Today we’ll tell you about a man who has helped 2,100 Families Afford Adoption….and he’s not done yet.
Hank Fortener still shudders when he remembers the day his 5-year-old foster brother, Hubby, was taken from his home 20 years ago.
He said it “felt like the most God awful thing that could have happened.” “I can still hear him screaming my name as they walked him outside.”
Hubby had been part of Fortener’s Dayton, Ohio, family for two and a half years as a foster child, and Hank’s parents hoped to adopt him, but instead the state sent him to live with an aunt in Detroit.
Life for Hubby was hard after that and he eventually ran away when he was 12. Fortener has carried the guilt of not being able to protect the young boy ever since.
He told People magazine, “It marked me in such a way that I could either carry that wound for the rest of my life or I could say I’m going to protect as many kids as I can because I couldn’t protect Hubby and I couldn’t keep his future secure.”
To date, Fortener has helped some 2,100 couples, families and individuals open their homes to children in need through his website AdoptTogether.
AdoptTogether allows would-be adoptive parents to invite their friends, family and strangers alike to help them meet the costs of adopting (which can reach up to $40,000). In a little over four years, the site has helped to raise over $8.6 million to give thousands of children homes.