Has anyone got experience of mentoring a child or teen in care?

[dashingandcrashing]

I'm disabled (ME/CFS among other conditions) so don't have a lot of energy but do have a small number of usable hours every week. I'd love to build a relationship with a child or young person through mentorship if it might ultimately help them. My DP is also interested in the idea as we love children but will never have our own. I'm just wondering how hard it might be though? My DP is the kindest man I've ever met and is strong and resilient but I'm wary of signing up for something that makes his life significantly harder. He already has to care for me, although my care needs are relatively low and my parents help. Can anyone advise if this might be manageable for people like us? From what I understand you would just spend a little time with the child or young person on a regular basis but they would live with foster carers or in some other care arrangement.

I’m an independent visitor. It is a volunteer role. Sounds like the sort of thing you are looking for.

https://ivnetwork.org.uk/become-an-iv/

We are retired foster carers due to me now having a disability. But we now volunteer through the ymca helping teens from age 18 to 25 who for whatever reason find themselves unable to live at home or are care leavers. We have taken in four young people now and given them the stability and guidance to complete education and settle into adulthood.

it’s not too full on. They look after themselves and keep their room tidy. DH helps them learn to cook (if they need) and budget money. I’m always around for encouragement and advice plus making sure they are staying on track. It’s been a lovely good few years and very very rewarding when they get their independence and you see them thrive.

https://www.ymcabc.org.uk/ymca-open-door-walsall/

Yeah, that sounds like what we'd be interested in doing Yorkypuds - thank you! Can you tell me more about your experience? How did you get into it and have you just visited one child or young person? Is it distressing in any way? Emotionally demanding? Or is there quite a lot of fun? A good balance? How long have you been doing it and can you see it being a long term thing for you? With one or more child/young person?

That sounds like a lovely thing to do ShowerFlowers - I had no idea that kind of thing exists. Do you get any funding to help pay for their needs or do they get money directly? If my health were to improve further I'd love to do actual foster caring or something like what you're doing but I don't know how likely that is. There are some treatments on the horizon for some of my conditions for the first time in my life so I'm daring to consider it, although there's no guarantee I'll be a candidate or that they'll work, so who knows.

And can I ask, have you always felt safe, both when you were fostering "properly" and now you're doing the slightly less intense version for older teens and adults? When I first started researching foster caring in the unlikely event of a miraculous health recover on my part, I read a lot of stories about kids trying to set the foster carers' houses on fire, smashing up their furniture etc, which made me think I had maybe been naive in terms of what's involved. I don't think I could cope with feeling unsafe in my own home, but from the small amount you've said it doesn't sound like the people you've helped have brought any serious safety issues to your door? I could cope with a child or young person being emotionally demanding and helping them if they were in distress to some degree but would always want to feel safe. Have you always felt safe?

I did an independent visitor volunteer role before I had kids and it wasn't demanding, about 3 hours per week taking a young person out and giving the foster carers a small amount of respite. Plus a few hours here and there to go to group sessions with the other volunteers. It was very rewarding and i enjoyed it. I was matched with one person, so saw her every week and got to build up a good bond and provide some consistency through multiple moves and multiple social workers.

Emotionally, I found the training quite difficult. There was a huge emphasis on spotting the signs of abuse and we had to attend a presentation from a police officer specialing in child protection which was difficult to listen to at times. But the reality of working with my young person was much more enjoyable. Of course, if you did come across a young person with some concerning child protection issues you'd be expected to ask questions and make reports etc which could be distressing.

If you have the time to commit long term, and enjoy being around and caring for young people, go for it OP! I think they struggle for male volunteers even more so.

That said, if you wanted a more flexible commitment, you could try volunteering at a local youth club first and see how you feel after that

I think I could handle the training even if it was distressing. But when does the training take place? I'm not good at mornings! Was it a block or one day every so often?

That's a good idea about the local youth club thing.

For me, the training was in the evenings (about 2-3 hours per session over a few weeks if I remember correctly) as I think they tend to plan around people with typical 9-5 weekday jobs.

But obviously each organisation will do things their own way and may even adapt the schedule according to the group of volunteers they have at the time. In my experience they were pretty accommodating of volunteers' needs

That sounds doable :)

There was a thread on being an independent visitor a while back, sharing here in case helpful: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5096608-has-anyone-been-an-independent-visitor?utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=app_share

I work with children in a residential care home. It’s run by a charity and they aim to provide a mentor for each of the young people living in their services. Full training and support is given to those who volunteer for this role. Currently one of our residents (they are all 15 years old) has a mentor. The mentor sees them about once a month, usually for between 1-3 hours, depending on what they’re doing together. For example, if they’re sitting watching TV & doing colouring, that might be one hour, but if they’re going to the beach, that might be 3 hours. Bear in mind that it will probably take a long time to develop a relationship with the care experienced young person. There are many positives for the young person in having a mentor. To my mind, one of the best is that the mentor/mentee relationship continues after the young person is 18 and leaves residential care. It is difficult for the support workers to continue a relationship as we have new young people moving in that we have to support, so it’s great that they have someone they know visiting them etc once they’ve moved on.

I foster two teens and they’ve had independent visitors in the past. It was great for my younger boy. He saw her once a month and they went out and did something fun like swimming or cinema or lunch at Nando’s or similar. She got given an allowance to spend for the trip from the organisation she was doing it with. He saw her for a couple of years until she got a more demanding job and had to stop but he was older by then anyway and not so bothered about being taken swimming etc.

