AIBU to question my friend's daughter effectively moving in with us?

[thesunisnearlyhere]

This is a long winded one and I will try not to drip feed.

my childhood friend is having some major issues at the moment although I have sort of lost sympathy over time. Let’s call her Sarah.

Sarah and I grew up in the same area and went to school with eachother from the age of 4 until 16.
she eventually has children with a mutual friend we had growing up who was always “ trouble “
I had my own kids with someone not from the local area and our lives are very different. We have always remained friends though.
she now has 3 kids and I have 4 kids.
the relationship between her and “ Steve “ has always been toxic. She throws him out every other week but his never changed I got tired over 10 years supporting her when he was always allowed back.
we both have daughters who are now in secondary school.
life has not changed for her one bit and still on the rotation of kicking DP out and having explosive fights every other week.
drugs, alcohol and the rest of it.
her teen daughter who is lovely has spent more and more time at our house.
I won’t let my DD around there and so they spend most of there time at mine. This gradually turned in to her being here over the weekends all the time and never going home during a school holiday.
last week after school broke up there was another huge fight, I went and picked up all the children and in the end and bought them back to mine.
I rang social services the 2 younger children are currently now at their aunts house and the eldest is still with me. Apparently social services are pretty useless and the younger 2 are returning home. The eldest is refusing and wants to remain here. The social services at this point don’t seem very bothered about her staying here and are coming for anoher visit on Wednesday.
Sarah has basically said keep her - she got us in to this mess. She seems to be blaming eldest for the social involvement because she rang my daughters phone that night.
she says she loves her but that she clearly doesn’t want to come home so she can just stay here.
surely it’s not that simple and social work just let her move in here with us ?
It seems a big responsibility to have another child who is not mine just move in.
social services have visited and made sure she is safe and coming against Wednesday but what happens next ?

My mum was almost in a similar position at this age. My best friend was the youngest of 4 children (other children much older), single mother, working multiple jobs, child neglected and in hospital on and off. It ended up with DM not fostering her (too much drama) but just being supportive and welcoming her into our home.

I’d go ahead with this but through proper legal channels if you can.

My best friend unofficially fostered a 9 year old girl when her kids were similar age, the child’s mother agreed, it worked for a few years until the girl was 16 and moved out.,

My priority would be to my own kids. Particularly my 12yr old. Quite frankly I’d want to keep her away from this shit show and thinking this is a reasonable way of conducting your life and relationships.
Whilst its very admirable that you want to help I can’t imagine itll be a smooth journey from here to adulthood for the poor kid, but I still wouldn't want to get my DD tied up in it all.
You should have ditched your feckless friend years ago…

This is a common scenario where I work so is absolutely true! The threshold for 'removal' of the child might not be met however an assessment still needs to be completed which the outcome might be that it's not in the child's best interests for them to return to parents care given the chaos at home (and possibly other risks). In this situation, the mother is giving consent for the child to live elsewhere and therefore LA doesn't need to go to court.

I have personally had a case with the exact same scenario where a young person remained living with friends parents as they refused to return home and child's parents were happy with child remaining there. Eventually the friends parents became kinship carers and received full fostering allowances from the LA.

Maybe it varies depending on the LA!

I dont think ypu should do it.

Firstly, a 12 year old doesn't get to choose a new home. Her aunt can take her and keep her with her siblings and that's in their best interests.

The more distance you can create from your "friend" the better for stabilising your own family.

Absolutely encourage the 12yo over as a friend, but do not under any circumstances take her on as a foster would be my advice. Aside from the unforeseeable impact on your own children, the closer she becomes to.ypur family, the further she will pull away from her own (siblings). You're already seeing that with her choosing you over the stable aunt. That's not in her best long term interest.

Heaven forbid you take her on and her and your dd fall out catastrophically. Your dd will be devastated living with her and if you take her on, you can't just move her out again because it would be exceptionally cruel and damaging. It's literally conditional love.

Eta- having your relationship stay as it is with the 12yo is probably the best stability you can offer and shouldn't be undervalued or confused.

This is why I think these casual unofficial arragements with friends are quite often not a good idea. Relatives are different. This child may get settled in for a few months then op decides it's too much. Then this childs life is turned upside down again.

SS however asses each of the kids needs individually so while it could possibly be ok for the younger ones to remain in the care of Sarah, the 12 year old has different needs. She might run away and be at risk of grooming if her friends mother can't continue to care for her.

