take one kid and act as that kid's voice, that kids advocate in court. And much to his surprise, a lot of people stepped up and now it's a nationwide program.

00:03:28.990 - Speaker 3

I just learned about it a few years ago. I don't know why I didn't know about it. But now that I do know about it, I realize it's one of the most important things that probably I'm ever going to do.

00:03:39.550 - Speaker 2

It's so interesting as you're talking about these kids and their social workers who when these attorneys who represent them and, you know, they typically have a caseload of at least 30 kids or more, I'm sure they are doing their best and trying. But you have there they probably can't get to know these kids at the level that would make an impact the way a single individual who's going to foster these children and care for them would when it comes to speaking to the judge, you know, working with social services, getting them the help that they need.

00:04:13.540 - Speaker 2

And so it sounds like having these advocates, the special advocate volunteers, really can be a difference maker for so many of these kids.

00:04:22.720 - Speaker 3

Yeah, that is exactly it, because the CASA essentially acts as the hub of a wheel and all the information about that kid is connected to the CASA because the cost is out there talking to everybody, the CASA making calls, making visits. CASA is really the one who's connecting all the dots. I'll give you an example. This attorney that I interview on my podcast, he has over 200 kids that he represents. 200. I mean, even if you're a powerhouse in a super tourney and he is, it's just too much work.

00:05:02.600 - Speaker 3

So, you know, he and I talk a lot about how important courses are for it for kids, even more than that. What happens with the courses that because they're not paid, nobody owns them, they are free to make their own decisions about what's actually going on and not say, well, you know, the agency has this case and, you know, we're going to follow through with that and you know that. And so that's the other thing in the case is, no, this is what's going on.

00:05:28.370 - Speaker 3

This is what I saw. And because of the cost, his role is so important. When a case is called more often than not, the first report that the judge reads is the cases, because the judge knows that the concept is the one that knows what's going on.

00:05:45.590 - Speaker 2

You said you only found out about this program a few years ago. I'm curious, how did you find out about it and what made you want to jump in and volunteer?

00:05:55.400 - Speaker 3

You know, I had always worked with kids in arts organizations. I used to work with a fifty second street project in New York and then the Virginia Avenue project in California. I'm an actor, writer, producer, and I, I, I did plays with kids and I had fun in them. About five years ago I got a new boyfriend and he had just moved to California and he had decided that he really wanted to start volunteering for the first time in his life.

00:06:22.640 - Speaker 3

And he found this organization called Peace for Kids. And after a few Saturdays when he was away from me, I was said, okay, can I come to the can see he was out a great time. And and so we started doing it together. And it's called Peace for Kids Dog. And it's a community. It's our brother. It's a community organization in the Watts Willowbrook community of Los Angeles. It's all foster kids. And I want to I want to actually clarify something.

00:06:57.140 - Speaker 3

I've been trying to get away from the term foster kids because we don't say divorced kids and we don't say kids with a dead dad or kids with alcoholic mom, but we do say foster kids. And really a lot of foster kids don't really like that term because there's so much stigma attached to it. It's really kids in care, kids with a lived foster care experience. So I'm really I'm going to think as we're talking now how to wrap around that, because it's so easy to say foster kids, foster youth, foster teens.

00:07:31.310 - Speaker 3

But they're really just kids who are dependents of the court whose families have failed them. And then very often the foster system fails them as well. But anyway, what happened at peace for kids? I heard this guy talking about being Icaza. I thought, what? What what is that? That's just that's I, I wonder what that is. Never heard of that. And I had worked with kids and kids in care for a long time, for 20 years.

00:07:57.770 - Speaker 3

But I never heard the term Khoza and so I started to research a little bit. And then I realized how important a casserole is. So I took what my boyfriend calls the deep dove, and I went and got trained and I realized through the training how important it it it is. I also learned a lot about myself and about who I am as a person and what I'm willing to do and also what I'm capable of doing. It turns out I'm probably a pretty good Kaza in part because I like to dig in.

00:08:31.670 - Speaker 3

And also I'm a pretty good Kaza because I've learned through the training really how to keep an open mind about what's happening in a case, what's happening with the kid. So it's not a problem, kid. Let's say it's a kid that's hurting. Or a kid that needs attention or a kids that are a kid that needs help and not a problem kid. And that was the really interesting thing for me to learn, because I think it well, I come from a family of 10 children and I don't have any kids.

