‘The baby whisperer’ has air of calmness
Temporary foster mom does it all; ‘no sweat’
CHICAGO — She keeps the baby clothes arranged by size in the guest room. The hand-knit caps are stacked on a table near the door. And the white wicker bassinet is always within reach.
Becky O’Connell knows the call can come at any time. And so, when the phone rings shortly after 10 on a recent morning, she crosses her kitchen and picks up on the third ring.
“He was born what day? Mm-hum. Never left the hospital? Mm-hum,” she says, the phone receiver to her ear. “It would just be overnight? Well I can do that, no sweat. See you at 4 o’clock.”
Within a few hours, a social worker is coming through the door with a tiny baby, just 3 days old. The child has big, blue eyes, dark hair and a round, ruddy face. His name is Alex. “Oh,” gasps O’Connell. “Look at those cheeks.”
This is how it begins. At 65 years old, O’Connell is tall and willowy, with coifed brown hair, goldrimmed glasses and a nononsense personality. And at this moment, shortly after 4 p.m. on a bitterly cold Monday, she is falling hard for tiny Alex.
Officially, O’Connell is a temporary foster care worker.
But love, she says, is her real line of work.
“You know how quickly you attach?” she says. “It takes about 30 seconds. You get a baby in your arms and it’s your baby.”
It is a sad reality that the youngest children are the most vulnerable to abuse and neglect, said Dave Clarkin, spokesman for the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. Of the 4,454 children taken into protective custody last year, “the vast majority were under the age of 5,” Clarkin said. “And many, many are under the age of 1.”
There is a huge shortage of people like O’Connell — the human safety nets of the child welfare system. Over the last decade, O’Connell has cared for 77 infants. That is at least seven babies a year. Babies who arrive on a moment’s notice, and who can stay anywhere from one night