Flo Murphy.Photo:Images courtesy of Flo Murphy
Images courtesy of Flo Murphy
In 2007, Flozell “Flo” Murphy already had a full plate working two jobs — but after seeing how she cared for residents at a nursing home, the coordinator directed Murphy toward a fulfilling future as a foster parent.
“She said, ‘I think I need you to work with children,’” Murphy, 54, a resident of Enterprise, Alabama, tells PEOPLE. The coordinator then encouraged Murphy to complete an eight-week certification course to work with children through the Alabama Department of Human Resources.
Since then, Murphy has cared for a total of 55 children — and has adopted two of them. “It’s been a long journey, but a good journey,” she says.
Murphy, who has two grown biological children, became a foster parent after the end of her 13-year marriage.
Some of the foster kids — who have ranged in age from 3 months to 16 — warned Murphy early on that they were going to be trouble for her. That didn’t faze Murphy, who only saw kindness in them.
“I said, ‘No, you’re not bad. You just made the wrong choice in life…We’re going to correct that. We’re going to turn that bad into positive, into something good,'" she recalls. “When I flipped it over, they realized how good they were, and they accomplished things in life.”
And Murphy has guided her foster children through life — from schoolwork to driver’s licenses — all while driving a school bus and working at Walmart.
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A turning point for Murphy came when she started fostering brothers, Gaige and Hunter, in 2015.
“They lacked love, understanding, someone there to talk with them.” she says. “It was so sad because these children were eating out of the trash can to live, to survive.”
Murphy says that although the boys initially struggled to understand what their new life would be like, with time, everything came together.
“They said, ‘You don’t understand. We’ll be hungry day after day, night after night,'” she recalls. “So I said, ‘Mama Flo got you. With the good help of the good Lord, we’re going [to] make it through this.’”
“And it took some praying for me," the 54-year-old shares. “I said, ‘Lord, this is my calling, and I will continue to do this.’”
The boys’ dying grandfather later made a plea to Murphy to adopt his grandkids so they would grow up in a loving home environment for the rest of their lives.
Now 19 and 21, Gaige and Hunter have since gone on to attend high school and hold jobs. Of the 55 children she raised as a foster parent, Murphy says the pair stood out to her the most.
“I mean, I love every one of them,” she says. “But those two, I just knew I had to adopt them and give them a home.”
As for the future, she plans on continuing to foster kids while driving a school bus for two local high schools and serving as an employee at Walmart, where she’s worked for nearly 20 years.
Looking back, Murphy says that her proudest achievement is “helping all the ones that came to me needing help or getting where they need to be in life.”
As for how she’s been able to juggle being a foster parent while working two jobs, Murphy says, “God’s just working a miracle in my life. That’s all I can say.”
source: people.com