Sorry just to add - I care very much about my children and their safety. There has never been anything that has been concerning towards them. The reason the post is mainly about the girl and not my children is because currently she is the one in need. My children have a safe roof over their heads and well looked after.
I have not made any decisions as of yet apart from keeping her safe in the interim basis which is not effecting my children in the slightest. Sorry this is aimed at the post about how I have not mentioned my children once.
they of course be apart of any conversation I have going ahead.
I have read the other post about the partners nephew and it was helpful although the difference is at this stage the girl has never shown any behaviour issues whilst in my house and is actually doing well at school despite everything.
currently my children know no difference as it’s the Easter holidays so she would likely be here anyway so nothing out of the unusual. This is Just about me processing the situation and the moment the vunerable child is her - this does not mean that I won’t take it all in to account and also that I have made any final decision just that whatever my decision is - she will be ultimately the most effected. My children have the support and the care they need to manage this where as she doesn’t. If my decision is that she needs to return home or go to her aunts / foster home then I don’t want to just wash my hands of her with no support.
my 12 year is yes more aware of the situation but has not been exposed to the man in question or anything like that but I also don’t think 12 is of an age where she can’t have an experience of hekpijf someone in need and realising not everyone is lucky.

You are amazing to even be considering this OP. There is loads of good advice on here already. I would urge you to only take this on if it can be formalised in some way so that Sarah’s daughter has the status of a looked after child and the support and financial resources that she would then be eligible for - such as counselling etc should she need it in future.
It is easy to focus on what is best for the 12 year old - but this must be balanced with the needs of your own children - and your husband would definitely need to be on board. It is certainly possible for things to all work out fine in the long term and I really hope that is the case 💐

I think if she is staying with you they possibly do not need to follow bedroom rules. If you apply to foster her and are paid then there would be rules around bedrooms. I would think carefully about what you want/need as a family. Definitely stand your ground about the younger children hopefully they can stay with their aunt. Your “friend” needs to take responsibility and stop expecting other people to bail her out.

You and your husband need to have a discussion about what taking on another child will mean to your family. At the moment it's another mouth to feed, but long-term it's a far greater financial impact. Will taking on your friend's daughter mean your own children receive less? Does it mean going from 1 family holiday per year to zero? Will you need a bigger car? It's not just buying school uniform or clothing... it's everything else from providing pocket money to birthday/Christmas presents!

The child's Mum should provide money to you for her daughter, but I doubt very much that will happen. Your friend is irresponsible, and ultimately selfish, because she prioritises her own need for a man in her life, over the welfare of her children.

Having the girl stay weekends and holidays, is not the same as permanently. She has lived in a chaotic household, and my guess is that her Mum has been preoccupied by 'Steve' to worry too much about what she's doing/where she's going/who she's with. She may relish routine, boundaries and be perfectly happy living within yours but what if she isn't?? What if you start seeing a side of her that you've not seen before? Living in the environment that she has, I would be surprised if that's had no impact on her at all.

What about medical appointments? Speaking to the school etc? You don't have parental responsibility, so technically her Mum would need to give you permission or attend these herself with her daughter.

Make sure you speak to SS. Write down things you want to ask before the meeting on Wednesday. Ultimately, your priority has to be your own children, and if you and your husband decide that temporary housing her will be OK but not long-term or not housing her at all.... that's OK, you're not a terrible person.

https://kinship.org.uk

This isn’t a private fostering arrangement if she is there for safeguarding reasons. Please speak to the social worker. Kinship care is an organisation who may also be able to help and give advice xxx

https://childlawadvice.org.uk/information-pages/family-and-friends-care/

What you are talking about is the child coming into care under a section 20 agreement which is where the parent gives consent for the child to go into care. This is not the case here and you are giving misinformation about access to finances and going to panel. The la will only agree to a s20 if there are significant safeguarding concerns but that is not the case here.
a kinship assessment is a different process. You will see in a previous post I made that the child has to have been living in with the carer for at least 12 months to apply to the court for an SGO. In these circumstances, it would be a private application and there it wouldn’t go to panel and it is the LA’s discretion on whether to provide financial support or not. It would only ever become an unregulated placement if the la placed the child there and the carer needed to become a temporary foster carer which is not the case here. I know what I’m talking about as it’s my job

For the moment, how about saying she can stay for the whole Easter school holiday if she often does this anyway, but that you will be returning her to family / SS at the end of the hols? This gives some structure & clarity, shows caring to her & has a better chance of nudging family / SS to plan longer term than if you leave things open. You can always extend the stay later but if you indicate now that you might take her for longer it will mean, sadly, that her welfare slips lower down others' priority list and you may also find yourself feeling trapped into something that is not right for your family.

