Two years ago, our family hosted a foreign exchange student from Germany.
Back when I was a college student, my studies had led me to study music in Germany for three years. After that experience, I knew someday I would want to host a German student in my home.
So many years later, we welcomed Fynn into our home. He came to our mid-sized Nebraska town and stayed with us for a year. During that period, he became a son, a brother, and a friend.
Recently we welcomed Fynn back for a visit. It was like no time had passed, and it caused me to reflect on the time we had when he lived with us.
The thing is, whenever we open our hearts to people, we are changed.
In our case, not only were we blessed by Fynn’s positive spirit, his kind and gentle demeanor, as well as the cultural aspect he brought to us, we became a better family because of him.
Why? It was the unique role that Fynn stepped into with my stepson, who at the time was a high school sophomore. Fynn’s position as a positive role model to my stepson meant that his presence in our lives was incredibly helpful to the relationship between my stepson and myself.
And because that relationship was strengthened, the whole family benefitted.
In short, God knew we needed him.
Here’s why.
1. Fynn made my stepson feel important.
Before we were approved to host an exchange student, we had to have a home visit from the cultural exchange representative. When she sat down with us in our living room, she looked at my stepson and predicted that just by being a host brother for an exchange student, he would gain instant notoriety around school. Sure enough, he became known around the high school as the “host brother for the German exchange student.”
People started paying more attention to him because of their interest in Fynn. Plus, Fynn’s friendship was valuable to my stepson.
As a rather insecure sophomore, having Fynn’s friendship helped my stepson gain confidence and come out of his shell. This confidence helped him relax more and not be so uptight at home, too, as he knew he had a buddy and an ally at home and at school.
2. Speaking of ally… my stepson needed another teen in the house that year.
With my stepdaughter’s departure for college out of state that previous summer, that left my stepson an alone-standing teenager in a home of three children under 5.
In fact, one of the big motivators for hosting Fynn that year was so that my stepson wouldn’t feel as alone (read: surly) being in an energetic home of young children.
And it worked.
When either of the boys needed quiet teen time, they would retreat to their rooms or hang out together away from the kids.
Sometimes my stepson would complain of the chaos and noise at mealtimes. Yet Fynn would assure him that it was better than the quiet house he would be going back to in Germany. You can bet that warmed this mama’s heart!
3. I finally felt validated in my struggles with my stepson.
For the first time in our marriage/step-family life, there was finally a voice other than mine in the house that was willing to tell my stepson the honest truth about the power of his words.
Obviously as the stepmom, you can imagine that my stepson didn’t always want to hear the truth from me, especially when it meant he had to step up to responsibility or be accountable for his words.
However, as custodial parents, having our stepkids for 95% of the year, I did need to have authority in our home, especially because my husband’s busy work schedule left me home alone with all the kids for a lot of the time.
So when Fynn started saying, “That was rude,” or “Why would you say that?” to my stepson, I finally felt like I wasn’t crazy.
And my stepson listened. Someone who truly cared for him, but was an “outsider” like myself, was telling him what he needed to hear.
And as you can imagine, coming from Fynn, it stuck.
My stepson finally started seeing the effect of his words. He also began to understand the heart and reason behind my words and my desire to guide him.
By Fynn gently but firmly putting him in his place, he learned that the hurtful or offensive things he said weren’t just my problem anymore.
He started realizing that he needed to be accountable for how he said things to me and to others. That truly began a healing process in the relationship between my stepson and me.
4. It empowered my stepson to view the world differently.
As a young person who tended to assume all new things were automatically negative, hosting an exchange student from Europe showed my stepson the value of trying new things.
In the past, he had been wary of meeting new people or of traveling to new places.
After hosting Fynn, my stepson started growing into a student leader. He stepped it up in band as a section leader, and in the classroom as a student role model. He befriended other foreign exchange students or new students at school after that, and had confidence to talk to new people anywhere he went.
And the craziest thing of all?
A year after Fynn left to back home after his exchange year with us, my stepson applied and was accepted to study abroad in New Zealand of all places! So during the first semester of his senior year, my stepson flew all the way to NZ for a semester.
You think he learned a lot by hosting Fynn? Well, he learned even more living with a different family in a foreign country.
And perhaps for my husband and me, the greatest lesson he learned was that his home with us and his younger siblings wasn’t so bad, after all.
Recently Fynn asked to come visit us for two weeks during the summer. It was a no-brainer.
We’ve since down-sized our home, and the kids have gotten a little bigger, but of course we found a way to make a space for him. This boy is family, after all.
He’s welcome home anytime.
