Latest / Adventures in Adversity: an inspirational podcast / Ep. 75: From trash bags to "Comfort Cases" w/father, foster care ally, host, & author Rob Scheer

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Ep. 75: From trash bags to "Comfort Cases" w/father, foster care ally, host, & author Rob Scheer · Adventures in Adversity: an inspirational podcast

0:00
Welcome back to adventures in adversity.
0:04
I am your host, Bri, and if you are new to the podcast, I am
0:08
too. No just kidding, two seasons,
0:10
but I'm learning. I'm basically this podcast is a
0:14
place for people from all over the world to share real stories
0:19
about how they have turned life's adversity into an
0:23
adventure. We all know that adversity comes
0:26
in many, many forms, and I am more than grateful, beyond
0:32
grateful to have somebody on the show today who I think knows a
0:36
thing or two about adversity, about overcoming it.
0:39
And then my favorite part is giving back to others who are
0:42
going through it. So with that, I would like to
0:45
welcome you, Rob. Thank you so much, Rob Scheer.
0:49
Bree, thank you so much for having me and thank you so much
0:52
for doing this podcast. You know, I truly do believe
0:54
that every single one of us has a story.
0:57
We all have a story, and it's all in how we tell our story.
1:01
Because I guarantee you when you tell someone's story, the impact
1:05
that you make, sometimes you can't even measure it, but there
1:08
is a true impact. So thank you so much for having
1:11
this platform. Hey, you know what?
1:13
Thank you. And I, I, I, it's been a journey
1:16
of amazing self discovery. And then what you just said, I
1:20
look around sometimes I'll be sitting in a cafe and I go, wow,
1:24
every single person could be on the podcast sitting here, every
1:27
single one. Like there's not one person that
1:30
does not have a story and then somebody gets something out of
1:33
it. That's like.
1:35
And you know, the thing I remind everyone is that, you know, as
1:37
we look around at our communities, and by the way,
1:40
your community is not your zip code.
1:42
Our communities are human race. And so as we look around, we
1:47
truly must understand that each and every one of us fall.
1:50
All of us fall. The difference is, is how we get
1:54
up. That's the difference.
1:56
It's how we get up. But every single person there is
1:58
not a person on this planet that has or will not have fallen in
2:04
their lifetime. The difference is is how they
2:09
get up. Beautiful, beautiful.
2:13
Now you rob your story. I've just been like reading
2:18
about you, watching you on videos and I'm going to put all
2:21
the links to all the beautiful organizations and books and and
2:25
things you've done. We're going to get into that.
2:27
But human to human, we all have adversity.
2:30
But I will say the adversity in your life started very early.
2:36
Very early, very early. You know, the fact is, is that
2:38
when those who pick up my memoir Forever Family, I start the book
2:42
out immediately in exactly what it was like to be a little boy
2:47
like me. The youngest age that I remember
2:50
was probably two or three. And, you know, again, my mother
2:53
and her decisions and I say that because when I was younger,
3:00
people used to always talk about the fact that my mother and my
3:03
father were products of their environment.
3:06
And you know that the fact that they had 10 kids, you know, my
3:09
mother had been married 6 times. We lived in out of every shelter
3:13
in Maryland, Virginia DCI am 59 years old, Bree.
3:19
And to this day, I'm still reminded every day of the horror
3:23
I lived as a little boy because of the scars of the cigarettes
3:26
that my father would put out on me.
3:28
And see, that was my family. That's exactly that what was
3:31
delivered to me. And when people would say that,
3:33
oh, your parents were just a product of their environment,
3:36
that's not true, not true at all.
3:39
We are product of the choices that we make, the choices that
3:45
we make. Now, mind you, those choices not
3:47
are always amazing and great, and they definitely weren't for
3:50
my siblings and I. But my mother was not a product
3:53
for environment. She was a product of the
3:56
terrible, bad choices that she made throughout her life, which
3:59
then in return we inherited as kids with the trauma and then to
4:04
come into a shattered system, you know, just continue to keep
4:08
repeating that total less of self worth that I felt as a
4:13
little boy. I'm so sorry you experienced
4:17
that. You know, I, I really, it's a,
4:21
it's something obviously you've, you've like you said, it's what
4:25
you do when you get up and you obviously have gotten up and
4:28
run, but that's something thank you for.
4:31
Just because you're 59 and you've processed it and you talk
4:33
about it doesn't mean that it's not something you it's informs
4:37
your life, right? It affects me daily.
4:40
It affects me daily. First of all, I have to give a
4:42
big shout out to Doctor Rich, my therapist who I actually have
4:46
have a love hate relationship with for many, many years.
4:50
I can't imagine my week going without having Doctor Rich.
4:55
And so for those of you who are thinking about therapy out
4:58
there, do it. Therapy is truly something that
5:02
has helped me be able to use coping skills to deal with the
5:06
trauma of a young boy who at 59 still, I see that within myself,
5:11
that feeling of the imposter syndrome, this feeling of I'm
5:16
not worthy, the feeling of how did I deserve to have a life now
5:21
like this after, you know? And so, so, yeah, there's still
5:24
a lot of work. And by the way, I I've said this
5:27
so many times and I'll say it again, I did not wake up at the
5:31
age of 18 and decided I was going to have this miraculous
5:34
life, OK? I was a kid who turned 18 years
5:37
old in a foster care system that we see so many kids like me who
5:44
turn 18 or 20, whatever the state is allowing Now back when
5:48
I came in out of the system in the 80s, it was 18 throughout
5:51
the country. And instead of someone, you
5:55
know, greeting me on my 18th birthday with love and, you
5:58
know, just way to go. You made it to 18.
