GOOD COUNSEL

We have a spare bed again. Our latest has left. The gentle, frightened, musically talented, passive, compliant, nearly-adult young man with what everyone continues to call 'mental health issues'. He was so vulnerable, you just wanted to wrap him in cotton wool. He was small for his age, smaller...

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FOSTER CARE FORTNIGHT

Foster Care Fortnight starts soon. Most of the fellow foster parents I know are too busy fostering to get their heads up on national campaigns and what have you, but Blue Sky are behind it and we thought it was something to flag up on the SFC blog. You can get the works on it at their site, Google;...

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THE TEA CUP PROBLEM

A teacher in our family says that two of her best friends and allies at school are her selective deaf ear and blind eye. Same in fostering. She says that if she picked up on every single thing that the students shouldn't be doing or saying she wouldn't get any teaching done. And I find that too,...

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A LONG GOOD FRIDAY

Sometimes you can tell right from the off if a day isn't going to go well. Children in foster care occasionally get out of bed on the wrong side and there's not much can be done. I learned the hard way to have my antenna twitching from my first  cheery 'Good Morning!'. If there's no reply...

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MONDAY MORNING PURPLISH BLUES

People often ask me why I started fostering. It's a hard question to answer, but only because if I decide to answer it honestly it ends up sounding as though I'm actually asking whoever has asked the question why they themselves haven't started fostering. So, seriously; "If you haven't started...

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