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Being a Foster Dad Began to Take a Toll on Him. Days Later, He Received a Phone Call That Changed Everything (Exclusive)
Peter Mutabazi grew up in Uganda with a childhood marked by poverty
He became a foster dad to help children in need, despite his initial doubts about being a single parent
Mutabazi adopted his son, Anthony, who was returned to the hospital at age 11, and has since adopted two siblings, Luke and Isabella, and continues to support foster youthWhen Peter Mutabazi became a foster parent, he never anticipated that his role would evolve into something far deeper.
Mutabazi's journey into foster care was driven by the intent to help, offering temporary refuge to children in need. However, his decision was also rooted in his own childhood experiences, which were shaped by poverty and hardship.
"I'm from Uganda, so I grew up poor — the poorest of the poorest. No one told me to dream. No one told me to be hopeful," Mutabazi, 51, tells PEOPLE exclusively.
As Mutabazi got older, things took a dramatic turn, and he decided to leave his home. He walked for miles until he arrived in the city of Kampala. Having never been outside of Uganda, the unfamiliarity was overwhelming, and Mutabazi quickly realized his only option was to survive on the streets.
"As a street kid on the streets of Kampala — in any third world country — you are treated more like a stray animal," the foster dad, who goes by the name @fosterdadflipper on Instagram, says. "The way people viewed you, the way people treated you, everyone who was kind was abusive."
This was until Mutabazi met a stranger whom he tried to steal from, desperate for survival. However, instead of responding with anger or punishment, the man asked for his name.
The stranger's unexpected kindness sparked a transformation in Mutabazi's own life, leading to a series of events that would take him out of survival mode and open the door to a future he had never imagined.
"He offered me [the opportunity] to go to school after a year and a half, [so] I went and excelled in school," he recalls. "I really began to [wonder], if a stranger can see the best in me, what can I do? So then I got a scholarship to come to [the] United States."
Mutabazi's early experiences of abandonment left an undeniable mark on him, and he couldn't shake the sense of responsibility he felt for those still suffering, especially children who, like him, were trapped in a cycle of neglect and pain.
Initially, he believed that in order to adopt, you had to be married and Caucasian, as he had never seen a person of color adopt children where he came from. So he began exploring the possibility of mentoring teenagers until a social worker asked if he had ever considered foster care.
"For the kindness of a stranger who changed my life, I wanted to do the same for kids," he says. "I think understanding kids in foster care, unloved, unwanted, being in homes [and] in places they didn't know, I thought I could give [them] a little glimpse of hope."
The initial fostering process was overwhelming for Mutabazi, as the constant cycle of children coming and going left him heartbroken. Each time a child left, the emotional toll was unbearable, and the sadness lingered long after they were gone.
'When kids go, you are left in tears,' he says. 'I was like, 'Man, this job is really hard. I don't want to do this again.' I [eventually] told the social worker that I needed a break for [at least] six months. I needed to heal.'
Little did he know, just a few days later, a phone call would change everything for him.
'The kids [I was fostering] had left [on a Monday] and I received a phone call on Friday,' he explains. 'The social worker said, 'Hey, there's a kid that needs a home,' and I said, 'Absolutely not.' But the social worker [proposed] dropping off the child and picking them up on Monday, so I said yes."
Mutabazi didn't want to know anything about the child or form any sort of attachment, having just witnessed the departure of 11 children.
'[The boy] arrived to my home and the social worker left, so I said, 'This is your bedroom, you can call me Mr. Peter,'' he recalls. He admits he was taken aback when the kid asked if he could instead call him Mutabazi's attempt to keep his distance, something in that moment began to shift.
'This kid had been in my home for only 20 minutes,' he continues. 'So he looks at me again, and says, 'I'm 11. I was told that since I'm 11, I can choose who my father should be. So I'm choosing you.'"
When the social worker arrived on Monday to pick up the boy, Mutabazi signed the paperwork, but something compelled him to ask why he had initially been left at the hospital and where he would be going next.
"The social worker told me he was adopted [but] the family that adopted him dropped him [off] at the hospital, never said goodbye and never gave a reason why they didn't want him," he explains. "That's when I realized, I've always wanted to be a dad, and this kid somehow knew I [would] be his dad. How did I not see it? That's when it all clicked."
Mutabazi immediately took back the papers he had signed and asked the social worker for new paperwork so the boy could attend school. While it was heartbreaking to learn that the boy's family had relinquished their parental rights, it also opened the door for the possibility of boy, Anthony, was 11 when Mutabazi took him in, and since then, they have shared in many milestones, including graduation, visiting Uganda — Mutabazi's native country — for the first time, and attending Mutabazi's younger brother's wedding.'It's one of those things that were always meant to be," he says. "Of course, there is no journey without ups and downs, you're going to have challenges [because] that's life."
"At first we had to [spend] almost a year and a half without [fostering] other kids, so we can get used [to each other], but once we got there, I think he knew my heart, and [that] I always want to help other kids who are in the same position,' he adopting Anthony, Mutabazi has fostered over 30 children and adopted two siblings, Luke and Isabella. The two siblings were originally meant to stay with Mutabazi for just the summer, but after being adopted, they've now spent four years together as a family.
While Mutabazi has reached many people online, where he has over a million followers on TikTok and Instagram, he knows his work is far from finished and still strives to help others in need.
In addition to sharing his experiences as a foster dad, he also actively raises money to help foster children in need of a home on his GoFundMe page.'I didn't sleep on a mattress until I was 16, and as a street kid, I never truly belonged anywhere, and that left me feeling unwanted, unloved, and less than human," he says. "But everything began to change when I finally had a stable place to rest. That simple gift, a safe space to sleep, gave me the sense of belonging I had never known.""That's why I now do room makeovers for foster youth, many of whom have moved through 12 or more homes before they turn 18," he adds. "For the first time, we're giving them dignity. We're reminding them they are seen, valued and worthy of calling a place home."
Read the original article on People