6:00
You're a senior in high school, which by the way, no one in my
6:03
family graduated, nobody. And you know, when you look at
6:07
kids in foster care, out of the 400,000 we have lingering in the
6:11
system, one child every two minutes, 700 a day that enter
6:15
foster care, only 54% of them, Bree will actually graduate high
6:20
school. That's it.
6:22
And I was a senior in high school in that fall day in 1984.
6:27
Instead of somebody being there to really celebrate me as a, as
6:32
a now a young man, instead what I was handed was my trash bag.
6:36
And I literally became homeless sleeping on the street of
6:41
Northern Virginia my senior year of high school.
6:46
After you had battled through all of that trauma and like,
6:50
yeah, it's. A walk into my foster home at
6:52
12, you know, they never once put a picture of me on the wall.
6:56
They, you know, they used to do these family portraits and they
6:59
would take the three biological kids and they would get
7:02
portraits. And I was never in them.
7:04
They never bought my school pictures as they bought their
7:07
three biological children's pictures.
7:09
Their kids got to go on sports. I never got sports.
7:12
The kids got on field trips. I didn't go on field trips.
7:14
The kids got to go on vacations. I didn't go.
7:17
That's a typical kid in foster care.
7:19
But for me, somewhere within my heart, they had to have loved
7:23
me. I called her mom.
7:24
I called him Dad, you know. But it wasn't until that day in
7:29
1984 that I realized that I was no more then just a check.
7:35
You know the check stopped coming.
7:37
And so when the check stopped coming because I was 18, I
7:40
stopped having a place to live. See 22,000 kids in the United
7:45
States wage out of foster care in 2026.
7:48
Out of those kids we'll see close to 70% of them become
7:51
homeless within 24 hours. See society is only giving kids
7:55
in foster care 3 choices. That's it.
7:58
Choice number one, we give up. We give up suicide rate in
8:01
foster care. Bri is higher than we've ever
8:03
seen within our country. Choice #2 we give in, we give
8:07
in. We do exactly what you expect of
8:10
us. You put the F word in front of
8:11
our names. We commit those petty crimes.
8:13
We fill your detention centers. As your listeners and viewers
8:18
are gathering to listen and watch this, they need to
8:21
understand that 80% of our death row inmates were in foster care.
8:24
If that right there does not tell you that we have an actual
8:30
group of children that are forgotten, nothing else will.
8:34
And by the way, Nelson Mandela said it clearly to all of us,
8:38
each and every one of us are judged in society by the way we
8:42
treat our children, by the way we treat our children.
8:46
Kids in foster care, they don't belong to you.
8:49
They don't belong to your viewers.
8:50
They don't belong to me. They belong to us, to us.
8:56
See, The thing is, is that our elders would say to us quite
8:59
often, you invest in a child, you invest in their future.
9:02
That is a lie. It's not true and stop saying
9:05
it. When you invest in a child, you
9:08
actually invest in my future. You invest in your future
9:12
because they are our leaders of tomorrow.
9:14
Wow. Those statistics, thank you so
9:19
much for sharing them because I don't know that people are aware
9:24
of that. And, and if they are aware of
9:27
that and, and that is, that is a, an epidemic, right?
9:32
And, and beyond. And it's almost like I, I, it's
9:37
just something that we all have to like open our eyes to, right?
9:41
And the statistics there, I mean, growing up with parents,
9:47
growing up in a typical situation is challenging and
9:53
it's challenging being a human being.
9:55
Then layer on that, layer on trauma and then layer on that
9:59
feeling of always being forgotten, right?
10:02
Sounds like you growing up, you're there but forgotten.
10:06
But you're like, you were probably searching for like
10:09
somebody, somebody love me and like, what can I do to make you
10:12
love me? Yes, and that's exactly what it
10:14
was. I mean, I used to wake up in the
10:16
mornings and I would clean their kitchen before they asked me to.
10:20
I would watch their biological children all the time because
10:23
they would say these are my biological kids and this is our
10:26
foster kid. And so I grew up with that
10:30
instilled within me. So to be rejected at the age of
10:34
18 and handed that trash bag again like it was handed to me
10:38
when I was 12 was an absolute shock to my system.
10:43
And the thing that really blew my mind out of everything that I
10:47
looked back and I think about, you know, close to 41 years ago,
10:52
you know, when I walked across that stage on graduation day,
10:56
I'll never forget it. Bria.
10:58
I, I've been, you know, I had like a part time job making
11:03
$3.35 an hour at the local Taco place because by the way,
11:06
everybody that was minimum wage back then.
11:09
And the owner found out that I was the token homeless kid.
11:14
And so he would make the managers leave the outside
11:16
bathroom door unlocked so I could sleep there at night.
11:20
And so I would wait till the kids left the cafeteria.
11:24
And I would gather in the trash can.
11:26
And I would gather as much food as I could that, you know, those
11:29
kids didn't eat because I didn't know if I'd eat that night.
11:32
And I remember as I would cower in that bathroom with the light
11:36
on doing homework. And by the way, there were
11:39
nights it would be so cold I would go to the Public Library
11:42
because it would close at 9:00. And I would go inside and I
11:45
would sneak in the very back and I would hide and wait for them
11:49
because back in those days they'd have cameras and alarms
11:52
and stuff like that. And I would wait for them to
11:54
turn the lights off. And I'd sleep there at night
11:57
because I just wanted to be warm.
11:59
And so, you know, that's the way my life was.
12:01
October, November, December, January, February, March, April.
12:05
And then May came this long haired, scrawny, dirty kid.
12:11
I went down to the principal's office and I remember asking the
12:14
secretary if I could please borrow a cap and gown because I
12:17
couldn't afford to purchase one, I think for like 30 bucks to
12:20
rent a cap and gown back in those days.
