To be absolutely exhausted and think this is just not sustainable night after night?

I have not read all the replies so apologies if someone has said this but they need to be close to you. Do you have room for them to sleep at yours ? So foster carers look after them daytime and drop to you at bed time? It may be that just knowing you are near will allow them to be more settled? Either that or you sleeping at foster carers house. The night time travelling is not sustainable. Bless you for caring so much. Sounds like you have all been to hell and back.

You have become a sleep association to them. I don't think anything other than living with them will work. Unless you do cold turkey and tell them you cannot go in the night because you can't drive after a certain time etc. the foster carers need support from social services to help them manage this.

It's heartbreaking but you are all losing sleep and sanity I bet so the sooner this stops the better for everyone.

Taking on the twins through adoption would be really tough. However you are spending so much time there and going back and forth that it may actually be easier in some ways,
So so difficult for you all.

I voted YABU because you shouldn't be doing this at all, in my opinion.

I would hate it if my DD felt that she should do this for her autistic brother.
She has her own life to lead, as do you.
I didn't give birth to DD, for her to become a carer.

Your parents have failed you all but caring for your siblings is not your responsibility.

Please let the foster carers provide the caring and you get on with your own life.
Your only responsibility is to keep in touch and visit whenever you can.

No guilt needed. No explanation needed. You have your life and they have theirs.
Turn off your phone at night, letting the foster carers know that you are unable to do it any longer.
Good luck lass

With respect, if you were ill or not available they would have to cope. It isn’t fair that the foster parents keep calling you. That is their job. They should find a way to manage.

They provide the best they can given the resources available. Not many people want to foster, and it costs a lot of resources. Many kids in foster care have worse outcomes on average. In an ideal world what you're saying would work but in reality, OPs relatives may well need her input to get their best outcome. However, if she it's breaking her and not sustainable....this is why things are hard.

Can they be taken to your house when they wake up? So you're not the one driving? There's two foster parents.

There's no easy solution here it's very tough.

No real advice but you sound like an amazing sister. Also bear in mind that you are doing this because you want to help your sisters, but not because you HAVE to. Foster carers can cope with traumatised, disabled children and if they can't then they are not the right foster carers for your sisters. Not all children in care are going to have a sibling who loves them deeply, and the carers would have to find ways to help the children without this support. All the time you are going through every night because you want to support your sisters, that is great, but if you get to the point where you are going because the carers can't cope without you, then it's time social services provided better care.

This sound terrible for everyone involved. :(( is there a possibility of your siblings sleeping at your place for sometime instead of you driving back and forth?

I just want to send you huge hugs. You are around the same age as my kids but have had a much tougher life. You sound like a wonderful sweet person and I hope your future is bright. You deserve it.

Oh gosh what an awful situation.

You sound amazing but this is not a fair situation for you. No wonder you're exhausted.

In the long term it's not helpful for you to be on call every night. They need to learn to settle without you. For everyone's sake.

Is there anyway you could stay overnight at the foster carers? Sorry you and your siblings are going through this.

I haven't read all the replies but am so sorry you all find yourselves in this situation. Whilst it is in no way your fault that they have been through this horrendous situation, and continue to suffer as a result, it seems clear that you are their security and safety. Can you not sleep at the foster carers' house so that you are on hand when they wake? Driving to the house several times a night is not sustainable for any of you

If nothing has worked then the only solution is for you to live with them but not sure if they will create more attachment or if it will help them recover from the trauma.

You have so much to cope with and sound like you're doing an amazing job.
I echo what others have said about putting on your own oxygen mask. You don't say what your other commitments are (work/study/friends etc) but it's really important that you are able to work towards your own goals and care for yourself (including getting enough sleep!). And unfortunately, no-one will advocate for you so you need to work out what it is you need and be very clear about it.

Some of these suggestions may be totally unworkable, but this is what you might want to consider:

• is there any space for you to move in with the FCs (if you wanted to and this would work for you?)? Your siblings might, over time, be reassured by your nearness, but in the time this takes to happen it might be a bit more manageable for you.
• in the short term could you switch to being available every other night? This would mean you get some sleep at least. And even if you did stay over at FCs you might still want to take it in turns.
• is there the possibility that if the FCs were to try and access more support that you could act as respite for the FCs in a paid capacity? Either overnight or daytime? This might allow you to continue to support your siblings but allows for some more flex in your own personal system that enables you to continue to care well for yourself.

Do the nighmares occur at about the same time every night? When my oldest had night terrors I roused him just before he usually had them, not to fully awake, and then let him drift back to sleep. Very quickly the night terrors subsided.

