AIBU to ask if anyone can talk me through the process of fostering

[Craftylittlething]

Just that really, seriously considering fostering a young person and wonder what the actual process involves.

There is such a lot to tell about the process. I would recommend looking up your LA website to look at their info and also a local fostering agency. You will get lots of good info. It is not clear from your OP. Are you thinking of a young person in particular or generally fostering? I sit on fostering and permanence panels for my LA and see the finished assessments. There is a lot of ground covered.

There are lots of different kinds of fostering as well - emergency, sibling groups, long term, foster to adopt. I would recommend contacting your council or an agency you are interested in, there are normally information evenings or stuff they can send you through the post at the moment.

I think there is also a fostering board on here.

There is a fostering board under 'Becoming a parent'.

If you call up your council they can talk you through it with no obligation to go any further. It’s hard to know how to summarise it in all honesty but essentially you go through an in depth assessment then get approved by a panel then have the opportunity to foster your first child; as part of your role you have a supervising social worker to support you and you have to do training. When you look after a child you have to do all the normal child care related things plus attend meetings, take the child to contact with their family, have the childs social worker visit regularly, advocate for the child and provide stable consistent and nurturing care

I have a few Q's. I would love to be a foster parent when my DC go off to Uni. Is there an age limit for fostering? I would be 58 by then. What about if you are single? All that aside, I think I could offer a lot to a foster child as in my own background, overcome troubles and I think I do a very good loving, supportive job with my own DC.

Age doesn’t matter as long as your in good health and It doesn’t matter if your single either. They will (our LA did anyway) want to speak to any birth children of yours doesn’t matter if they are living at home or have moved out they still like to speak to them (if they live at home or come back home in the holidays they will be assessed too)
The usually speak to ex partners if you’ve been married before of have children with them too but are good at spotting any malicious views if the relationship isn’t good.
They will want a good look around your home and any dogs would need to be assessed too.
It’s quite a long process and they really look into your whole life story Which is how it should be given the vulnerability of the children you would be caring for.

Thank you

Thanks missed

Hi - I’m a foster carer. We went through our assessment in 2020 during lockdown. It was a thorough process, which really enjoyed.

We are a same sex couple. My husband had a middle-class upbringing that on reflection was quite privileged. I on the other hand had a childhood fraught with trauma, poverty and a life that reads like a Charles Dickens’ novel.

Panel was great. We’ve now foster for over a year. We’ve had a lot of success helping the siblings that have come to live with us. It hasn’t been smooth sailing due to the trauma they have suffered but it has been amazing.

If you decide to explore fostering further then feel free to send me a message.

Age wise I’m 41, my husband is 38. He’s become the full time foster carer and I work from home. It works well for us.