12:22
And she found me one. And I remember that I put the
12:26
cap and gown on and I stood in the mirror and I said, you know
12:28
what, Robert? You did it.
12:30
You did it when nobody else believed in you.
12:32
You believed in yourself. And I went and stood in line and
12:35
I remember people were clapping and screaming and cheering.
12:39
And then all of a sudden they called my name.
12:41
It was silence. It was silence.
12:46
And I realized at that moment that the trash bag did its job.
12:49
It made me invisible, disposable, as if I didn't
12:53
matter. I left that stage.
12:55
I never went back to my seat. And I left the auditorium.
12:58
And at that time, I went to the back, back parking lot and I sat
13:01
down and I cried. I cried for my mom and dad,
13:05
Bree. I wanted to feel that cigarette
13:07
so bad being put out on me because I knew that if my father
13:10
was there putting a cigarette out on me, at least he was
13:13
there. At least he was there.
13:15
And then I cried for my foster parents.
13:18
I mean, how dare they? How could they give up on me
13:20
because of a check? And then I cried for you,
13:24
everyone, my community, who felt that this young boy who had
13:28
tried so hard just to be loved, that no one even clapped for me.
13:35
At that moment, I realized what my community was teaching me.
13:39
They were teaching me to think about me, me and me.
13:43
So what did I do? I joined the United States Navy,
13:46
and by the way, I did not join the Navy to take care of you,
13:49
your family, or anyone that's listening.
13:52
I joined the Navy because this boy was hungry.
13:54
This boy wanted a future, and this boy made it.
13:58
I became a very successful businessman.
14:01
I literally was in the mortgage industry for 28 years.
14:06
I had companies all over this country.
14:08
I did exactly what I needed to do #1 my husband and I.
14:12
My husband, I've been together 21 years.
14:14
And So what I did was the first thing was I bought that big
14:17
house in DC, the one that people would walk by, they'd look at it
14:20
and they'd be like, wow, whoever lives in that house, they're
14:23
successful. I bought a really expensive car.
14:26
I bought 2 of them because when I pulled up with the stoplight,
14:29
I wanted you to look at me. I wanted you to shake your head
14:31
and say, wow, whoever was able to buy that car, they're
14:34
successful. And then I filled my bank
14:37
account so fat I could take you all to Disney World.
14:39
Because see, that's what was important to me until 17 years
14:43
ago. See, the fact is, is the only
14:45
thing I ever wanted in my life was to be a dad, to be a dad.
14:49
I wanted a kid to look at me and know that no matter what they
14:53
did, I I loved them. I wanted a kid to feel the true
14:56
definition of unconditional love.
14:59
I wanted a child to know that no matter what, they were safe and
15:02
that they were wanted. And I remember when my husband
15:06
and I decided to start building our family.
15:08
That's almost close to 18 years ago.
15:10
And I thought we would adopt A baby overseas and be that cute
15:15
gay couple in the city with the expensive stroller.
15:19
And my husband looked at me and he said we're going to adopt out
15:22
of foster care. I said what?
15:24
He said we're going to adopt out of foster care.
15:26
I said, are you crazy? I was like, I know about those
15:30
kids. He was like, Rob, you are one of
15:33
those kids. He's so right, by the way.
15:36
He's got his master's. He's really smart.
15:39
I don't even know the difference between there, there and there.
15:41
So he, you know, he was right. I was one of those kids, Bree.
15:46
And I was so worried about what everybody else thought about me.
15:49
I forgot about all those kids. Gosh, yeah.
15:55
That's an incredible story and it's not and the stories you
16:02
haven't even told the whole thing, but that is a that moment
16:05
of realization and then kudos and love to your husband for he
16:10
sees you, he knows you like and then for him to be he he well,
16:16
and we we you're going to get to what that all led to, but I'll
16:19
continue please. I just.
16:20
Got to be powerful. My husband actually grew up
16:23
totally opposite than me. My husband Reece grew up in the
16:26
Midwest. He is very well educated.
16:29
He has several degrees, a master's, and, you know, his
16:35
life has always been about education and, you know, his
16:38
career and and so, you know, for me to meet him.
16:43
And by the way, you know, as I wrote my memoir, you know, and
16:48
I'll name drop Derek Jeter actually was the one who
16:50
convinced me to do my memoir and Simon and Schuster, and they
16:53
published my memoir. And I'll never forget when
16:56
someone called me after reading it, they said, you know what we
16:58
got out of this memoir? And I said what?
17:00
That it's a love story. It's a love story.
17:02
They said you had your husband and I, you know, I went back and
17:05
I read it again and I was like, it is true because, you know, I
17:07
want people to understand that, you know, for me and as any kid
17:12
who grows up in this system, we have trauma.
17:15
I will tell you that I suffered from drug addiction.
17:19
I had four suicide attempts and it wasn't until I was 26, maybe
17:30
I had my 4th suicide attempt and I woke up in the hospital and
17:34
I'll never forget it. I, I remember looking up and
17:37
saying, well, you can't even do this right, you know?
17:41
And by the way, I was business was fine.
17:43
I used my mental part. I couldn't deal with that.
17:45
Yeah. And I remember I got out of the
17:47
hospital and I found where my parents were buried.
17:51
And I had not been to their grave since I was like 12.
17:55
And I went to their grave And I remember it took me hours to
17:59
find where they were actually buried.
18:01
And I found this little silver strip that the funeral director
18:05
helped me find. And it was my mother's.
18:08
And I remember falling to my knees.
18:10
And I remember saying to my mom and dad that I forgive you.
18:15
I forgive you. I forgive you for touching me
18:19
when you shouldn't have touched me, for keeping food from me,
18:23
for scarring my body and my mind.
