You Needed This Yesterday
A free resource for foster, adoptive, and kinship families in Iowa, built by someone who's been there.
Our Story
I'm Sara Jo — an adoptive parent in Iowa. Partway through this process, I lost my husband, and finished the journey solo. That experience is a big part of why this site exists — because I know firsthand how much harder it is to navigate alone.
Court dates I had to learn to navigate, benefits I didn't know I was entitled to, hard days with no one to call, and an overwhelmed system that moves fast and doesn't always pause to explain itself.
I built this site for the person I was on day one. For the grandparent who just took in their grandchildren and doesn't know where to start. For the foster parent sitting in a parking lot after a hard visit trying to hold it together. For the adoptive parent who thought finalization would feel like an ending and is realizing it's actually a beginning.
This is not a government resource. It is not sponsored by an agency. It is just one person who has been there, putting everything she learned in one place so you don't have to figure it out alone.
You needed this yesterday, but better late than never.