I realise it is up to the foster carers, just putting my experience out there in hopes it may help.

Also one of my twins would become preoccupied at night about one of their birth parents (also in prison) as they were worried about them being in prison and this worry would intensify at night time. We had a lot of (age appropriate) honest talks about how life might be or how their day may have gone. These chats in the day would be reassuring and would lead to less worrying at night.

I appreciate this might not be right for your situation but share in case it may help.

I’m thinking maybe you should suggest sleeping in their room every night. I know this isn’t ideal. You are an adult and you need your own life. You need to keep your flat though so you have your own adult space for the rest of the time. Hopefully things will improve faster if you’re there every night to begin with. You’ll get far more sleep that way too. I hope things begin to get better before too long. Thank goodness they have you as you obviously care so much about them.

Hi @BeJollyOrca,

I really feel for you in this situation. My DS is ND and has cPTSD from medical trauma in his early years, so I can understand a little of what you are coping with.

My DS also wakes at night and it takes a lot of work for us to get him to sleep and get him back to sleep.

The thing I want to tell you is that my DS is in a loving home with two very engaged parents, and it is still really hard. The trauma is very deep and very long lasting, and it's not a matter of just keeping going for another few weeks until he settles. It just goes on and on, and it got dramatically worse at puberty (age 14). At that age things got harder at school and the real world stated to imping on his sense of safety and the anxiety escalated very dramatically.

I think that it may be that you need to just stop going at night and look after yourself, and the forster carers might need to ride out the storm. I think you are too young for this responsibility and you also have lost your parents so you need looking after too. I really think you need to take care of yourself and allow other adults to case for your siblings.

Is it possible that you could just step back and let the dam burst there? It might be that they will find a way through if you step back.

Take care and look after yourself. You really deserve some safety now.

It’ll be an SGO they’re looking at as a family member. They avoid adoption as it alters the dynamics a lot.

I have one for my granddaughters. It’s great in one way. Legally they aren’t looked after children anymore etc. However, you have to fight for ongoing financial and emotional support.

Talk to SS about being a kinship Foster carer for a while first!

This is so tricky because although the foster carers are being paid and have been trained, the fact is that you are the one who has always been there with these children, and who smells and sounds like home. It just isn't possible for other adults to offer that however well trained.
I think your siblings are more likely to move past this painful phase if they have more access to you, not less. Their parents have already been taken away, and however badly they treated the children (and you) the children probably still love and miss them. Losing you now would make everything much worse for them.
All this is very very hard on you, OP, especially after having had an abusive childhood yourself. I hope you can find some solution. Preferably one where you are not the only carer, so that you can have your own life; but so that you are close at hand, especially at night, at least for now.

How much do the children know/understand about what has happened to your parents? Just asking as you said it was only triggered by the sentencing. Were your parents on remand prior to that? Presumably they got a long sentence? How long is it since they've had any contact with your parents/been in foster care?

You must consider therapy for yourself too- I know you're older but you must've witnessed or experienced abuse yourself. You've done very well to escape and abusive home and make a life for yourself. You sound like you've been able to maintain a close bond with your siblings while living away from home.

Hi @BeJollyOrca I'm so sorry to read your posts. I think you are a truly remarkable young woman.

I have adopted twins, currently awaiting an autism assessment, and they struggle with sleep And we have found a weighted blanket has hugely helped calm their nervous systems. They go to sleep more quickly and they sleep more deeply. This is one suggestion.

My second suggestion is drawing and/or talking about the dreams they're having. Are they repetitive dreams? If so, breaking them down can be quite powerful. It might seem counterintuitive but I personally found doing this helped me when I was processing trauma.

I worry that the twins and the foster carers will become too reliant on you and this is clearly not sustainable.

Social work will be keen re adoption because - to be blunt - it gets the kids off their books. I’m an adoptive parent to two very traumatised children and while I love them to bits, it’s very difficult. Especially as they reach teenage years, even as a social worker and trauma specialist.

In terms of sleep, I’d be tempted to go right back to the start. By that I mean take every stressor off them - take them out of school for a couple of weeks, have a routine at home, and if they’re waking in the night the foster carers sit with them without worrying about getting them back to sleep. Take the pressure off everyone to get back to sleep, they can rest, do quiet activities, watch tv with foster carers but not stressing about sleep. And they can sleep during the day if they don’t sleep at night - break the association of night waking with trauma.

What happened re sentencing? Were they in court, how was it explained to them and what do they understand about prison. Is there someone doing therapeutic life story work with them separate to the therapy?