18:27
But the thing I did was I forgave them because I needed to
18:30
take the power back. And I said to them, I'm not
18:34
forgiving you for you 2 to rest here in peace.
18:37
I'm forgiving you so I can move forward in peace.
18:41
You know, I have to tell you that after that day, I have
18:44
never once done a drug. I have never once tried to kill
18:47
myself. Do I suffer from depression?
18:49
Hell yes. You know, look what I went
18:51
through, you know, and yes, I take my little pill a day that I
18:54
absolutely can make sure it's regulated.
18:57
But you know, The thing is, is that forgiveness is a powerful,
19:01
powerful thing if it's used in the right way.
19:04
And people need to understand that forgiveness is not for the
19:08
other person. Forgiveness is for you to take
19:11
the power back that they took from you.
19:14
Yes. Yes, I'm I'm so glad that that
19:20
moment happened for you, as hard as that must have been.
19:23
So am I. Like I'm so glad that it that
19:26
that like that transformative moment where it sounds like the,
19:31
the, the holding on to the anger and all of that.
19:34
It was. It eats you and kills.
19:37
You and does. Slowly it.
19:38
Does. It's a slow death and then the
19:41
suicide attempts are an attempt at a fast one and it's both are
19:46
both are awful. Yeah.
19:49
And the fact is, is that you have to look at, remember I told
19:51
you in the beginning, I'm the youngest of 10 kids.
19:54
My mother had been married 6 times.
19:56
She had 10 kids. And the saddest part is my
20:00
brothers and sisters didn't make it.
20:02
You know, they fell to the wayside.
20:05
Teenage pregnancy, drug addiction, incarceration, you
20:09
know, suicide, you know, cancer, all of the things.
20:14
I have three siblings, four siblings that are left, and I
20:19
don't have relationships with any of my siblings.
20:21
And again, that is a choice. And The thing is, is that I have
20:25
chosen in my life to not blame the.
20:28
System, OK, I have chosen to get use my life and my platform to
20:33
change the system. And so for me, the constant
20:38
finger pointing and blame doesn't change anything.
20:41
And so, you know, I, it's like my sister, I, I tried to tell
20:45
her years ago, it's like, listen, you, you are actually
20:49
doing everything that mom and dad did because you're allowing
20:54
that, you know, you're, you're, you're blaming all the choices
20:57
you're making because of what they did.
20:59
No, you're doing it. And sometimes people just don't
21:02
get it. And that's OK.
21:04
But that's just not the way I wanted.
21:06
To continue well, and I'm so glad what you said because it's
21:10
a perfect segue you want you took that moment of forgiveness
21:14
you decided that your life is going to be instead of blaming,
21:18
it's going to be change which brings you to what you.
21:21
But yeah, but I want to tell you, I wasn't looking for the
21:24
change that I'm doing now. I was looking at the change from
21:27
me. See, I come from the.com world.
21:29
We're takers. I never thought I'd be in
21:31
the.org world where we're givers.
21:33
But you know, that changed 17 years ago on January the 15th.
21:42
It'll be 17 years tomorrow and yes everybody, we're recording
21:47
this early. 17 years ago, my husband and I did all the things
21:52
we needed to become foster parents because we were going to
21:55
foster to adopt. Back in those days, 17 years
21:58
ago, we said foster to adopt. Nowadays, if you say that,
22:01
they'll shut the door in your face.
22:03
And so we, the phone, the phone rang and the social worker said,
22:09
hey, Mr. Scheer, guess what? I said what they said We got two
22:11
kids. I was like, whoa, wait a minute,
22:13
I only wanted one. And they said, but we have a
22:15
brother and sister. We have a little girl who is 4
22:18
and her brother who is 2. You will be their third
22:22
placement. They're going to be reunified
22:25
with their birth mother. But they need a place to sleep
22:28
tonight. And I remember saying that I'll
22:30
see you at 7:00. And as I called Reese at his
22:33
job, Reese had always said that if they ever called us for a set
22:37
of siblings, we would never split the siblings up because I
22:41
was split up. And, you know, and Reese was
22:43
like, you know, Reese grew up with his sibling.
22:45
And by the way, as I said, Reese grew up in the Midwest.
22:47
Parents married 50 some odd years.
22:50
I mean, I don't even think Reese ever said a cuss word in front
22:54
of you, you know, so I mean totally different than I grew
22:58
up. And so so, you know, all of a
23:00
sudden the doorbell rang. And when I opened up the door
23:03
for the social worker, there she was with this cute little boy
23:08
and this beautiful little girl. But the shocking thing, I mean,
23:12
the thing that shocked me the most is that they had this a
23:17
trash bag and they had their belongings in it.
23:20
You know, Bree, that for me was that triggered me because I grew
23:26
that I carried that trash bag and I I by the way, I'm not
23:30
talked about it. I had, you know, if not, it
23:33
wasn't something that yes, it was not in my vocabulary, wasn't
23:37
something that I shared. But when I saw it, it was this
23:42
flood of emotions. And I remember that the night,
23:47
you know, the kids, we got the kids immediately restarted
23:50
looking through the trash bags And you know, the my kid, they
23:54
didn't even you know, my daughter didn't even have a
23:56
decent nightgown. My son didn't even have babies
23:59
blanket didn't even have stuffed animal.
24:01
And Reese and I had gone shopping and we had shopped like
24:04
you would not believe it. I mean, we had filled several
24:07
carts up, pyjamas and toys and you know, we were ready.
24:11
We were ready to be dads. And I remember Reese got Amaya
24:15
in the tub and there were all these bubbles and they were
24:19
these bubbles around this beautiful brown face.
