Host Family Testimonials

Our family has hosted students from 23 different countries. Each student has brought something different to our family experience and have all been wonderful sons and daughters.  But I write today about a really special young lady, Anja.

Upon arrival, Anja immediately fit in with our family. Every day after school, she would stand in the kitchen and tell me about her day. She was happy and open and seemed to love being with her host sister and brother. She had managed to understand her host father’s somewhat off-beat sense of humor. She even had learned to love our crazy dog, Harold.

Time went on and we realized more and more how special Anja was and felt as though she had always been a part of our family. My husband, the kids, and I loved her unconditionally and it was obvious she loved us, too. Time was passing too quickly and none of us wanted to face the reality that we would have to send her back to her father in Germany. I was particularly in denial, not wanting to face the thought of giving up the daughter of my heart.

Anja had lost her mother to cancer when she was just twelve years old. She was very close with her father and it was obvious he had worked hard to be both and father and a mother to her. The one thing he had not been able to give her was something she had always wanted - a little brother. Anja got her little brother on our son, Joshua, and she was incredible with him. She would sit on the floor of his bedroom and play Legos and would tuck him into bed and read him stories at night. They shared a really special bond.  

Anja didn’t save all the love and attention just for Joshua. She painted fingernails and talked to her host sister, Mary Leigh, about all the things girls are interested in. When Mary Leigh starred in her school play, Anja was there for every performance, telling her how great she was. When Anja would ask her host father for help with math, she would roll her eyes as only a teenager can when he started telling her his “no boys” rules. Anja opened up to me about her mother and everything she had experienced through her mother’s fight with cancer and what came after her death. Our entire family grew so close to Anja and enjoyed every day we had with her.

Imagine someone taking a rusty spoon and carving your heart out and you may have some idea of what I felt on July 2 when I had to let my baby girl go home to Germany. It was all any of us could do to keep from falling apart. Just days earlier, Joshua had had told Anja he did not want to go to sleep after his bedtime story because he knew that going to sleep meant he would have one less day to spend with her. When the time finally came for Anja’s flight, after a delay, Anja looked at me and said, “If I don’t go now, I am never going home because I can’t go through this goodbye again.”  Even my daughter, who is stoic like her father, was standing there with tears in her eyes, hugging Anja like she would never let her go. 

Since that day, even though time has passed, our entire family looks forward to having contact with Anja. We have had the privilege of seeing her since her exchange program and we talk to her every week. I wait for those phone calls, emails, and visits as eagerly as I would for any of my children and still get teary-eyed when thinking of Anja. But the truth is that Anja will always be considered as a part of our family, as is her German father and his wonderful fiancée.

Every child who has walked through our door has been special and we love them all. Hosting exchange students has been incredibly rewarding and has brought our family so much love and joy. I hope that any family who is reading this, wondering if they should host or not, will take the challenge and open their hearts to an international student. You never know, you may find your own version of Anja and your family will be better for the experience!

Tracy Enders
Connecticut