“Former Real Estate Broker Alex Takes on Foster Care and Health Challenges”

Alex and his wife Saskia regularly take care of foster children in their own home. Since they sold their real estate agency last year, they have more time for this. In WOMAN Magazine tells the broker that the recent death of his brother and a setback in his own health contributed to the decision to sell his company. “My type 2 diabetes bothered me a lot; it really didn’t go so well for a while. By exercising, eating healthy and reducing stress, that is now under control,” he says.

“I was such a busy businessman, always working. And of course I also came on television. (…) We now mainly do things that we enjoy, such as going on vacation. I am a househusband these days and still have not bored for a minute.”

Although: Alex doesn’t do anything at all either. For example, he still runs a ‘small company to buy up real estate’ and he and his wife regularly take in foster children, something that came about years ago when they took in a nephew. “When he left, we realized how many children can be helped in this way. We decided to take in foster children more often,” says Saskia.

Alex, who comes from a family of ten, thinks the best thing about foster care is the development of the children: “That’s what you do it for. It’s wonderful when they can be normal children again after all the difficulties they’ve been through. (… ) You don’t do that for yourself, but for the child. It’s really not always easy. Such a child often comes in very stressed, perhaps with fear of commitment and heavy nightmares.”

Although Alex and his wife are now a strong team, he has to convince Saskia. For Alex it is love at first sight when he bumps into her, but Saskia needs five years. “But after that I was madly in love! And that’s always been the case.”