For his brother it was a disaster as he kept being assigned someone, meeting them once or twice then they would keep having to cancel visits for various reasons until eventually they would say they couldn’t fit the visits in and wouldn’t be back. Then there would be a really long wait while they tried to find someone else. And all the while he would see his brother going on fun visits with his. I did suggest they shared the visitor and take it in turns but that wasn’t allowed. Eventually I said don’t bother trying to find him a new one.

That’s so sad and terrible that someone signed up and then didn’t commit to it. I’m an IV and was told at The very start of the assessment process that people need to commit to 3 years as a minimum as otherwise it’s too much disruption for the young person.

cheapskatemum · Today 19:47

I work with children in a residential care home. It’s run by a charity and they aim to provide a mentor for each of the young people living in their services. Full training and support is given to those who volunteer for this role. Currently one of our residents (they are all 15 years old) has a mentor. The mentor sees them about once a month, usually for between 1-3 hours, depending on what they’re doing together. For example, if they’re sitting watching TV & doing colouring, that might be one hour, but if they’re going to the beach, that might be 3 hours. Bear in mind that it will probably take a long time to develop a relationship with the care experienced young person. There are many positives for the young person in having a mentor. To my mind, one of the best is that the mentor/mentee relationship continues after the young person is 18 and leaves residential care. It is difficult for the support workers to continue a relationship as we have new young people moving in that we have to support, so it’s great that they have someone they know visiting them etc once they’ve moved on.

That is sad that only one resident has a mentor. Can one mentor have more than one mentee if they want to do you know? I could do more than once a month - twice a month is totally feasible at the moment. I'd love for a relationship to continue long term. Do you know anything about the matching process?

This is indeed incredibly sad and it seems strange that sharing the visitor was not allowed, although you wonder who made that decision. It's great that you get an allowance for activities as well as the training etc. They were both lucky to have you though by the sounds of things.

I feel I would be incredibly committed from a motivational point of view - my big worry is that somehow they would deem me doing the mentoring to show that I'm not disabled enough for my benefits and cut them off. I need them for various meds and private treatments etc so that's a genuine concern.

I read that other thread, thank you @morellamalessdrama - really interesting. I hadn't realised there were so many different organisations you can go through though and can't work out if it's worth contacting several to see if they all do things slightly differently. Or if all roads lead to Rome as it were.

I'm still slightly concerned about potential risks. Is that something you just have to accept? Do these types of thing ever go badly wrong, if the young person grows up to have serious problems on account of their early adverse experiences? I'd love to think that our support and friendship would prevent that from happening but I know that that's probably naive.

My foster son had an independent visitor because he didn't have contact with his birth family. Once a fortnight his IV would collect him and they'd go bowling and a burger after. FS could have chosen different activities but set in his routines so always chose same activity. It was a very positive experience for FS and he had the same IV for 3 years until he reached 18.

@dashingandcrashing yes, I think you can be mentor for more than one young person in care. The charity I work for would be concerned that you wouldn’t get burn out, so would probably match you with one in the first instance for that reason. I know a little about the matching process, for example our young person & her mentor share some interests and are both full of energy.

I'm an independent visitor with nyas - have been for nearly 5 years - and I really enjoy it. Another option you could look at is one million mentors.org.uk - that has a commitment of about an hour a month for nine months.

Thank you fuckitallabit - I'll look into both of those!

That's fair enough cheapskatemum - I can understand why they take that approach. I'd be happy to start with one and see if I could manage another if it went well. In an ideal world, my energy levels permitting, I'd love to spend time with a child and some time with a teenager or young person. You'd get different types of interaction and it would just be a nice mix if it all worked out.

And I'd love to know more about the matching process. I worry that they might just see I have ADHD and match me with someone with ADHD. When I go to ADHD meetup groups I get on like a house on fire with some of the people there but find the rest so totally exhausting that I know I'm going to crash from my ME/CFS if I spend too much time around them. It's hard to describe to a stranger who it works with and who it doesn't. It sounds really hard to get a match without meeting multiple kids/young people but I can understand why they don't let you do that.

With nyas the coordinator gets to know you, and you do an 'about me' leaflet (they give you examples). They use.this to pair you up with a young person - they share the leaflet with them to see if it looks like a good match, and then you meet them in person. After that meeting they ask each of you separately if you'd like to proceed. The aim is to be like a fun auntie or uncle, and have nice times with them, and be a consistent presence - it's not providing counselling or any such thing. They provide a monthly budget for activities as well.

I've been independent visitor for three young people (only one at a time). The commitment is a few hours a month. I know one volunteer who has two young people - he's retired. I'd suggest starting with one, do it for six months, and then talk to the coordinator if you think you have capacity for a second.

There's also a range of organisations that match up mentors with care leavers - some of these have a weekly commitment, and others a monthly one. Some of the organisations work with homeless charities (care leavers are much more likely to end up homeless or in jail). Just search for volunteering with care leavers.

I like the sound of being a fun auntie and having fun times - I think I can do that consistently! And I think I can do a few hours a month, but yes, i would agree that it's sensible to start slowly with one relationship and see how it goes. I'll look into those charities and organisations - thank you!

This looks great. Thank you i think im going to sign up