00:09:08.040 - Speaker 3

I have got, I think 18 nieces and nephews and as many now, you know, grand nieces and nephews almost, or at least there's there's going to be probably by the time I'm dead and I always wanted children, but I was never in the right situation to have them. And then time passes and then. Well, I guess that's not going to that's not going to play out. But I've always loved being around children and I learn from them.

00:09:32.670 - Speaker 3

I love their resiliency and their ability to learn and live. And I think that's particularly true for kids in care. What I have seen is they are incredibly resilient. I mean, and then and the challenges that they face in their very young lives make them force them to be adaptable and inventive and extremely attuned to any situation. Unfortunately, for sometimes the worst reasons, like who's going to hit me now? So they pay attention and they adjust and they adapt.

00:10:11.220 - Speaker 3

And I'm inspired by them. And in my podcast, I there's a lot of stories of trauma, but so many more triumph. I know this one kid I just recently interviewed at four years old, he threw himself out of a three story window to save himself. I mean, to save himself. Anyway, I hear a lot of stories and my hats off to these kids are pretty amazing.

00:10:42.180 - Speaker 2

So you go on this journey, you start to do the work. You see how incredible of an experience it is, the impact that you can have on these kids. What made you then want to turn around and turn this into a podcast? What was the thinking there as I talk to more and more kids? I realize that they don't have a forum to tell their stories. Yeah, they tell their stories to the social worker sometimes or the therapists, and sometimes they don't even want to be in therapy or they get asked a couple of questions by the judge, but they haven't had a chance to actually tell their stories of how they feel about what's happened to them and how they've arrived at where they are.

00:11:26.420 - Speaker 2

And as I was thinking about that and dreaming on what the podcast could be. I realized that my role as a icaza could act as a guide because the CASA's role is to get information about everyone in that child's life. So part of what I'm doing in the podcast is not just talking to the kids, not just giving them a form, although that is the most important part of it. I'm also talking to the adults in care, the social workers, how difficult the job is, how how they went into it with one idea, how much it takes a toll on them and how there's dirty social workers and ones that lie.

00:12:11.780 - Speaker 2

And I talked to attorneys and the nature of that work and how they how they got into it. Instead of making a half a million dollars a year, they decide to work for, like the Children's Law Center making a fraction of that, but that they know that they're basically saving a child's life on a regular basis. I realized I wanted to tell a more 360 view about what's going on. And I have the capability of doing that, in part because I'm reaching out to people and they're saying, yes, we want to tell our story.

00:12:44.000 - Speaker 2

So it's been really easy for me to get guests, especially once they've heard some of the episodes, because they see it straight. It's hard hitting. I'm not sugarcoating anything. I'm trying to get the real stories of what is happening in the Foster Care Oddisee today. And it's not good. There's a lot of good that's done, but it has to get much better.

00:13:08.320 - Speaker 2

So, I mean, you're clearly comfortable behind the microphone, right? You said you were doing some work in acting and theater and it sounds like the adults are always willing. I wonder, what is it like to try and get a child to one, agree to come on a podcast, but more importantly, get them to open up and talk? I mean, I'm guessing some of them are more than willing to just talk. Right. You know, kids love talking.

00:13:37.810 - Speaker 2

So experience with two of those right now. But what is it that you do or how is it that you were able to coax some of these children to want to share their story and put that out there in the world?

00:13:53.170 - Speaker 3

First, just to be clear, I don't have any minors on the show, OK, although I will probably have quite a few very soon because I've made arrangements with parents who who are willing to be on the show with their kids. But even so, I've got kids there like 19, and he is very, very difficult for them to tell their story. But I'm an empathetic listener and they know I care about what I'm doing and I let them take the time.

00:14:20.710 - Speaker 3

And I ask questions, I pay attention, and sometimes we go back and we go over things and I let them stop and I say, OK, if you need a moment, if you want to think about this, let's take your time. But I think this is a really important part of it. So I really coach him through it to some extent. And some of that ends up edited out and some of it doesn't. There's one kid that I had who just was super fidgety, like he just, you know, he had a really good might.

