I'm putting my DS 14 into voluntary foster care

[TheLovelinessOfDemons]

He was admitted to hospital because he's nearly stopped eating because of anxiety. The choices presented to us by the social worker were:
Bring him home
Send him to my aunt
Put him in voluntary foster care

He can't eat at home because he has anxiety from his younger DB with ADHD.

My aunt lives a long way away and he wouldn't be able to visit as easily. Also DS is concerned that he can already eat there fine as it's away from the stress, so it's a false situation.

Foster care would be in our city and he'd visit occasionally to see if he can eat here, with a view to returning home once they've worked on his anxiety.

My family and one of my friends are scaring me, saying that he'll never come home. I'm looking for unbiased facts.

Will he come home, or is he in the system forever if he goes to a placement?

I'm scared.

He doesn't know what's causing the anxiety at school.

I would be feeling anxious if I was 14 and such huge decisions (pretty much life-or-death decisions) were being laid in front of me.

It all seems very extreme...

@TheLovelinessOfDemons

Social services have put a plan of enhanced medical and psychological support.

It’s a shame they wait until crisis point to do this.

Why not at any point before you are on the verge of him going into foster care. ?

Kids are let down time and time again.

Sorry you’re having to deal with this @TheLovelinessOfDemons

I’d be worried that the foster placement will end up exacerbating they anxiety

I agree.

It sounds to me like there is extreme anxiety with maybe a strong social anxiety component, not eating in front of others can be a part of that.

Everyone is running around trying to rationalise it - he can eat with his aunt but not at home because of his brother. He can’t eat at school but let’s focus on how he says his brother is the problem at home and move him away from that.

Unaddressed disordered eating/severe social anxiety isn’t going to get BETTER when he’s moved into a house with strangers, who don’t love him, with different rules.

It all seems very unusual and very naive of the social worker.

I had to come back to this thread because it’s been weighing on me. I know every situation is different and every child is different, but this plan is just radically the opposite of the advice we were given with our own child. Our child was also still eating, just restricted, so I know that is a huge difference, but her anxiety was at a huge peak. Her psychiatrist and therapists all recommended really intensive parent contact, practically love bombing in a way which is a really imprecise way of describing it.

It’s been on my mind too. And maybe I’ve missed it but what does he think which option does he prefer? It’s a foster family and doesn’t have a younger or very demanding child this could work.

I worked as a Foster carer. With voluntary care social services will be happy to give him back the moment you say so. It's only really the cases where the child is removed (or sometimes voluntarily given to care if it's due to a safety issue such as parent's drug or alcohol addiction that is seen to not have resolved) where they'd consider not doing so. Too many kids in the system and local authorities pay way too much to private foster companies due to not having enough foster carers as it is.

You retain rights as a parent, and Foster carer can't even give the kid a haircut without your go-ahead.

I had a teen boy through my door who was in a similar situation. No issues with the parents. They put him in foster care due to his out of control behaviour putting a younger sibling in danger if he stayed home.

Now the major issue to consider is whether he'd have less anxiety in foster care. It's sadly a bit of a pot luck when it comes to foster carers. Some are great. Others are really not.

The boy I mentioned had a lot of difficulty in his placements, and in fact we weren't suitable for him but he stayed with us a night and a day anyway due to his placement breaking down and not being able to find a suitable placement at short notice. However I think most of his issues were due to his behaviours causing harm to others, so would hope your boy would have better luck keeping a placement.

A teen girl stayed with us for example. She was not voluntarily given into care, but her issues only put herself at risk so closer to your boy. She had a placement that seemed to be going well. She'd been with them at least a couple years and only came to us a couple weeks so main fosters could get a couple weeks respite (she had very extreme issues so respite definitely needed to keep foster carers healthy).

Moving to a new environment will be difficult even if you luck out with a great placement. I'd involve him in the decision and really think through your options.

I think the only other thing to mention is the therapy. Check they definitely have therapy set up for him and it will go ahead straight away. We had a real issue with one of ours as they refused to put any therapy in place as they didn't want to fund it until she was in a permanent/ long term placement, but we couldn't agree to that due to her behaviours, and of course without the therapy she destroyed every placement faster and faster each time as her behaviour never improved. Horrible situation with an outcome that caused us to decide to stop fostering. However this kind of thinking in regards to therapy varies depending on local authority. Just check he doesn't fall into that hole if you do decide on the fostering option.

Hope that gives you another perspective. Good luck with your decision.

We were foster carers for many years. We had several teens who came to us voluntarily. It gave them a calm breathing space. They came here to quietly work through their issues without any pressure or judgement. They went back home at weekends after a while and after a few months went back home to live. They had lovely parents. It was just the right thing for them.

Having worked in child protection and as an adoption counsellor I'd be very hesitant to go down the Foster care route. Some families are great, others are dreadful.

I'd go with the aunt as a first step and take it from there.