CM Club: mindees and personal boundaries

[KaySamuels]

I have a mindee who I am struggling to keep professional boundaries with.

My mindees for example have always understood that this is my job, but I currently have an 8yr old mindee who wants to go camping with me, sulks if dp comes home from work with a sweet for ds, will sit and ask, is this your ds' comic, then fills it all in, goes through

I honestly don't know if this is trying it on, or she simply doesn't understand!

I feel terrible today that she is gutted she couldn't go camping with us.

How can I handle this? Any suggestions?

This is my ss mindee and I think that plays a huge part in this BTW.

oops that should say

goes through cupboards and drawers

Maybe they just don't understand about families. Perhaps explain to them about who is in your family, and who is in their family.

Get them to agree to house rules - such as not going through cupboards, drawers without asking first.

She wants to go camping with you... hmm, perhaps she wants to be in your family, not her own. I haven't read about anything you may have written about the background of this child... but as you say, if she has come via ss, then she may not like her family and thus is looking for a substitute family - or may even think you are her substitute family.

Thanks for reply nn, mindee is staying with extended family in a lovely caring environment but does need to feel liked and loved, she is 8 though so we have talked about not going through cupboards, asking before doing etc. I do feel for her tho.

I guess it's hard in this case as usually I find a balance is struck easily, with cm and mindee becoming like extended family whilst remaining professional, IYKWIM? But with this mindee I am finding that more tricky. Msybe it is that I am just a softy who hates saying no repeatedly!