24:21
And I remember saying to Reese, I'm the happiest I've ever been
24:24
in my life. And I said, and I am a dad to
24:27
the most beautiful little girl. You know, I want to remind you
24:31
and your viewers, people need to understand something.
24:34
Women rule the world. OK, simple as that.
24:38
As long as men want to keep believing, they do continue to
24:41
believe it. But it's not true.
24:42
Women rule the world and I will tell you I've raised my daughter
24:45
as a Princess because she will be a queen one day.
24:49
But when I looked at this little girl in the tub, she was so sad.
24:52
The eyes were so dark and sad. And I said to Ree, she's never
24:55
going to smile. And she got out of the tub, she
24:57
put on a little pink robe and she walked into her new bedroom
25:01
and Reece had laid 3 brand new night gowns on the bed.
25:04
And she walked over, she picked one of the night gowns up.
25:07
She picked it up. She tore the tag off of it and
25:09
she turned around and she smiled at me and I said, Amaya, why are
25:14
you smiling? And she said, Mr. Rob, I've
25:17
never owned a new pair of pajamas before.
25:20
Wow, my friend, that's unacceptable.
25:23
It's not acceptable that kids come into a system because of a
25:26
choice that someone else made and we can't even give them a
25:29
brand new pair of pajamas. But for me, it was about being a
25:32
dad. Month, one month, 2 month three
25:34
goes by phone rings, Hey Mr. Scheer.
25:37
I was like, hey, they said guess what I said what they said we
25:39
got two more kids. I said two more.
25:42
I was like, I already have two kids and they said we know, but
25:44
we have two more. We have a little boy who is 2
25:48
and his brother who is 6 months and they're actually going to be
25:51
fast track for adoption. And by the their mother was 12
25:54
when she gave birth to the 1st, 113 when she gave birth to the
25:58
second. And Oh yes they came into the
26:01
system with bleeding of the brain shaking baby syndrome and
26:04
three broken ribs. And when the baby was three
26:06
months old, she took a razor blade and carved her boyfriends
26:09
initials in him. I said, I'll see you at 7:00.
26:12
I went home and Reece was in the kitchen.
26:14
He was cooking dinner for Amaya and Makai.
26:16
And I told Reece about these two boys.
26:19
And Reece was like, Rob, we've got to talk about this.
26:21
We have two kids and we both are working full time.
26:25
And he was like, I was like, OK, that's fine.
26:27
We have just until 7:00 because. We're that we're getting.
26:31
Them because the doorbells ring and it's 7:00.
26:34
The doorbell rang and there were my babies, my son Grayson, who
26:38
was two, and our baby Tristan, who was six months.
26:41
And again, they had trash bags. But you know what the fact is,
26:45
is that we became 2 dads with four kids in diapers.
26:50
And I will remind everyone, ladies, you had nine months.
26:53
Don't you ever think gays are not overachievers?
26:56
We had four and three months so. Hey, point taken.
27:01
OK. Point taken.
27:04
Prepare laying there being like, Oh yeah.
27:08
I've had people laugh at that, but I've also had people get
27:11
upset with that because I'm just like, come on.
27:12
I'm just like, you know. Like.
27:16
Prepared a lot of it was like all of a sudden we 4 kids and I
27:20
remember like, you know, Oh my, it was like a year and a having
27:24
the kids and then we started to file for adoption because you
27:27
know the kids, you know, again, at the end of the day, if a
27:30
child ends up in foster care, we've already failed, OK.
27:33
And for my kids, you know, I just, I just had made a
27:38
decision, a conscious decision that our children were not going
27:42
to linger in a system waiting for adults to do adulting.
27:47
And so we gave the we gave the birth parents a year to, you
27:51
know, you know, get their acts together and it never happened.
27:55
Visits never happened. Classes were never taken.
27:59
And I remember after the year, I said to the social worker, this
28:02
is enough. You know, we have been to court
28:04
every six weeks. Reese and I show up every six
28:07
weeks. Birth parents are never there.
28:09
I was like, you guys keep dragging this on.
28:12
When will these kids be able to move within their lives?
28:16
Social worker saying this takes time.
28:21
And I looked at her and said, excuse me, Children do not have
28:24
an opportunity to wait while we decide to be adults.
28:29
And by the way, if you're going to play the game, get in it and
28:33
play it. So what did Reese and I do?
28:35
We hired our own attorney and we filed adoption for our children.
28:39
And the social worker said, you're going to lose this case.
28:42
And when you lose, they will take these four kids from you.
28:46
And I looked at the social worker and I said, I'll tell you
28:48
this right now. It will be the saddest day in my
28:51
life when I lose our four kids. But at the same time, when my
28:55
kids are older and they come back and find me, the thing I
28:58
will be able to say to them is that I fought for you.
29:01
I, I fought for you. So we did.
29:04
We went in for the fight. We hired bondage study experts.
29:07
We had to hire experts that would let the courts know that 2
29:11
white gay men were not going to change my three boys, make them
29:15
gay. That just because we were two
29:18
white men did not mean that we did not know how to to raise for
29:21
black kids. And after four days of trial,
29:26
back and forth, back and forth, the judge ruled and we were told
29:31
we would be the parents to Amaya, McKay, Grayson and
29:34
Tristan. And that moment was unbelievable
29:39
because the first thing I did went out and got passports for
29:42
all my kids. Let's.
29:44
Go. Let's do it.
29:45
Amazing life. Let's do it.
29:47
You now are no longer part of a shattered system.
29:50
You're a sheer. And with that they got passports
29:54
and designer clothes. And I failed, though, Bree, you
29:59
can sit and think that, but I failed.