00:14:53.470 - Speaker 3

He had a great head, said he's a gamer and but he just couldn't stop making noises like it was a chair. It was rocking back and forth. But he was agitated. So I say up front, I can hear you're agitated. I can hear the movement eyes. I can see you moving. And that's OK. Just let's try to get on with the story. I try to be really encouraging. It is hard, though, I have to say Mathew for me too.

00:15:21.820 - Speaker 3

It's really draining. It's it hurts to do it. It hurts to hear the stories. You know a lot, you know, a lot of times quite frankly, to hurt hurts to hear the stories. But I do think that it's more important for me to focus on what I'm hearing and letting kids tell their stories then how difficult it is for me to do it or for them to do it. And somehow we were doing it. You know, we're doing it.

00:15:50.290 - Speaker 3

I also give the guest a little bit of time at the beginning when we're not recording to understand the nature of the exchange. And I gave him a lot of leeway. And I also let them know if you got to stop or if you want to walk away, if you want to do it a different time. There's nobody your feet are not to the fire. This is an agreement we have. If you want to go forward. Great. And that seems to really assuage their fears.

00:16:15.250 - Speaker 2

Well, I think something that you said at the very beginning of that is something that so many podcasters and just content creators in general need to understand better than the good ones do. This is that being a good interviewer is usually about being a good listener. That is really the key to a good conversation is not what do I want to get out of this? What does the person who I'm talking to want to share? And if you really take time to listen and pay attention, they can guide you to ideas and thinking and thoughts that you might not have been brought up in your prep for a good interview or, you know, things that you thought were going to cover.

00:16:55.000 - Speaker 2

So I think that's such an important lesson for everybody doing a podcast that to really be a good interviewer, you've really got to be a good listener. And being a good listener just creates a friendly, warm environment for the folks that you want to have join you on your show.

00:17:08.620 - Speaker 3

I think that's really true. And also right up front, I like to establish trust because if they trust me, I know that they're going to talk to me. And I do that with the first phone call that I have with them. I always have a preinterview call. I keep it short. I keep it like fifteen, twenty minutes. I get some I get some details about their life so that I know I have a guide when I'm interviewing them in case we get stuck or lost or overwhelmed.

00:17:38.830 - Speaker 3

I have a very loose guide of where the conversation might go. But in that pre call I also let them know that I'm paying attention to them and that they can trust me. If there's anything that happens that makes them uncomfortable, it can be cut or we can stop or all that stuff. And as you can imagine, some of the material is really pretty rough. It is explicit. It is very, very difficult for them to tell. And they've consistently wowed me by willing to go there.

00:18:13.720 - Speaker 2

Well, it's deeply, deeply personal, I would imagine, for many of them to.

00:18:18.220 - Speaker 3

And sometimes it's the first time they've ever said it out loud, keeping in mind that they know it's going to be broadcast.

00:18:25.780 - Speaker 2

It seems like you have a pretty good handle on creating this content. Right. You've got a good microphone, like I said at the beginning, very comfortable behind the microphone. You have a it's been a crap shoot from the beginning. I've been winging it. I mean, I had a really tough time with getting the set up and the mic and the connections. And it's just it's been crazy. But I'm in a little bit of a rhythm now.

00:18:49.570 - Speaker 2

Yeah.

00:18:50.350 - Speaker 2

You definitely got to where you need to get to at this point. So my question and again, because this is such a unique piece of content, a unique cause, and what I imagine is a very unique audience. What are you doing to grow the show, to reach your target audience, to connect with people who could be either future Carson volunteers or folks that could, you know? Help and provide services to those that are, you know, these advocates for kids that are in state care?

00:19:27.330 - Speaker 3

Well, I'm thinking about that every waking moment right now, actually, Mathew, because I just launched this podcast. It's there's a eight episodes up. I'm doing it all on a shoestring. I'm right now very actively looking for sponsors. I have a lovely young woman who is one of my guests who is helping me with the PR. I just got her on board, were doing Sociales so that I've got some regular postings out there. I'm not into that stuff.

00:19:56.100 - Speaker 3

I had a very successful, very successful book that actually prevented me from being online. Very much so. That's it. So it's not something I learned and it's not something I'm all really all that comfortable with either. So she's helping me do that. And it's kind of growing organically because she's also a former foster youth. She understands the nature of the work. Meantime, I'm thinking about everybody I know, every local business I love, and I'm going to start hitting them up.

