NO MORE ADVICE PLEASE

I try to be frugal with advice. People don’t really want advice, unless they ask. Even then they probably know what they want you to say, and the best thing is to advise them to do whatever they intend to do anyway as at least they’ll do it with the enthusiasm you have for something that’s your own idea.

When our first baby was in the pushchair I had a T shirt made up that said “No More Advice Please”. I was tired, working hard to get everything right for the kid, and couldn’t get down the high street without a queue of ex-mothers-of-babies with their advice.

“Is she going to be warm enough like that?”

“She should be taking some solids by now”

My all time favourite:

“You need to keep the bottom of the pushchair clean or you get rats”

I’ll say one thing for fostering, it shuts up the stream of advice. Doesn’t matter how many children of your own you’ve had, you haven’t fostered until you’ve fostered. Not that you draw attention to your fostering, in fact you never mention it, except to family and good friends.

We sometimes do “Parent and Child”. If you don’t know, this is where the parent, usually the mother, stays with her child, usually a baby.

Going back to the advice thing, I do try to talk to the mother about contraception in cases where the reason she had a baby was because contraception failed. Or wasn’t even considered.

Often the mother is a young girl, and quietly determined to have more children. You ask them why they want lots of kids, and they shrug and say “I like kids”, or “My mum had six” or “Better than going to work”.

Like good social workers, foster carers don’t judge, just stand ready with support and information about alternatives.

I watch these young mums out and about with their pushchair. When their baby is a few weeks old passers-by go weak at the knees, a crowd gathers. You sit on a park bench and other women can’t resist coming over “Oooo isn’t he lovely!” “Aaaaah how old is he? Isn’t he georgeous.”

Around six months, when the babies are starting to get some wherewithal, the billing and cooing starts to dry up.

We had one mother who had a newborn and a three year old. When she was out and about people did the whole gushing thing about the baby, never even noticed the toddler.

Everyone wants to be somebody, maybe some girls only get to be somebody when they’ve got a tiny baby.

Maybe it’s one reason why they want to keep doing it.

I mention the advice thing because a couple of would-be foster carers have asked Blue  Sky if an experienced foster carer could chat with them and…

…offer some advice.

I have my advice ready, should I be asked.

My advice is: When a foster child first arrives, let them choose a mug in a shop which is theirs to keep and gets stored with everyone else’s.

That’s it. Apart from that, trust your heart.

The Secret Foster Carer

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Fostering and the Return to School

This time, when it was first morning back at school, I brought up Christmas during the school run.

The school summer holiday is a long haul, everyone knows that. I notice that in spite of all the various squabbles and splits, they are around you to such an extent that there's a deepening of the bond.

It's not a chocolate box bonding between foster parent and child. It's not a love thing, more a trust thing. 

So there's a bit of a mutual sadness when they clump down the stairs in their school clothes for the first morning.

When it comes to talking about Christmas, you obviously have to keep the conversation away from the matter of where they will be for Christmas and who they'll be spending it with. If that stuff comes up, you have to deal with it honestly, and move the chat to somewhere positive, and it worked.

"If you're here for Christmas, have you thought about what you'd like? It's never too early to start thinking about presents."

Daydreaming about laptops, mobile phones, electric pianos and puppies always takes the curse off almost anything.

It can backfire financially. We had a teenager in the build-up to Christmas, they couldn't say if she was going to be with us for Christmas itself, or go home. So we did the whole build-up thing, the gift list, the crossing out of things that were too expensive or inappropriate, and the antenna twitching for casual mentions of things for the stocking such as favourite band or singer, and nail colour dreams.

Then she went home on Christmas Eve. Laden down with our pressies in a sack. Brilliant. Although we never got to know what happened to the Blackberry because we rang it in January to say Hi and the line was dead.

We'd run all the gift ideas past Blue Sky, who have well-thought-out guidelines on mobile phones for young people.

It never came up, but I reckon Blue Sky sussed that the child asked us and her real parents for a Blackberry, ended up with 2 and flogged ours off. 

The conversation in the car worked and we all cheered up.

It cheered me up until I got home and went to work on the house. 

1. At least half a dozen opened envelopes with the letter put back inside having checked to see it's nothing too urgent but something that must be dealt with eventually scattered around the kitchen dating back to mid-August.

2. A smell somewhere towards the back of the fridge, not made by the glass of apple juice that did not get drunk at the time so got put in the fridge for next time someone asked and has been there since mid-August.

3. A child's vest that has sat on the landing outside a bedroom door in a semi-folded state so it's unknown if it's clean or needs a wash. Since mid-August.

The list goes on.

