Foster carer

[Madwife123]

Because I can’t sleep and am trying to distract myself from the reality that one of my fosterlings leaves me tomorrow ...

I’m a foster carer (and a midwife as my name may give away) ask me anything?

Hi I would like to do this but people have told me it's not a good idea while I have young kids (6/4) and I should wait till they are late teens so it doesn't affect there lives would you tend to agree with that

Is it true that as a fosterer you can't have a job? I'd love to foster one day but would need to be able to work part time!

Also, it's very easy to read all the idealistic blog posts about life as a fosterer and all easy to read lots of horror stories. In your experience, what's the reality?

How long do the children stay with you on average? Do you keep in touch ever afterwards (if you're allowed!)

Wow what ana amazing thing to do

What made you want to become a foster carer?
As above are you allowed a job at the same time?
What's the longest a child has stayed with you?
Do you have gaps in between fostering or do the kids overlap each other?

Do you get to know everything that has happened to a child before they come to you ?
Do you get advanced warning that they are arriving, or can the phone go in the middle of the night ?

I used to work in a fostering agency, if you are not a single parent then one of the parents can have a full time job as one of you need to be available for local authority meetings, contact with parents, school meetings- some children can have very complex needs or backgrounds so there might be a lot of meetings you need to attend to. Our foster carers were all lovely and nurturing, it is amazing but can be hard at times. You will have the child's full background and you will need to have a log book and report to LAs on weekly and monthly basis too.

@Indoctro My youngest child is early teens. While it can be done when you’re own children are young it’s more difficult as foster children can take a lot of your time, particularly traumatised children with high needs, and so young birth children can find this difficult to cope with.

@TaraR2020 Perfectly possible to do with a job providing you can be flexible and the child is school age. I work full time, my partner works school hours only so we only take school aged children. In terms of the reality it’s a mixed bag. The early days of getting to know a child, earning their trust is very difficult but once you’ve got through that it’s great and so rewarding to see their progress. Sadly some children just don’t fit with you or you’re not the right person to help them. This is really hard but it’s better to recognise that and make changes than end up in a horror situation that you read about.

@ApocalypseNowt We are short term foster carers so for us the average length of stay is 6 months. This is how long children’s services have after removing a child to make a permanent plan for that child whether that be return home or not. Once this permanent plan is made that’s when they tend to move on. Long term foster carers take the children once that plan has been made. We got into fostering after taking on a family member that needed fostering and that child has been with us 6 years now. We will foster them until adulthood. It all depends on the child’s plan and your wishes. We stay in touch with some children where it is deemed in their best interest and the new carers support this. Those that return home tend not to as the parents prefer to forget the time they were in foster care.

@Ohtannenbaumohtannenbaum As briefly answered above we were inspired to foster when a close relative was taken into care. There is a process for relatives to have a quick emergency fostering approval to take a relative short term. Once it became apparent that child wasn’t going home we either had to say bye or go through a full fostering assessment to keep them with us which is what we did. As some of my own children grew up and left home we also fostered unrelated children after seeing the huge difference that can be made. This child is the longest we’ve had, 6 years now. Other than that we had a child for 2 years before they eventually returned home. We do have gaps yes but that’s our choice. There is a grieving process to go through when a child leaves you. Even when they go somewhere that is perfect for them it’s hard on the whole family to say bye and so we take some time to regroup before taking the next child. If we didn’t enforce that ourselves we would almost never be ‘empty’ there is a lot of children needing a safe place.

@flippertygibbert We don’t know everything no. Often Children’s services don’t know everything. We know why they were removed. The evidence the local authority has against the parents etc. We join in meetings with the parents where these details are discussed but often more details come out from the child months down the line. We are told what Children’s services know however. All foster carers can choose to be on the emergency list or not. If you are then the phone can go anytime if not it’s more planned. Unless a dire emergency the local authority tend to know they are planning to remove a child so you have some advance notice. What happens more is you are asked to have a child and that child doesn’t come to you as they often have several carer’s ready and sometimes the court verdict doesn’t agree with removal.

@MollynAlly Spot on, amazing to do and very rewarding but also very challenging. The training really prepares you and I find it helpful to chat to other foster carer’s. Our local authority hold monthly meets (now online) which are great for getting advice or just offloading to someone who understands. You really start seeing things from a whole new perspective when you meet these strong children that have been through the most horrific experiences and see how strong they are. Your heart also breaks to see just how damaged some children are as a result. It’s an emotional rollercoaster. The level of paperwork is the one thing I find the hardest. I’m quite used to documentation being a midwife but I do find it hard to keep on top of sometimes as their can be quite a lot, particularly with a high needs child, and you’re always aware it can be used in court so you’re cautious about what you write and how it sounds.

Amazing. We would like to but my husband has been told it may put his job at risk if any allegation was made which is not uncommon from troubled children. An x head of his said he was looking into doing it but that is what stopped him continuing with the process. DH is an SEN teacher in a PRU.

Are you worried about this aspect at all?

How long have you been doing this and how many children have you fostered?

@lovelemoncurd I’m very surprised at that advice. Allegations are not common at all and you are taught safe care procedures to protect you from these. As a midwife my job would theoretically be at risk but people don’t lose jobs based on unproven allegations.