30:01
See, I was so worried about making sure that my children had
30:06
all the things that I didn't have as a young boy that I
30:09
forgot the most important thing. See, the thing that we must
30:13
understand is as parents, our responsibility is to do 2 things
30:18
for our children. Number one, teach them empathy.
30:22
See, the fact is, empathy's not in our DNA.
30:24
It's taught. And I realized that I've been
30:27
raising some privileged kids, but also their legacy.
30:32
See, The thing is, is that our legacy is about what we give,
30:36
not what we take. And for me, that was a failure.
30:41
And I remember my husband walking into my office 13 years
30:44
ago. And by the way, my husband
30:46
actually gave his career up a year after the kids arrived.
30:50
And it was, it was the funniest thing.
30:52
So my, I, we had come home picking kids up from daycare and
30:56
after school, but I had all that got to the house, you know, and
30:59
it was the typical, you know, 2 parents working, wake up early
31:03
in the morning, rushing around for breakfast and school drop
31:07
off. And are you picking them up
31:08
today? Am I picking them up today?
31:10
And, and I remember Reese had come to my office and he was
31:15
just like, I can't do this anymore.
31:18
And I was like, what? I was like, I've already
31:20
explained to you that which thing I'm going to let you know
31:23
that you're not going to leave this with unless you're in a
31:26
box. And he was like he was like, I
31:29
don't I just I don't want to go to work.
31:31
He was like I go to work and he's like and alls I think about
31:35
is Makai and Tristan and am I and Grayson and you know what?
31:39
And and I said, Reese, what do you want to do?
31:41
And he says I want to be a stay at home dad, And I was like
31:44
what? And he was like, I want to be a
31:46
stay at home dad. I was like, you know, that's not
31:47
for me. And he said I know.
31:50
And I said, I said, honey, if that's what you want to do, I
31:53
was like, we'll change our budget and we'll figure it out.
31:55
And that's what we did. And my husband became a stay at
31:57
home dad over 16 years ago. And so 13 years ago, he walked
32:02
into my office and he was like, OK, it's time to do the toy
32:04
drive. And by the way, Barry, we, we
32:06
used to do this toy drive in DC. Everybody talked about it.
32:10
We had celebrities and politicians and everybody gave
32:13
toys like the last toy drive we had during that time.
32:16
We collected like 2500 toys in one day.
32:20
He was well known in DC and I said no, I said I don't want to
32:23
do it. And he said, what do you mean?
32:25
And I said we failed our kids. And he said what are you talking
32:27
about? Our kids are amazing.
32:29
I said no, Reese. I said we forgot to teach them
32:31
empathy and we forgot to teach them their legacy.
32:34
And he was like, what do you want to do?
32:36
And I pulled out a trash bag and I laid it on my desk and see,
32:40
the fact is, is I don't allow it to go far away from me.
32:42
I don't want to forget where I came from and I don't want my
32:45
children to be embarrassed for where they came from.
32:48
And I said, Reese, I'm going to eliminate these in foster care.
32:51
He said you are BS crazy. I said, I know that's why you
32:54
married me. I said we could do this.
32:57
So we gathered members of our church, local politicians, my
33:00
senior staff and I shared the story, the story that I shared
33:04
with all your listeners and viewers about the 12 year old
33:06
little boy who was given no hope.
33:08
The 12. You're a little boy who was put
33:10
on a pathway that was totally going to make him not succeed,
33:15
but he chose to succeed anyway. About the four kids who arrived
33:19
at a home of strangers with no more than a bag of trash and how
33:25
I wanted to grab a backpack. And in that backpack I wanted to
33:28
put a brand new pair of pyjamas with A tag on it.
33:31
I wanted every child to get their own lotion, their own
33:34
shampoo, their own conditioner, and their own bar of soap.
33:38
See, kids walk into a House of strangers.
33:42
We expect them to assimilate like that, but we will not even
33:47
stay in a hotel and use a used bar of soap from the people
33:50
before us. Why?
33:52
It's called dignity. Dignity.
33:54
Children deserve that dignity. Then I want every kid to get a
33:58
toothbrush and toothpaste because by the way, my beautiful
34:00
teeth and you know, my teeth are beautiful.
34:02
They cost me an arm and a leg. They cost me so much money
34:06
because when I was in the system and just like kids today, people
34:09
don't talk about dental hygiene. You know, it's not something
34:12
that is something to talk about. So I want kids to have a
34:15
toothbrush and toothpaste. Then I want every kid to get an
34:17
activity because I, you know, I know that 90% of our kids in
34:21
foster care come in the back of a police crew.
34:24
I also know that they're put into holding centers.
34:27
We call them rainbow rooms, Light, bright, whatever the hell
34:29
you want to call it. They're no more than holding
34:31
cells. These kids go in there with
34:33
broken toys, broken crayons, and I want these kids to know that
34:37
they're loved by a community. And so we give them coloring
34:41
books and crayons brand new for kids under the age of 10 and
34:45
kids over the age of 10. They get a journal and a pen and
34:48
pencil set. Then we make sure all of our
34:50
girls over the age of 10 get a menstrual kit.
34:53
And by the way, everybody, without a menstrual cycle, we
34:56
would not be here. It is important that we empower
35:00
our young women to understand that a menstrual cycle is
35:03
something that should be in our vocabulary, our conversation,
35:06
and make it more readily for women and young girls.
35:10
Because for me, as my daughter, I could not imagine my daughter
35:14
walking into a House of strangers on the very first
35:17
night she started her period. And So what we've done here at
35:21
Comfort Cases is not only do we give them a menstrual kit with
35:25
wipes and pads, we also got together with a bunch of smart
35:29
people and we designed a pamphlet that actually talks
35:32
about their menstrual cycle, about their heavy flows and
35:35
their light flows and how to use their wipes and their pads.