But before I got the hoover out, I made a cup of tea and turned the TV on. The house felt huge and empty. Like a Cathedral. A Cathedral that needed a good hoovering.

I turned on the Shopping Channel. QVC were doing Christmas. 

Who are these people that wish our lives away, thinking about Christmas in September?

The Secret Foster Carer

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SLEEPOVERS

I absolutely did not think I'd get a spare 10 minutes this weekend to write a blog, but guess what.

What it is at our house this weekend, is that one of our 3 foster children is having a sister and brother, who are also in care, over for a Sleepover. Or a "Stayawakeover" as I call them.

So that's 5 then, which we've never had under one roof before.

You know fostering is always surprising you? 

Well as things stand, it turns out 5 are easier than 3, which is easier than 1.

Right now, early Saturday evening, nobody is arguing about what to watch on TV, or whose turn it is on the laptop. In fact no-one is bothering about technology, toys or snacks at all. Why? They've got much more interesting gizmos to hand. People. People they share the big thing with. 

They've all given their early warning system the weekend off. The radar that alerts them when there's an incoming reminder they are different. 

Couple of weeks ago I was in the mini-supermarket with one of mine, a child of ethnic background. She was trying to reach down a mini-Toblerone from a high shelf, and a lady shopper helped her, I was watching. The lady is a neighbour, about ten doors along. The lady knows me, and has met the child several times. But she's 83, and I don't blame her for what happened next.

The lady looked around at the customers in the shop and saw a woman aged about mid-thirties. And ethnic. The lady called out to her "Do you mind if I help her get a Toblerone down?" The woman looked understandably confused. The child shot me a glance, one of those pictures that paints a thousand words. Then the lady asked the woman "Sorry, is she yours?" 

On the way home, I'd bought the child the Toblerone plus a lolly, and I apologised for the lady.

The child said "Shut up!"

Which I did.

Fostered children are permanently on Red Alert for little nuances that single them out, aren't they?

So it should be no surprise they relax to the end of their toes when the situation is top heavy with people who have the same backstory.

I had to visit a school for disabled children way back, and I'd always been a believer that children in wheelchairs should be in regular schools. But the Head said to me "Here they are normal." And we all need to feel normal.

Blue Sky crank up a bunch of social events during school holidays where carers bring their foster children and stuff happens. The ones I've been too have been brilliant. 

All these unique, vulnerable individuals with loads of problems, relaxing and sharing and supporting each other. That's just the foster parents.

The children really bubble, drop their exhausting guard, get stuck in because from start to finish it's a day where they are normal.

And that's what's going in our home this weekend. 5 young people sharing being normal early on a Saturday evening first time in a long time.

2 older people sharing a contented house early on a Saturday evening, first time in a very long time.

The Secret Foster Carer

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CONTACT: A Better Way

It's hard work being a child. Most adults think children have got it easy, funny how grown-ups have such a pink-tinted memory of what they went through themselves.

I heard about a child who came home from school crying, ran upstairs to their bedroom, and lay on the bed sobbing. Mum asked what was up. The child said they'd been told by a teacher  that these were the happiest days of their life.

Then along comes Social Media: another way to screw up. Or is it? I wonder whether fostering is missing a trick.

I watch my looked after children, with all their jaw-dropping problems, unbelievable courage, totally unique life stories; each and every one of them completely hooked on their phones.

They walk around holding it, checking the screen every few seconds. They tap away at the tiny keyboard all day, probably half the night too. They don't give themselves a single free moment. I try to get them to come to the table without the phone; but sometimes you have to be flexible to avoid a scene. They sit watching Harry Potter and send/receive 100 texts before we even see the Half Blood Prince.They take it into the loo with them, they sit in the car tapping away. They never, ever speak into it. They conduct 99% of their life by written word.

Not GR8 written words tho.

Our children are evolving into people who communicate totally differently from all previous humans. There's nothing we can do about it.

I had a teenage girl stay who was almost mute by choice. "What would you like for breakfast?" "Arrdunno" "Would you like a ride to school?" "Fyerlike". Never off her phone messaging service.

One day I texted her during morning break."How did you do in the test?"

"Not bad. Some of the questions were ok, but I struggled a bit with the last section."

"Was that the stuff you missed when your placement went wrong"

"Basically yeah. They say I can re-sit if I want, but it's one of the courses I want to drop anyway."

I think today's children communicate better by text and messaging and the rest of the social media than they do face-to-face. 

Especially foster children. 

Nothing new about this, I'm told that relationship councillors often get partners to sit back to back to talk so they can't see each others faces. My partner and I find it easier to resolve a difference on the phone.

I wonder what the response would be if we proposed Contact should be electronic? Why not? If they communicate better with their significant others by written word, whether it's a series of texts or a closed messaging service, once a week, the transcript provided to social services is it's meant to be a supervised session.

The things that trigger anger and other negative emotions in a child are visual and audio signals, especially the faces and voices of people they associate with bad times. 

Texting would work really well for a lot of Contacts., not all, obviously. And there'd need to be appropriate safeguards. 

The Secret Foster Carer

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Think Time

Children are forever asking questions where we have to stop and think carefully how to answer. 

We have just had 7 days abroad, we took one of our foster children, the holiday was timed to coincide with the other two having a joint spell away from us.

I'm sitting at the table on an apartment balcony killing half an hour while partner traipses to the Supermercado for bread and milk, playing poker dice with the child, like you do, but don't tell social services, they'd have to pretend they'd disapprove.

Then she says "Why do you love me?"

Get out of that without moving then, as they used to say in the playground when they had you in a headlock.

Thing is, I can't ever remember saying "I love you" to the child. Not that I don't, in some way or other, it's just that it's a sixty-four thousand dollar phrase and you keep it under lock and key.

I remember saying "Lots of love" more than once at bedtime, at the end of the ritual
"Night night"
"Night night"
"See you in the..."
"Morning."
"Lots of love"
And if you got "Lots of love" back, you felt you were making good progress with their attachment and emotional intelligence.

As for answering the question "Why do you love me?", blimey, what do you say?

"Well," I said "Because you are a great kid, and kind and funny and generous."

Okay you can see what I'm doing here, I expect the child can too. I'm flanneling.

"And, you know, when you get to know somebody, who lives in your house and kind of becomes part of the family, well you get a really good type of feeling going where you put up with the other person's bad times. So I put up with yours and you put up with mine."

She could sense I was trying to get somewhere.

"It's called unconditional love."

"Un,,, what love?"

"Unconditional love. It's when you care about someone and understand they are human and you care about them no matter what."

Short pause then she said;

"Your throw."

When you have to show passports with a fostered child you get given a letter by Social Services stating that the child is in your care. The woman at the airline gate at Gatwick wasn't up to much. She made a thing about it. 

"Yes, I noticed the names on the passport were different."

Bully for you.

"So who are you then darling, are you a foster child?"

WHAT! In a queue of a hundred people this uniformed twerp is showboating her Sherlock Holmes? 

Then:

"Are these people your foster carers?"

The child looked down like she'd been rumbled for being a lesser person; and mumbled "Don't know..."

Then the woman says "Don't worry darling, all you have to do is say Yes I'm their foster child okay?"

Then she looks up at us and says "It's difficult for us, you know, you get grandparents with different names, even parents on their second marriages and that."

I smiled while mentally writing a letter to the airline. I understand the value of vigilance against children being trafficked. It looks to me the airlines go through the motions to satisfy some guideline or other, regardless of the pain it causes the child. The child didn't answer, looked shaken, the letter could have been easily forged. The woman didn't apply any nous, she banked we were kosher, she just wanted a bit of interest and interaction in her otherwise mind-numbing job. It didn't cross her tiny mind her crassness would knot up a child's insides.

But maybe it was that little unpleasant episode, or another similar moment of awkwardness (fostered children are exposed to so many moments when they are made to feel different by bozo jobsworths) that made her feel loved by us. Or want to be loved by us.

She is loved by us, even though I've never said it, although the day may come when it's right to say it. Right for her, not us, right for her.

If I do write a letter it'll be to ask how much good their watching out for children with different surnames has achieved. How many kidnaps they've intercepted. Compared to how many children they've upset. 

The Secret Foster Carer

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When They Go Home

Two went yesterday.

It's always a strange time in the house, depending on the circumstances.

It's six in the morning I'm writing this, just been downstairs to make a cup of tea. Their bedroom door is half open, the beds made, silent and empty.

A fostering friend had a ten year old boy who was severely emotionally damaged. A very angry mixed up child, physically huge for his age. He'd had four placements break down.  It was her first placement, and she and her partner were learning as they fostered. They tried everything, but the downward spiral was speeding up. The boy stayed with me a couple of times to give my friend respite. It was clear that the boy needed lots of help, and his helpers would soon need protection. He was removed from my friend and is now in residential care. My friend is now doing a great job with another placement, she's a great carer. But my point is that when the boy left she didn't know what to feel.

Blue Sky's chief psychotherapist is adamant that we carers begin offering attachment from the day a child arrives, even if they may not be with you for long. I agree, and all the good carers I know try to do the same. He refuses to call us "Foster Carers", he says we are "Foster Parents" because the child needs a parent. I don't always agree with everything the "psyches" say - I've never met one who's ever fostered - but as far as this bit of advice goes; spot on.

My friend felt guilt at feeling relieved, she felt discomfort that maybe she failed. She struggled to feel proud of the good she had done, the unending care she had poured into the child. She and her partner came round to our house a few times in the aftermath and we talked about the boy most of the time. They used to go to see him in his high security residential unit. My partner and I felt they had formed an attachment with the boy, even if they couldn't define it themselves.

How can you not form an attachment with a child who has suffered enough to be taken  into care? 

I have to stop myself from trying to find out how each and every single one of the children who've been with us are doing.  Most social workers are the same. You can ring up the social worker of a child who was with you years back and they grill you for every bit of news about the child.  One child we had spoke to me about a previous social worker in great glowing terms, so I rang her up and told her, and she almost cried with a mix of joy and relief. She'd been the worker who had taken the child from her real parents. She remembered having to prise the child's fingers from around the banister to carry her into her car.

The two who are gone, no-one had to have to prise any fingers from around any banister. They were prepared and proud. Blue Sky, the children, their social workers, and us the foster parents, laid out the programme from day one, all boxes ticked. Forward planning done; fallbacks in case of future problems all agreed.

But emotions don't have tick boxes do they?

These two were only with us for six months, and here I am marking their departure with the same sign of respect I used when our flesh and blood children left home: their bedroom door exactly half open. Not closed, not wide open, exactly half.

Is that because I care about them as if they were my own? Or is it because my own children have got their room available again if they want to come and stay?

It's a strange time in the house when they go.

It's a strange time in the heart too.

The Secret Foster Carer

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Rough and Tumble

Play is so important to all of us. We are never happier than when we're off the clock and having a laugh, browsing the internet, watching some rubbish telly, or best of all joshing with friends. The cut and thrust of the gabbling is not just about laughter, it's about strengthening important bonds, even the slightly competitive edge to the yak is good for camaraderie.

This is ten times more true for children. And twenty times truer for fostered children.

I went to a fantastic Blue Sky training session recently, on Play.

The instructor made us play games, and the thing I noticed was how important it got for me not to screw up when it was my turn to pass the balloon from between my knees to the carer on my left. Oh yes, everyone was laughing, and I enjoyed my moment in the spotlight when the room was looking at my efforts, but I even got a few nerves as my turn got close. At the end of the day we all bustled off smiling. But I'd been reminded how important "play" is when you're little.

In fact, there's no such thing as "play". It's learning for life. Learning self-esteem, social skills, dealing with ups and downs, finding out about other people.

I used to feel a bit unusual in that I know I learned far more in the playground than the classroom. Now I'm sure it's true for almost everyone.

With your own children it's a straightforward business, playing with them. Rough and tumble games, when they're small, are fantastic. The tactile element  is a bonding thing, letting them experiment with their strength and agility is great for self-esteem, especially if you let them win the right amount of times. There's a lot of laughter and excitement. Later on this develops into a quest for triumphs such as cycling without stabilisers, swimming, and the other sports. You may care to know I can strike a football, toe down, with both feet. I understand several millionaires in the Premier League still can't do that yet, har har.

It's not quite so straightforward when you foster. You have to abide by very sensible guidelines concerning physical contact with other people's children, quite rightly. It's not unlike the things teachers are trained in, except teachers don't get challenged to a play-wrestle very often.

Each time any type of contact-play comes up you do a quick check; what's the age-appropriateness of the game? What kind of contact will be involved? Is it danger-free? 

Obviously, a child will get to be too old or big for rough and tumble, but you can always back out anytime  saying "You're a bit too old/grown-up/big/heavy/strong/quick for me these days". Or "Not with my back/shoulder/wrist/knee".

You try hard not to betray to the child that you are avoiding any activity that could, in a bad old world, end up as being misinterpreted as inappropriate. And this is one reason why we keep our written records.

In the meantime if everything is right, I stick to games we played and perfected with our children that are also safe. Running away and being chased is great, so long as the "tag" is just a tap on the back.

The all time favourite is "Rhino Derby". You go down on all fours, as does your opponent. You put your heads down so your upper backs are pressing against each other. And push. You keep your head well out of the way. There's an element of rough and tumble, but it's safe, as long as you concentrate and stay alert to any dangers. It's got (safe) contact, competitiveness, and if you play "Best of three" you are out and defeated 2-1 with no danger of bruises, pulled muscles or a build up of anxiety.

Unlike the rough and tumble of adulthood if you're a foster carer, which usually sees us posting a lower score than we wanted, with a well bruised ego.

And as for freedom from anxiety, if that's what you're after, stick to gardening.

The Secret Foster Carer

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