QUALITY 15 MINUTES

When a new foster child arrives it's hard to keep up all your other responsibilities because you're so focussed on settling the newcomer in.

You're ever on the alert for things that help you build the fullest picture of the child, learning about their personalities and how to make best use of who they are to help them towards being who they want to be.

Take Ryder, who's settling in brilliantly. Okay, the odd glitch, usually around Contact with her significant others, nothing a couple of minor fixes can't heal over. On our way home from Contact I take her straight to the sweetshop. She knows this and it even helps get her to the Contact, she starts talking about her treat, it softens the complicated emotions.The distraction of choosing from the vast shelves of goodies works wonders. She knows she's free to spend as much time as she wants browsing, I never hurry her. She always manages to persuade me to go a bit over her budget, all part of the therapy; the distraction of having freedom of choice and entering complex financial negotiations distances her from the angst. Just to nail the whole thing I choose a treat for myself, agonising over what to have and getting her advice. I pick something, usually a packet of mints rather than a bar so she can sample my treat on the way home, it bonds us.

Then you get the moment when she offers you a sweet from one of her packets, and you know you're getting somewhere. 

Naturally I'd be happier offering her carrot sticks or an apple, but Contact is such a major upheaval for her she deserves what she wants the most, which is a sense of control and freedom. We have an ongoing competition between her and me as to who has the whitest teeth, which has led to her cleaning her teeth not only voluntarily but if anything too often. Sometimes the foster mum's tricks of the trade are almost too successful for their own good...

But like I started out saying, the first few weeks of a new arrival can result in other priorities dropping down your radar. 

I've noticed that I might cut corners with little things - the family might moan "Not pasta again...", I cram the pedal bin rather than empty it when almost full, cut back on the hoovering telling myself I'm the only one who notices a few bits on the carpet. I re-assure myself that it's down to having an extra person to feed and tidy up after, but the truth is I'm pre-occupied with helping them feel at home, and it fills my head.

The one mistake I try to make sure I never make is to let the others think I don't care about them as much as before. You have to up the TLC for everyone (even my other half, who is easily capable of feeling neglected...).

It's really important, most important of all, to re-assure any other children in the home, that you love and care for them just as much, maybe even more. The minute they get a whiff that you are doting on the new arrival, allowing them a bit of extra leeway while she settles in, they're going to get unsettled. 

So here's what happened...

At the tea table Ryder passed a comment which was, shall we say, adult in nature. Either she didn't know what it meant but had heard it said in her real household, or she was making a bid to raise her grown-up status. 

The table went silent. Everyone was waiting for me to react. In these situations you get no time to think and you usually feel afterwards that you said/did the wrong thing. I fell back on a tried and trusted trick of mine which was to say this;

"Er, Ryder, no more of that sort of talk please, I'll have a chat with you about it later."

Deferment. I love this device. I use it especially when I'm asked a really difficult question by a foster child relating to their fostering, or their real family. It gives me a chance to think my words through, if necessary get clarification or advice from my social worker. The children usually are happy that my head is filled with thoughts of them and their needs.

However, in this instance eldest foster child got the knock (only slightly) because he felt that if he'd come out with a remark like Ryder's the you-know-what would have hit the fan. How do I know he got the knock? Am I vested with mind-reading powers or supernatural skills? No.

He said so. He said, immediately;

"If I'd said that you wouldn't have said what you said to her to me".

Which was true, but I couldn't tell the whole family that a new arrival is entitled to individual treatment until they are familiar with our do's and dont's. 

So I did deferment followed by distraction;

"I'll explain later, meantime who wants vanilla who wants chocolate chip?"

But I did speak to each of them separately. I got to Ryder asap. She kind of knew what she'd said, and agreed she was only trying to act grown up. She did really well not to get upset with worrying she might be in trouble, because being in trouble at her real home was, we had been told, worth worrying about.

Eldest I planned a quality 15 minutes with, just the two of us in the garden, it was getting dark and quiet. 

Quality 15 minute chats one-to-one with foster children are a big hit. They know it's going to be just 15 minutes, which is long enough to get things said, short enough for them not to feel in jail.

I asked him not to pass anything we would talk about on to Ryder even if she asked (requesting his confidence was also a way of marking his maturity). I explained the truth, that Ryder got allowances in her early days with us. The clincher was that I'd done the same for him and it had helped him. Now he had to help me help Ryder. But it went further and we talked about him and the big things in his life. The mate he'd had a barney with, they were back on track. The teacher he thinks has a downer on him has been not so bad recently. The teacher he thinks is brilliant who gives him a fist bump. 

It got deeper. He talked about the dad he hadn't seen since six Christmases ago. 

Then he talked about his mum not paying him any attention.

His mum not paying him any attention. I could have kicked myself to the end of the road and back. The big thing I give this child is attention, constantly. Except (the child was telling me via his subconscious) when there's a new foster child in the house - or at least that's how it can feel to him.

The quality 15 minutes turned into nearly an hour and I came indoors geared up to give everybody else in the house a quality 15 minutes (or hour) sooner rather than later.

And yes, including Ryder.

And yes, actually, including me, because things turned out for the better in the end.

As is so often the case with fostering.