35:38
Because I truly think it's so, so important that we empower our
35:43
young women to know that having a menstrual cycle is nothing to
35:47
be ashamed of. And by the way, also brave.
35:50
I make my boys go into CVS and buy my daughter tampons because
35:54
I do think that women deserve to have allies as men for their
35:59
menstrual cycle. And then I give every single kid
36:02
a stuffed animal because I don't care whether you're a newborn or
36:05
you're 59, you know, we all love a good stuff.
36:08
It always makes you feel good. It does.
36:10
It makes you smile. And then finally, my son
36:13
Grayson, he was 5 when we packed our very first case.
36:16
He's now 18. He said, Daddy, we have to put a
36:20
case. I mean, put a blankie in every
36:21
case. And I was like a blankie.
36:23
I was like, these kids aren't cold, he said.
36:27
I know, daddy. But every time they wrap
36:29
themselves up in their blankie, they know we love them.
36:33
Isn't that what we all want? We want to be loved.
36:35
We want to know we matter. And with that, we packed a case
36:38
and another and another. And because of amazing people
36:41
who are listening to this podcast and tuning in, we have
36:44
packed and delivered over 300,000 cases.
36:49
We have delivered them to all 50 states, DC and Puerto Rico.
36:54
And I know I don't need to remind your smart viewers and
36:56
listeners. Puerto Rico belongs to us.
36:59
Yes, it's surrounded by water, but so is Hawaii.
37:02
See, what we must take away is to understand that our
37:06
forefathers, again, they built our communities not for our
37:10
bushes to match, but to take care of each other.
37:17
And that is the story of how comfort cases.
37:20
Started to. Change the lives of all those
37:24
kids and then all the people they interact with and the.
37:28
Changed my life. So the crazy thing is in 2019, I
37:34
decided to, when my, when my book was released, I decided to
37:38
give up my career and become a public speaker.
37:41
And I remember telling my husband that I was going to
37:43
leave my cushy job. And he's reminded me that I was
37:46
the breadwinner of the family. And I just, I remember I said to
37:51
him, I said, I don't want a job anymore.
37:53
I want a purpose. I want a purpose and my purpose
37:56
is to go around the country and educate people about kids like
37:59
me. My purpose is to make sure that
38:01
children in foster care know that there is one person with on
38:03
this earth that is going to shout out on the tallest
38:06
mountain that we are here, we are here.
38:10
See us, understand us, and also realize that when you invest in
38:15
US, you actually are investing your future because we are your
38:19
leaders of tomorrow. You are an incredible voice for
38:25
them, and I am. You're a gift from God.
38:29
What? You're doing.
38:31
And what you're doing, you are literally like shouting out to
38:35
God's children that are like help me and you're being like
38:39
I'm coming for you. I love you and I've got a team
38:42
and resources and a beautiful. It's about so much that case,
38:46
the comfort case, yes, logistically you feel, but
38:49
that's a core memory in their life forever because of what
38:53
you're doing. That's what.
38:54
I believe you are. Yeah.
38:57
And you know what, Bree? I know.
38:58
I know. I've talked a long time, but I
39:00
got to tell you, I promised myself in 2019 I would never
39:03
leave a platform without telling one more quick story.
39:06
See, The thing is, is that I had was out on a book tour, and I
39:09
was coming back to the East Coast, and my assistant had
39:12
emailed me and said that she wanted me to go speak at a local
39:15
high school. And I was like, I'm so tired.
39:18
I was like, you know, can we research?
39:19
Like, no, You said you would never say no to a high school.
39:21
And she was right. I said I never would.
39:24
And I walked into this high school and I gave a talk, the
39:27
talk that I shared with you. And a young boy I could see was
39:30
getting emotional. And afterwards, all the kids
39:33
left and the young boy walked up to me and he said, Mr. Scheer,
39:35
will you sign my book? I said, of course, what is your
39:38
name? He said, Alex.
39:39
I said, Alex, tell me something about yourself.
39:42
He says I have nothing to tell. I said, Alex, we all have a
39:44
story. He said, no, Mr. Scheer, my
39:46
story's like yours. I've been in foster care since I
39:49
was five. I've been in 11 homes, 6
39:52
schools. I'm 18 years old old and I'm
39:54
getting ready to age out. I'm going to be homeless just
39:57
like you. That hit me so hard, Bree.
40:00
And I handed in my business card.
40:02
I said, Alex, I want you to call me.
40:03
We're going to figure this out. I looked at the principal and
40:06
she had a tear going down her eye and she said, Mr. Shearer,
40:09
Alex has a 3.6 and he's falling through the cracks of child
40:12
welfare. And I was just like, what?
40:16
And so I said, please make sure he calls me.
40:18
I went home that night, and I told Reese and the kids about
40:20
meeting this young boy and my son Makai said, Daddy, if he
40:23
calls, invite him to our house for dinner.
40:25
And I was like, what a good idea.
40:27
And the next day, Alex called me.
40:28
And I said, Alex, I was like, you know, he was like, hey, Mr.
40:31
Shear, this is Alex. Do you Remember Me?
40:33
I was like, I'm not that old. I was like, Alex, give me the
40:37
phone. Give me the number to your
40:38
foster parents. I was like, I'm going to call
40:40
them and invite you to our house on Saturday for dinner.
40:42
And he was like, you mean, I get to meet the family you wrote
40:45
about in your book? I said, no, I have a fake
40:47
family. So I picked Alex up on that
40:51
Saturday. I brought him to our house.
40:53
I saw him playing in the backyard with our kids.
