GOING HOME...

A foster child who'd been with us for a little less than a year has gone home.

The process was handled really well by the social workers and hopefully I did my bit too.

Remains to be seen whether the child's real family can keep their end up, I hope so with all my heart.

It's an emotional set of events, a child in care being returned home. For anyone thinking about coming into fostering it's worth a few words.

First up (and this is something I have to remind myself of throughout), it signals job well done by the foster family, for the simple reason that returning a child to their real home is a key aim in fostering.

There are other aims aplenty of course namely all the things you try to do for one's own children. We keep them well fed and watered, in warm clean clothes, encourage good behaviour, help them with their homework, try to put a smile on their face. Try to explain the world to them - just as we do with our own brood.

The difference is that our own brood don't leave, nor do they keep asking if and when they can leave.

And this is the second thing. Almost every child who comes into care arrives at your front door emotionally - and sometimes literally - bruised and battered by their home life, yet wanting to 'go home'.

I usually sit a newly arrived child at the kitchen table with biscuits and gently explain a few things about our family and how the house works. Then I ask them if they have any questions, and I've been in fostering long enough to expect that the first and only question almost every time is;

"When am I going home?"

Then they ask it again and again, as the days turn into weeks and months. They never stop wondering and asking.

You have to gird yourself for it, it doesn't mean they don't like you or your home, it's just that everyone feels most at home when they're in their actual home, whatever that home is like.

The third and last thing I'll mention here (there are millions but I want to mention a wonderful little moment), is that you never forget a single child. They jump into your mind over and over, for ever; which says everything about this great profession; fostering.

The little moment is this;

There comes the instant when a child leaves when it's time to say the goodbyes. 'Goodbyes' are always special, but in this case it's usually goodbye for ever, so it's a bit hard on the heart. The child is generally so bound up with excitement they get into a little bubble and I try not to intrude my own feelings, they've got their work cut out dreaming about and planning their welcome home.

Their heads are full of pink imaginings of their family and the family home, their high hopes fuelled by the proof that things at home are now better, or else they wouldn't be going home.

You can't help but share their dream of the future, even though a big element of their dream is a bit hard on the foster parent, namely...you're not in the dream.

So you put on a brave face, you're glad for them. You deny any doubts you may have that they really are going home to a happy family and a bed of roses.

You don't even expect a wave from the back of the social worker's car as they drive away.

So I definitely didn't expect what happened this time.

The car pulled slowly away with the child in the back, then stopped. The social worker got out and beckoned me so I trotted up. The back window slid down and the child said;

"I forgot to say...thanks. For like...everything...yeah?"

Ouch.

In the nicest POSSIBLE way, ouch.

I probably blinked to disperse the moisture that came into my eyes, didn't want a tear down the cheek, and said;

"You're welcome, I'm always here for you, remember that."

Then the child was gone. I watched and waved until they were out of sight.

When I got to thinking about it, I wondered if the social worker had played a part, maybe asked or suggested what happened. I doubt it, they try not to impose themselves.

Glorious little instant.

Any wonder I'm gearing up to go again?

The world doesn't give bods like me many opportunities to feel amazing.

Fostering does.