00:20:28.320 - Speaker 3

I've got some language I'm building. I've got some blurbs, some pictures I'm about to start doing. The big asks to say, do you want to support this very, very worthy podcast and do you want to support. Real positive change in the foster care system, and I'm trying to make that happen.

00:20:52.440 - Speaker 2

What kind of support would you be seeking, who are the types of businesses, associations, organizations, charities, individuals, even that, you know, you're looking to support this project that would either benefit from having themselves associated with this content or, you know. See, the benefit of of, you know, propping this up, right?

00:21:21.900 - Speaker 3

Well, I'm not yet a 501 3C and I'm actually in the process of trying to make that happen for sure. At some point, I'd like to get some big funding, like from Annenberg or the James Irvine Foundation or Cal Matters or, you know, there's a host of many there's there's great foundations all over the country that I think would be interested in something like this. But I'm starting small with local businesses and with people that I know, with law firms, with restaurants, with the places that I frequent, who see my face, who I can go and pitch in person.

00:21:56.790 - Speaker 3

And even though there's part of me, it's like I don't really want to do that. I also know that I'm such a passionate advocate at this point that maybe I'm the best person to do that. Just to walk in and say, hey, I'm in this restaurant now, you know, post covid three times a week, you own 10 other restaurants. You want to do a little sponsorship of a worthy cause. So that's what I'm thinking about right now.

00:22:22.050 - Speaker 3

I also think that it is such a worthy cause that I'm hoping that as I start to really hit up the people that I know and the businesses that I know and the smaller I want to see smaller foundations that I know. I think if I get a little traction, I'm hoping that that will snowball. I mean, that's my dream of dreams. And you've caught me right at the beginning of it. Really try and think about how am I going to make it happen?

00:22:54.390 - Speaker 3

Like, how much does it cost to produce an episode? And if I were able ever to compensate myself for the massive amount of work I'm doing, what would that be worth? I want to pay my PR person. I want to everybody I know from is working for free for me, my editors, my supervising producer, who's just a genius of a guy who's like this is so important I cannot not help you. It's a little bit like that right now, but I'm hoping that'll be different next week.

00:23:29.280 - Speaker 2

When you're not working on the show, are you? Actively. Advocating for a child right now?

00:23:36.710 - Speaker 3

Yeah, I have a child she's about to get adopted, I hope, fingers crossed. I've been her CUSA for over four years and she's had a really, really rough road. I hold her educational rights. So I've been her advocate in school as well. When I first met her, when she was in first grade, she didn't know how to hold pencil or write cat or hat or mat, and now she's at the top of a class even in covid and is because I advocated for special services, for special schooling.

00:24:10.760 - Speaker 3

I got extra tutoring for her. She didn't have a chance to have the kind of regular extracurricular activities that the kids have. So I got her swim coach and I'd been taking her swimming. She's now pool safe. You know, at ten years old, she's learned how to swim. You know, she's doing all those things that a kid should be able to do under normal circumstances. But she's now just getting them. And she's about to be adopted by her young cousin, who I have also advocated for.

00:24:42.110 - Speaker 3

As you may know, or you probably listeners know, ideally, you want to keep the kids in their families, even if they're in extended families. And in this case, it's totally worked out. But it's been a long, arduous journey because there was a lot of push and pull and back and forth. The kid was in several foster homes, not good ones, not happy ones. And now she's doing great. She's she's just doing great.

00:25:09.760 - Speaker 2

So she just so I understand, she does not live with you, right?

00:25:12.860 - Speaker 3

No, absolutely not. In fact, they're not allowed to I don't bring her home. She doesn't have anything to do with my personal life. It's totally separate. In fact, if there's anybody out there listening, is thinking about being a. That's one of the main things, not only to protect the kid, but also to protect you so that you can do your work because every little kid and it happens to every Khoza. After a couple hours of meeting my kids, she said, Won't you take me home?

00:25:40.600 - Speaker 3

Won't you take me home? Can I live with you? And you know, you can't help that kid by doing that because you can't take home every kid that asks you that. Instead, I said no, but I'm going to make sure that I get you a good home. First thing you know, it was very hard to explain to to a six and a half year old why I was even in her life. So the way that I explained it was I said, I work for you, nobody else.