100% this. So much potential for your own DC to be adversely affected, especially since the teen years are looming.

This happened to one of my friends, a best friend of her son’s moved in with them although he was 15 so may be slightly different.
Mum had moved her new bloke in, son and new bloke didn’t get on so he spent more and more time at my friends house.
It came to head with a massive row when he was at his house and the son was told if he couldn’t abide by the rules he could get out.
He left, went to my friends and she rang social services. I don’t know all the ins and outs but he remained at their house and didn’t go back. He stayed with them until until he finished school, got his apprenticeship and he moved out when he was 19. He considers my friend as his Mum and she treats him like she does her biological children and has no contact with his Mum, he had no siblings.
I guess all you can do is wait for them to visit again on Wednesday and see what they have to say.
Sadly parents ‘washing their hands’ of teen children is not uncommon but usually a family member steps in, why didn’t she want to go to her Aunties with her siblings?

But how high is the threshold for safe guarding. This is what I can’t get my head around.

In my experience Social Services are so overstretched, they’ll jump at the chance of having a child living somewhere they know is safe, and they won’t ask any more questions.

The younger 2 will almost certainly stay where they are, because parents have to pretty much kill their kids before they’re forcibly removed. All Sarah will have to do is tell them that Steve has moved out, and they’ll accept that the danger has been removed, and move on to the next case.

OP what you’re doing is extremely kind, and I admire you for it. But I would think carefully before formalising it as a long term arrangement . Right now Sarah’s daughter is a sweet 12 year old. But teens and puberty will soon come, and given what she’s witnessed growing up, there’s a strong chance she could have some significant issues. It may be hard for you all to manage.

I have known the whole family my entire life I’m assuming she believes her aunt is not as far off bring similar to her mum ( mum and aunt are very close to )

You are lovely to take her in...but what if her and your daughter fall out? They are almost teenagers and the fallings-out of teenage girls can be the stuff of legends!

I may be being thick but why did you call ss? Because parents were on/off and having arguments.
Was it loud and violent? Not judging just wondering

If she is officially to move in with you and you are ok with this you must get registered as a foster carer and treat it as a professional arrangement so it will be fully funded . You aren't a charity and you've got your own children to think of . Make that absolutely clear to all concerned. You’ll need the CRB checks and everything. Otherwise dont even consider it .

As she's so young I think this is tricky, the teenage years are difficult for everyone and you've no idea how this will pan out long term. Its a massive commitment

That’s a really good question and can be different in different LA’s (which I appreciate shouldn’t be the case). It is generally much higher than most people think especially to meet the legal threshold for a child to be removed but there is a lot that could be put in place in the build up to that (early help, child in need, child protection). The approach from social care is always to look at the family network to see what support they can offer before intervening as that is best for the child. It’s not nice having social care involved so they shouldn’t be unless absolutely necessary. There is an even bigger push for this with the new social care reforms.
The way it stands at the moment is that you are providing safety for the child so the concerns have actually reduced. I appreciate though that this can feel really unfair for families as the then receive less support.
My advice to you would be to be really honest with yourself about what you as a family can provide this young person. It’s such a difficult position for you to be in but there is no shame at all in saying if you can’t do it. I always respect prospective carers when they tell me if they can’t as it means we can move on and consider other options. It is a huge commitment to take on another persons child and I would say doing it under a private fostering arrangement is particularly difficult as there is no support around it. Good luck with whatever you decide x

My concern would be what happens if / when your DD and this girl fall out? Especially if they have to share a room

Is it going to lead to a weird dynamic where this girls feels that she has to keep your daughter happy or risk being thrown out?

I'm friendly with 2 adults (now in their 40s) who both moved in with family friends in their teens (one because of dysfunction similar to what you describe OP, the other due to parental illness and subsequent death). In both cases they view their 'new' families as their family - referring to them as mum/dad/siblings etc. They are happy, successful people with families of their own now. So it can work out. But, it's so complex OP - so many things to consider. It could also all go very wrong. Like others I would worry about the dynamic between the girl and your daughter if it shifts from extended sleepover to essentially siblings. Children change so much in adolescence, they may drift apart as friends as interests diverge. And are you and your husband in this for the long haul - through school, college, uni... A huge amount to consider but it's obvious how much you care about her, whatever decision you take doesn't diminish that.