The need for spiritual support of parents who choose to become a foster family

The aim of this study is to understand the spritiual support needs of the foster parents based on the reasons for becoming a foster family, question marks before the process, their motivation to continue the foster care, the changes they experienced and how they found solutions to the problems they encountered during the foster care. In accordance with the purpose of the study, we preferred qualitative research method in order to analyze the experiences of the foster families before and during the foster care. As a research design we used phenomenology model and as a sampling method we selected maximum diversity and snowball sampling. The sample of the study consists of 15 Muslim foster parents, 7 mothers and 8 fathers. A semi-structured interview protocol was applied with in-depth interview technique, and the obtained data analyzed by descriptive analysis and content analysis. As a result of the research, it has been seen that during foster care, foster parents can feel anxious, inadequate, unhappy and under pressure due to the general problems of foster care, the problems of their children and the negative criticism they receive from their environment. It has been determined that foster families don't hesitate to consult a mental health specialist for problems related to their children but do not exhibit the same behavior regarding their own problems and instead use social support and religious coping methods. From this point of view, it is thought that foster families can benefit from spiritual support in cases where they feel unhappiness and plague because of the privacy concerns and negative religious criticism they received from their societies. In the light of the findings, opinions and suggestions were presented to the close circles of foster families, academics and spiritual support specialists that will deal with this issue from different angles.