The run-up to Christmas in fostering... I once overheard my mum say to her mum: "Sometimes I wish there was a pill you could take and fall asleep on Christmas Eve and not wake up 'til New Years Day".
It upset me a bit as a child. See, little me saw Christmas as a wonderful intervention into the mundane day-to-day of school and bedtimes. It sung of decorations, carols, good things on the telly, gifts and family togetherness.
It turned out it was the challenges of building, maintaining and managing family togetherness that got her goat.
Well let me tell you mum, wherever you are now, you should try doing the same in fostering, it's a totally different ball game.
Take this coming festivities:
We currently have a long-term foster child who has patches of family here and there which barely count, barring one. One of those adults who bears a grudge and is uttely driven to get theor own way however plain wrong they are. This particular adult has concocted in their mind that the child was somehow responsible for the family plunging into chaos. The adult needn't have bothered to invent a false series of events which "prove" the case because children coning into care routinely believe the collapse at home was their fault, they don't need anyone telling them.
Or, in the case of this adult, reminding them. Which this adult does every Christmas, roughly the week before. The child has elected not to block the adult on social media, saying that it helps to know what the adult is up to and that the child can deal with it all. Which the child does, but it upsets nevertheless.
So, at least we know where we are with this child.
However, we're out into inchartered waters with our Parent and Child placement.
See, the 16 year-old's mother has told her that she doesn't want them to visit over Christmas.
This has caused heartbreak for the young mum, and a massing of the forces of good (social workers, guardians, legal people, mental health specialists, home-helpers and Independent Review Officers) all striving to get a better deal for the distraught young mum. Namely, getting her to have some time with her own mother over Christmas.
Not just her mother, but her three brothers and three sisters. They live in a three bedroomed house. The sisters sleep downstairs on the floor.
The first time the young mum's mother refused to allow her daughter to visit, the proposed plan was that I would drive the mum and her baby over (an hour and a half) on Cristmas Eve and Social Services would find a social worker to drive her back to us the day after Boxing Day. The mum refused and gave the reason that there was no room for them to sleepover. Someone suggested the young mum and baby check into a nearby hotel, but it's not allowed for 16 year-olds to stay in hotels unaccompanied.
Blue Sky pitched in with a brilliant idea. They have foster carers here there and everywhere. they tracked down a husband and wife who had rooms and lived about 20 minutes for the young mum's house. But they turned out to be a no-doubt wonderful couple, but happen to be strict vegans and don't allow any meat or dairy in their house. Their perogative. But it was a deal brwaker because the young mum would struggle to feed her baby in the foster home.
Social Services then raised a budget to do the whole 3 days by taxis! Every morning a taxi from our house to the young mum's mother's home and another back each evening!
The mother was surely outmanoevred? But no, and we'd all seen another excuse coming. See, the mother has privately told social services that she would never have her daughter back around the house! But, here's the truly weird bit; she didn't want her daughter to know she felt that way because:
"I don't want to hurt her feelings."
So, when cornered by the taxi idea she came back:
"The thing is I can't afford a big Christmas this year."
And there's probably a bit of truth in that. The woman has, we understand, grown adept at claiming everything she's entitled to, and lives well, likes to spend big. Their family "tradition" at Christmas is that everybody gives everybody else 10 presents on Christmas day.
There's a possibilty that the "System" (as the mother calls it) is wising up to her various claims. Her Child benefit income is starting to decline now that he sons are reaching a certain age. She might also be under investigation for a false claiming of a disability allowance which is not only longstanding, but money that the "System" might get a ruling should be repaid.
But the court will have trouble doing that because the young mum told us that one of her mother's hobbies was to buy a bottle of every new top-of-the-range perfume (£60 and counting) on its launch day.
The young mum says her mother;
"Is permanently skint".
This one isn't solved yet, but I think we all know where it's heading…
The young mum asked me a couple of days ago" "Do you have a proper Christmas dinner here?"
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