00:26:08.440 - Speaker 3

I work for you. And she said, you work for me. And I said, yes, I work for you. And then she understood, you know, that I do work for her and I do I pay attention to what she wants, what she needs. Also, the role of the CASA is not just to advocate for the kid, but to listen to what the kid wants to figure out if they can get it, and then sometimes to convince the kid that what they want is actually not the best thing for them.

00:26:41.930 - Speaker 3

Because that's often true to what's your ultimate goal for this podcast project, when will you have felt like. This was a smashing success, and you will have realized your goal with it.

00:26:57.080 - Speaker 3

There are 650000 kids in foster care in this country. If at least half of them had a icaza, it would make all the difference in the world. So we need more cases. We need one person looking out for a kid that acts as the eyes and ears of the court for that kid to figure out what's going on with that kid. Because what happens in the foster care system, kids get lost. They get lost and they don't get what they need.

00:27:28.610 - Speaker 3

They are not cared for, so they're abandoned by their families and then they are essentially abandoned by the foster care system. I find this reprehensible and we need more causus. That's it. And we need more men. We need more people of color. We need more we need all shapes and sizes and genders and gender preferences. There's a very high percentage of kids in care who identify as LGBTQ and they don't have enough representation because very often foster families are religious based and they don't want a gay kid in the house.

00:28:07.970 - Speaker 3

They don't want a transgender in the house. So the kid gets moved and moved and moved and moved and moved. And it's a terrible thing for a kid, it's nothing more terrible than being told out of the blue to grab your shit and put it in a plastic bag because you're getting move that night. One thing I learned about Icaza, I mean, that I learned as a Kasser, I was terrified at first that I wouldn't be any good.

00:28:33.880 - Speaker 3

And I know what I want. Maybe the kid would like me all that, all that stuff. And then a very, very seasoned Kaisa told me, if you do one good thing for that kid, that can make all the difference. And that's what I've been riding on. And I think it's really true. If you can do one good thing for a kid, you can change that kid's life jumping off from that point. And, you know, moving on to we always like to talk about the charities that our guests are supporting.

00:29:02.560 - Speaker 3

In your case, obviously, one that hits very close to home, which is CASA L.A. This is the court appointed special advocate. Group, the specific chapter of Los Angeles, CASA L.A., but if you're listening to this and you're interested in getting involved, becoming a volunteer, there's also national CASA G.L. Doug Kosygin, court appointed special advocate, j.l guardians, ad litem. And just tell us a little bit about what national Casa Gadg is all about.

00:29:34.640 - Speaker 3

And then specifically for those in your area, you know what they should know about the L.A. group?

00:29:40.190 - Speaker 3

Well, I have to say, they're all really great organizations. I was at the national conference just before covid, the one that happened for covid. And it's just astounding, the very accomplished, terrific people involved. One thing about the CASA program, this is true for CASA of L.A. and all the national programs. They have extremely good training. So you can go through the training to find out if this work is right for you. You don't have to commit to it until you figure out whether or not it's right.

00:30:12.260 - Speaker 3

They do ask you to make a minimum of a two year commitment, because one of the big things about what happens to kids in care is that they have many, many different adults in their life. There's many different attorneys, many social workers, all these different people that just this funnel in and out. So the CASA is very often the only person in that kid's life is that is consistent and the consistency is what makes it work so well. I will tell you that across the board I have found that the cases that I have met are astounding people.

00:30:47.360 - Speaker 3

They're very often the busiest people. You don't have to be retired. I know cases that are attorneys, that are producers, that are writers, that are teachers, that are therapists, that are just regular people. But there are people that want to make a difference and they know that they're capable of doing it and they apply themselves. And if you think you have that in you and you just want to check it out, you can just go to an orientation and find out what the training is like, what's going to be expected of you, and then you can go through the actual training and still figure out, is this the right thing for me at the time.

00:31:25.880 - Speaker 3

I will tell you, though, in all fairness, that the program is somewhat selective and not in the way that you would think they're looking for certain open mindedness and a certain ability to listen and to learn. You know, I don't you know, I'm not even sure what they're looking for, but that's because I've never you know, it sounds like it's something like that. I'll give you an example that my boyfriend I tried to convince him to also be costly, because if you if we were doing it together, we could maybe get a family of kids because in general cases are assigned one kid only very, very rarely you get siblings.

