By Mike Sever
Record-Courier staff writer
Mother's Day should be very special for Marlene Tromczynski of Kent. She's had more than 120 children over the years.
Starting in 1974, Tromczynski has been a foster parent for the Portage County Department of Job & Family Services. In that time she's had dozens of boys and girls, usually teens, under her wing.
"It's not a lot for all the years, but they stay a long time," she said. "Not a lot of (foster) parents want to handle the teenagers."
Tromczynski said she and her husband got started because they wanted to share their good fortune.
"I had a very good marriage, three beautiful children (two boys and a girl). We did a lot of camping, fun stuff as a family. We read about children less fortunate and we just felt we would like to reach out to another little girl."
Her first foster daughter came on Valentine's Day. The girl and Tromczynski's biological daughter bonded.
"They were just a pair," she said. The two even worked together at Geauga Lake in the summer.
Each year, the foster children went along on the Tromczynski family vacation " more a combined vacation and reunion " to the beach.
"It's a good experience with the fosters seeing a family with no drugs, no booze," she said.
Tromczynski's husband died in 1979 at age 38.
She took a break for a few years, to get her and her three biological children through school and over the shock of his loss.
She said she was very fortunate she was able to keep her family together. She worked at Aurora, Streetsboro and Kent city schools.
She came back to foster parenting in 1986.
"And I've been doing it ever since. I want to give it back until I'm pushing up daisies," she said.
Tromczynski lauded the support she gets from the child service workers at the Portage County Department of Job & Family Services. Her first supervisor was Evelyn Swartz and then Penny Ray, who now directs the foster parent program.
"She worked her way up and always kept in touch with all the foster parents. She's a really, really special gal, and she's got a lot of wonderful people who work for her," Tromczynski said.
Many of her foster children come in 8th or 9th grade and stay through high school graduation.
"Each one is different, and each one has their own problems. You have to get into what makes them tick and what it will take to make them successful," she said.
Right now she's fostering three boys, 11 to nearly 17 years in age.
She said she had four girls previously.
"You could smell the cream and the hair spray, and now its gym clothes and shaving lotion."
Tromczynski said her feeling is, "There is no child that is born bad. It's the experience, the environment. If they get off the beaten track, and I'm able to help them get back, that's enough for me."
She's had children brought to her at 3 a.m. with barely the clothes on their back.
They come from difficult situations where authorities have determined they are no longer safe. They come in frightened, not knowing what's to become of them.
Some never had a childhood, Tromczynski said.
"I tell them I'll take the responsibility, you go and have some fun."
For some, their first birthday party, or swimming lessons, baseball, or summer vacation was with Tromczynski.
She's helped raise dozens of foster children along with her own three.
"My children have always accepted these foster children as part of our extended family," she said.
Many of the foster children stay in touch. She has a few who've had children of their own and she's now an honorary grandma.
"I have one girl who had a child who calls me "Oma' and another boy with a son, 5, I'm his "Gabbo.' I don't know where they come up with these names, but I answer to everything."