@SimoneAndGarfunkel I’ve been doing this for 6 years now starting with the related child that I talked about and 4 years when my oldest birth child moved out we decided to start taking unrelated children also. We have fostered 11 children in that time. Some just for a weekend and others for several months. Our shortest was 1 night when we collected a newborn from a local hospital until she could be transported to her foster carer the next day and the longest was a 5 year old who stayed for 2 years before returning home. He is the one that I wish the most I was still in contact in with but birth parents were not keen to maintain contact sadly.

How do your own children react to having extra kids around?

I've wanted to be a foster carer for a while but my Dc doesn't want to 'share' so I haven't progressed it. Is that normal? Dc is an only child.

@Madwife123 he wouldn't lose his job because they wouldn't be founded but he would be suspended pending investigation and that would be enough to put him off. I wouldn't do it if there was any chance of that either tbh.

@Mintjulia When we first took in the related child my youngest child was 8. She really struggled with the adjustment at that time and there were some times when she felt upset about ‘sharing’ as she had always been the youngest and suddenly here was this younger, high needs child. What helped is the fact that my daughter was already close to this child as they had a prior relationship. I don’t think she would have coped with an unrelated child at that point. We made a big effort to always give my daughter 1-1 time and make sure she never felt left out.

Once she was 11 we opened up to other children. By this point she had matured a lot, got used to sharing and understood more about the foster care process. We obviously got her views prior to doing this and the social workers will do the same to make sure they are happy. She loves it now. We do make an effort to ‘match’ with children that don’t directly compete with her needs however. So she’s now 14 and going through all the battles of puberty. A teenage boy she would find mortifying to share her home with right now so we offer on younger children whereas when she was 11 she preferred older teenage children to be around. It’s flexible and there is some trial and error to find what works for your family.

One thing that’s really important for your own child and foster children is to ensure everyone has their own belongings, not expected to share them and have their own private space that the others can’t enter. So we have a no entering each other’s bedrooms ever rule. Not even to play with each other etc. Toys come downstairs and get played with down here. They need to know they have something that is just theirs.

@lovelemoncurd That would really depend on what the allegation is. That’s the risk you take every day with that kind of job to fair, any of his pupils could make an allegation at any time and the same would happen. Foster children are no more likely to make an allegation than children in a PRU. It’s all about protecting yourself and following guidelines plus good documentation. Coming back to my post above about my rule of no-one enters bedrooms, that includes adults. So if let's say for example that a child made an allegation that occurred in a bedroom the fact that we have that rule well documented and all previous foster children have confirmed it to our social worker would protect us. I really think you’re over worrying about it though. I’ve never had an allegation made against me and I don’t know anyone that ever has and I meet with a large group of foster carers in my area every month. They are not common at all.

Good to know. My DH teaches the most damaged of the damaged so I guess that taints his views. It happened to a foster carer he knew. The child also went onto sexually abuse his foster carers granddaughter - pretty horrific tbh.

@lovelemoncurd In fact I’ve just remembered one carer who had an allegation made many years ago but it turned out to be a misunderstanding. The child was actually making an allegation about bit the family that was proven to have happened but because the foster family allowed the foster child to call their family the same names there was confusion about who the allegation related to. It was quickly cleared up thankfully. That’s why you never allow children to call you mum, call your parents grandad etc. no matter how long they have been in your care. It protects everyone to use names.

@lovelemoncurd That’s awful and I would say comes down to being a bad match. You know a child’s history so if a child has been sexually they are very likely to show sexually inappropriate behaviour. That child therefore shouldn’t be with children that are vulnerable and there should be very strict boundaries around personal care etc. We personally don’t take children with a history of sexual abuse as we would struggle to manage that. Those that do only take children much younger than the other children in the home and have fingerprint locks on bedroom doors etc.

@Madwife123 the foster carer had been fostering for 20 years. She was so careful and experienced but it only took a moment and she stopped after this. Terrible end to a long successful history of fostering. 😥

@lovelemoncurd Yes terrible end and sadly completely preventable. That’s one thing that is constantly stressed to us. Children with a background of sexual abuse should never be left unsupervised with other children, not even for a second as like you say it doesn’t take long. That’s one of the reasons we don’t take these children as we cannot practically manage this and ensure everyone is safe. You really need to know what you are doing with these children.

@Madwife123 he had no history of it. Social workers don't know everything all the time. I know he didn't because DH used to sit on the MDT meetings.

@Madwife123 he had been groomed by another older child!

I'm thinking about becoming an independent visitor and would love to hear your thoughts about the role and if it's something that supports you and the children.

Does it make a difference or is it a tick box?

@Bellevu It makes a big difference to those that want it yes. Being a child in care can be really lonely. You have all these horrible things that you need to process but the only people to talk to are those on authority and involved in the case. You can’t talk to friends as you don’t want them all to know your background and judge you for it. Sometimes they just need to vent and have a friend type figure. Some kids are the complete opposite of course and don’t want to engage at all. There’s no one size fits all. It really does benefit so much though.

Really informative, thank you @Madwife123. Re safe guarding procedures, are you allowed to hug the children in your care? I think this is such an important part of growing up, as long as the child is comfortable with it of course, but I wouldn't have thought its allowed these days?