00:32:04.610 - Speaker 3

But I was trying to convince him to do it. And he said, absolutely not, because I'd kill somebody.

00:32:11.350 - Speaker 2

This isn't the same boyfriend that got you interested in the first place.

00:32:14.830 - Speaker 3

Is it the same guy?

00:32:16.810 - Speaker 2

Oh, the same one. Oh, so he he guided you down this path, but he won't do it.

00:32:21.170 - Speaker 3

No, but he does he does volunteer with kids in care every Saturday with peace for kids dog just a different way.

00:32:30.520 - Speaker 3

He doesn't want to be a because he says if I met a man who abused his child I would want to hurt that man. So he's like, it's not for me. It's not for me. Now, the truth is, I want to hurt that man too much. But I've been able to kind of compartmentalize it in a way so that I can do the work for the kid to get the kid ahead. Has I don't know if I answered your question about what to expect either through CASA of L.A. Dog or the National Casa Gál.

00:33:04.180 - Speaker 3

There are actually CASA organizations in most major cities and in every state. So you don't even have to go to national CASA and you can go to, like, you know, CASA of Sacramento. You can go to Middlesex County, CASA. There's many there's they're all over the country and you can just make a phone call and find out if it's right for you.

00:33:26.710 - Speaker 2

Yeah. So if you go to national casa gal dot org under the tab, our work is a little line. That's a state and local programs. You can click on that. You see a map of the country, you pick your state and yeah, for almost every state you click on, there's half a dozen to a dozen local councils that you can get involved in. So this could be super local, super convenient to you. And certainly it sounds like an amazing cause to get involved in.

00:33:53.350 - Speaker 2

And of course, if you are even remotely thinking about this, the first thing I would have you do and I don't think we mention the name of the show enough on it is check out the Bonus Babies podcast. You can find that at Bonus Babies dot com. We'll have a link to that as well as Apple, Google, Spotify here. And the show notes a link to TOSA, L.A., the National Catholic League website and to all the social media accounts for bonus baby and for Jane.

00:34:21.310 - Speaker 2

You know, earlier we talked about the goal of the show. But in terms of the folks who you want to speak to, who do you have in mind?

00:34:27.730 - Speaker 3

I'm looking to talk to as many people as I can who have have a lived foster care experience, and that includes celebrities and athletes and other people in politics there. It's all walks of life right now. I'm just reaching out to my inner sphere. And then every now and then someone just calls me and says, I heard you doing this. I really want to be a guest, but I really am looking to cast a broad net to talk to anybody with a lived foster care experience or a caring adult who has worked with them, because those stories are really important to.

00:35:06.820 - Speaker 2

Jane, this is incredible work that you're doing, incredible advocacy. We just want to thank you so much for being here on CausePods today.

00:35:14.110 - Speaker 3

I really thank you, Mathew. I appreciate the work that you're doing. And I appreciate the forum to talk about my podcast and get people involved in a worthy cause.

00:35:26.200 - Speaker 1

Thanks for listening to this episode of CausePods, if you've been inspired by the work of our guest, please check out the show notes of this episode in your podcasting app or at CausePods.org. There you will find links to their show, their website, their podcast, links on Apple, Google, Spotify, as well as a link to support the charity that they highlighted here in this episode. You will also find a CausePods.org way to subscribe to this show on your favorite podcasting app, How to sign up to be a guest on this show and a link to our Facebook group, which is going to have special resources just for the folks who are podcasting for a good cause.

00:36:02.770 - Speaker 1

And I can tell you right now, we've got one great deal from our friends at Pod Page, but you're only going to learn about it and get that special deal if you are a member of the Facebook group for CausePods. And before I go, I should say thank you in particular. The show is edited and produced by Ben Killoy of the Military Veteran Dad podcast and what a great job he has done. And all this is made possible because of the great support that I received from Shannon Rojas here at the podcast, consulted Dotcom once again.

00:36:28.930 - Speaker 1

If you want to learn more, go to CausePods.org. Thank you so much. And we will see you next time on CausePods.