40:55
And Reese was like, you know what, Let's go out to dinner
40:56
tonight. And I was like, what a good
40:57
idea. And so we gathered the kids up
41:00
in the Suburban. We went down to the local
41:01
Mexican restaurant. We eat at least once a week.
41:04
And we sit down. And my son Tristan, was 10 at
41:07
the time. And he looked at Alex and he
41:08
said, you know, Alex, you can order anything off the menus and
41:12
my dad's don't care there. And he was like, I couldn't
41:14
order anything. And my son was like, I'm going
41:16
to get the shrimp fajitas and if I don't need them all, I never
41:19
get in trouble. And my daughter looked at Alex
41:21
and said, Alex, haven't you been to Guapo's?
41:24
And Alex looked at my daughter and said, I don't remember the
41:27
last time someone took me to a restaurant.
41:30
Three. At that moment, as a dad, I
41:31
realized I'd done my job. I saw the empathy flow out of my
41:36
children's eyes. We ate, went to Dave and
41:38
Buster's. We dropped Alex off at his
41:40
foster parents house. I get into the car and it's
41:43
silent. And all of a sudden one of my
41:45
kids say, Daddy, we have to do something for Alex.
41:49
I said, guys, I know Daddy just doesn't know what to do.
41:53
And one of my kids said, Daddy, we got to bring him home.
41:56
And I said, what? And they said, we have to bring
41:58
him home. And I looked at my husband and
42:00
my husband said, what's one more?
42:03
My husband and I were the very first couple in the state of
42:05
Maryland to petition the courts to have a child from foster care
42:08
live with us without a stipend. The judge looked at me and said,
42:12
Mr. Scheer, why would you do this?
42:14
I say to the judges, I say to each and everyone of you, every
42:17
child deserves a foundation. Every child deserves to know
42:20
that someone they're rooting them on.
42:22
Every child deserves to know what it feels like to be loved
42:26
unconditionally. I looked at my son and he was
42:29
crying. He said, pops, you've changed my
42:31
life. I said no Alex, you've changed
42:34
our lives. I said I only have one regret.
42:37
The judge said, Mr. Scheer, what is your regret?
42:39
I said I didn't get to walk him to kindergarten, but now I get
42:43
to walk with him for the rest of his life.
42:46
My husband and I legally adopted Alex a year later.
42:49
My kids are now 25211918 and 17. Thank you.
42:59
And that's the beauty of life and what you're doing.
43:03
That's incredible. And I just want to thank you as
43:07
somebody who is just being connected to incredible people
43:11
like you who are sharing really tough stuff and then sharing the
43:18
beauty behind, like looking at your pain and asking for help.
43:22
And then what you've done for these kids is incredible for our
43:26
future for them, for human to human.
43:29
As somebody who like, feels that deeply, I'm just like, really
43:35
grateful that you've crossed my path.
43:39
Well, I'm grateful you crossed my path as well, my friend.
43:42
I really AM. And again, thank you for this
43:45
platform. Thank you for making the impact.
43:47
Because again, as you and I both know, sometimes we don't know
43:50
how the ripple effect actually is.
43:52
No, but I will say this much, you know, I meet kids all over
43:56
this country and now all over the world because we are
43:59
international now. We serve 84,000 children in the
44:02
United Kingdom. But what I hear from kids all
44:05
the time is they always say to me, Mr. Rob, why?
44:08
And I say why what? And they say, why does someone
44:11
give me all this new stuff? You know I look at the kids.
44:13
As I say to you and all your viewers and listeners, as we end
44:17
this, always remember you do not have to know someone to love
44:21
someone they don't. Beautiful.
44:26
It's a great way to close. I'm going to keep that in mind.
44:29
Yeah, and of course. And please, everybody listening,
44:33
look at the show notes. Link to your beautiful
44:36
organization comfort cases, link to your Instagram, link to your
44:40
Amazon memoir, link to all of the CNN heroes you've been on.
44:45
Ellen, I'm just going to name drop.
44:46
I'm sorry. You're amazing.
44:47
He's been on all the things and then he decided to come over to
44:50
my little neck of. The oh please.
44:55
So we just had an HBO for those who love what so if you have HBO
44:59
Max, you can TuneIn to somewhat familiar new documentary that
45:03
was dropped in November season. Episode 5 is about the sheer
45:06
family and our amazing organization comfortcases.org.
45:10
So, and if you have Apple, head over to Apple and watch Dad's
45:14
Dads, which was directed by my amazing friend Bryce Dallas
45:19
Howard from Jurassic Park. And I was in this documentary
45:22
with her and her father, the amazing Ron Howard.
45:27
So yeah, if you have Apple, just go ahead over there and watch
45:29
Dads as well. But yeah, thank you again, Brie,
45:32
for this platform. Hey, you're welcome.
45:34
Thank you. And we are going to be
45:36
connected. I'm going to be bothering you
45:38
for quite a while. And by the way, my daughter's
45:40
name is Reese. Oh, is it with AC or an SSS?
45:46
OK, so so my son's name is my husband's name is Maurice.
45:49
And but when I met him, when I met him and he was like, he was
45:53
like, my name is Maurice. I was like, and by the way, I'd
45:57
never met a white Maurice before, so I was just like,
46:00
where are you lot? First I thought he was lying to
46:01
me. But but no, they all come and
46:04
it's with AC. But our youngest son, Tristan,
46:07
his name is Tristan. His middle name is Reese, but
46:09
it's Rhys. It's the Welsh version R.
46:13
EE SE so. Oh, see, I love that.
46:16
I love it. Well, listen, I got to run to
46:18
another interview, but Brie, thank you.
46:21
Thank you, everybody. Hey, make this year the most
46:23
impactful year. Yes, yes.
46:26
Take care my friend. Bye bye.