Belonging: Finding Family Among Strangers

Maybe you know what it feels like to hold everyone else together before you are old enough to hold yourself. To learn young that love can leave, and that safety is not something every kid gets to keep. Robin was eight when her mother died. By eleven, her father had chosen a new life over his children and sent Robin and her younger sister into foster care, rather than let them live with the aunt who wanted them. Five and a half years passed with no contact from her family. She grew up among strangers, first in a shelter and then in a foster home where she was fed but never really loved. And still, somehow, she kept reaching for people. At eighteen she traveled alone to a village in Kenya and found the belonging that had been missing her whole life. This is a conversation about what happens after the people who were supposed to stay decide to go. Her story is not tidy, and she does not pretend it is. But Robin is proof that a hard beginning does not get the final word, and that love, once you let it in, can be the thing that carries you the rest of the way. What You'll Hear The moment a father's choice changed the course of two young lives What it means to be parentified as a child, and how it stays with you Becoming sensitized to racism as an eleven year old inside the foster system The year in Kenya that turned strangers into family How raising her own children became a way to reparent herself Why Robin believes love is the counterpoint to grief Guest Bio Robin Rosenbluth, author of the forthcoming memoir, Living With Strangers: Healing a Wounded Heart in a Distant Land (to be published by She Writes Press on October 27, 2026), is a former foster teen who advocates for finding permanent homes for older foster youth. She has worked in the nonprofit sector in New York, raising funds for museums, women's organizations, healthcare, and environmental causes, and has taught fundraising at New York University and Columbia University. She has studied memoir and the craft of writing with many renowned authors and writes a Substack, My Jagged Journey as a Debut Writer. Robin and her wife have raised two children who now have families of their own. She lives in Brooklyn, New York. robinrosenbluth.com | Substack: My Jagged Journey as a Debut Writer Listen and follow: www.thelifeshiftpodcast.com/follow Subscribe to the newsletter: https://thelifeshiftpodcast.beehiiv.com/ losing a parent young, foster care survivor, childhood abandonment, finding belonging, grief and love, reparenting yourself, feeling unwanted, chosen family, healing after a hard childhood, foster youth advocacy You Might Also Like: 147 Days: Raising and Losing My Sister Grief: Making Something Beautiful From What Broke Starting Over: You Can Lose Everything and Still Be Okay Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices