Am I mad to even consider this?

[Toobusytofoster]

I have 3 childfren aged 6, 5 and 2. I homeschool the older ones. My dh and I are active members of the church. He is youth deacon, lay preacher, worship leader. Me as creche and toddler group leader.

Given my current responsibilities am I mad to even think that I could provide the right environment for a foster child?

Does anyone know what impact having a foster child would have on my home-edding. We are not currently known to our LA.

Would being part of the church go against us?

Is La or independant fostering better?

Loads more q's but this will be alright for a start.
thanx

I'm a part of the church and I foster. Not quite as active as you but the LA were very happy to have me. The understanding we have is that fostered children will come to church with us on a Sunday, if that's inappropriate for some reason then the LA will provide sitters. Most of the families (including non-Christian families)have been happy for the child to be included.

Impact on home-edding - expect to have lots of meetings during the day. If the child is in school, expect to have a fair amount of exclusions to deal with. If the child is out of school factor in another child around. If preschool then there may be lots of contact to supervise which can often take place in the house and during the day. Would that be a problem or could you work around that, would you want to be home edding the foster child too or would they attend school and if so how would you help the child to not feel excluded by being pushed out of the house most of the waking hours (I'm not trying to be controversial or offensive, just listing some of the questions the social worker may well ask).

There have been a lot of stories about Christians being not approved as fostercarers and adopters for various reasons - smacking their birth children being one, not being able to accommodate a child of a different faith (or no faith) being another - are those issues that could affect you?

I foster for the LA and find it much simpler than independent but I have a supportive LA -there are advantages and disadvantages to both. If you have a reasonably local independent which has a Christian origin they may possibly be more welcoming than an LA, especially if the LA has a lot of children needing fosterplacements from different religious background, but it all depends. In general a local authority will use their own carers before paying out to an independent, so theoretically you should be used more often as an LA carer but it doesn't always work out that way. Ring a few local ones and sound them out - see which ones are more welcoming, which one you feel might be a better fit.

We are also active members of our church and previously fostered and now are adopting.

Being a Chrisitan made no differnece to us. Our social worker is wonderful and is also a Christian (in fact she was our minister's Sunday School teacher!) and it was good as we could talk openly with her and then she put some of our explanations for stuff into more secular language for the official reports.

The children ahve always come to church and Sunday School with us and we said we wouldn't take a placement where that was not acceptable.

The support of our church family has been invaluable over the past few months and we couldn't have done it without them.

I hope you can find the right way forward for you.

Good luck and prayers
mBop

Belonging to a hurch shouldn't prevent you from fostering or adopting, it would be discrimination. But let's assume that for any reason my child had to be put into care or adopted, I'd be much happier if he/she went to an atheist family.

Correct me if I'm wrong but in your family's case the child would inevitably be indoctrinated into a religion before they're old enough to make up their own mind about it. How are you keeping neutral about religion?

This is really sad.

I'm an agnostic who "culturally" tends more towards Christianity but is not religious, but I never thought of being religious as being a barrier to anything.

I'm amazed people would hold this against you, given that being a Christian is supposed to make you a good person.

Being a good person has nothing to do with religion. Morality has nothing to do with religion. Like I said, religion shouldn't be a reason for discrimination, I've just expressed my own personal view that to me it's preferable for a child to be brought up in a non-religious environment.

Ideally there are more carers than children needing care. This enables the social workers to choose a good match. Religious and cultural backgrounds and preferences are considered when placing a child with carers. This doesn't always mean a perfect match - for example not all the children I have fostered have come from actively Christian families. But either the parents are happy for the children to attend church services and participate in our general life, or we arrange sitters and the child stays home.

I'm not sure that I appreciate the implications that I indoctrinate the children in my care. I will answer any questions asked by the child, and be clear to tell them that this is what I believe, but that other people believe other things, and we all have to make our own minds up. Where a child has an ongoing relationship with birth family I would encourage them to talk to their birth family about this.

Being a fostercarer is about being non-judgemental and accepting and loving the child for who they are. It isn't about imposing your own values on the child.

I wonder if the fact that you home school might be an issue, perhaps more for your family than for the LA.

There could be a great deal of disruption fostering an older child in particular, which you might find difficult if you start to feel it impacts on the education of your other older children. I guess that may not be as relevant if you fostered only babies or toddlers.

If you foster older children, I think that you will seriously need a break for yourself and I wonder if that's achievable if the older children are always in the home?

Good luck!

great posts runnig mum and NYON. I agree that the home schooling might make fostering difficult

if you foster a baby or toddler, how will you have the time to home school? If you are fostering a school aged child, when they are at school the SS will expect you to be available attend meetings. Do you have childcare available for your own children during meetings, doctors etc appointmnets, contact visits etc?

Its not like with your own children, when you can generally arrange these thing around your own schedule & take the other kids with you. With FC you will have to fit around them IYSWIM.

If/when they are excluded ( which can be quite often), will you expect the Fc to join in the home schooling with your own children? If they are not willing to do so , the ed of the others would be disrupted

re independent or LA - i have only fostered for an independent agency - the LA nearby are TERRIBLE to work for. Just depends on where you live.

Given your family and church committments, have you thought about child minding, not fostering?