Foster parent rights?
We’ve talked before about being called ‘foster carers’ by the system, when as far as the children in care are concerned we are their parents. An article in the SMH today threw that issue into stark focus.
You can read the article here: ‘Agony of deciding who will look after young’ – the byline is ‘An Aboriginal mother has reclaimed her children, but the foster parents are furious, writes Adele Horin.’
By our reading of the article, the two children in question have been in care for about 4-5 years, from when they were very tiny. The biological mother has reclaimed them, after getting her life back on track and establishing a stable relationship.
One paragraph really struck a chord:
‘When is the right time - if ever - to restore children to their biological parents? How is it possible to weigh up children's stability and their attachment to their long-term foster carers against the potential enduring benefits of growing up in their biological family, knowing their siblings and their culture?’
Listen to the language of that paragraph. Biological parents. Biological family. Siblings. Enduring. Adele Horin is using the terminology the system uses.
The problem is – that terminology is loaded with meaning and riddled with assumptions. We all use that language daily and it instantly evokes, for most of us, a sense of right and entitlement and relationships and outcomes.
The people these children have lived with for the last 4-5 years – the bulk - of their lives are referred to in the paragraph as ‘long term foster carers’. The article later explains that for one of the children the foster mother is ‘the only mum he's known’.
The foster carers lost out in that paragraph, big time. The language does not describe any emotional connection with the child that most of us can relate to. Attachment? Carer?
Here’s how it might have read with one small change:
‘When is the right time - if ever - to restore children to their biological parents? How is it possible to weigh up children's stability and their attachment to their second mum and dad and siblings against the potential enduring benefits of growing up in their biological family, knowing their siblings and their culture?’
The child leaps the divide – giving you their heart, their trust, their love. You become their mum and their dad. And yet the system is unwilling to acknowledge the shift. We could be cynical, and say that it helps the system justify the movement of children back to biological parents. You start by using language that maintains a distance between child and new family.
So, having trouble recruiting foster carers? No wonder. There is nothing in that story to reassure any carer that the child they have parented will be with them until the child is able make a decision about their future.
Until prospective carers hear language from the media and the ‘system’ that recognises the emotional bond we ‘carers’ create with these children, it will continue to be difficult to attract quality carers.
Posted by EssentialMum
You can read the article here: ‘Agony of deciding who will look after young’ – the byline is ‘An Aboriginal mother has reclaimed her children, but the foster parents are furious, writes Adele Horin.’
By our reading of the article, the two children in question have been in care for about 4-5 years, from when they were very tiny. The biological mother has reclaimed them, after getting her life back on track and establishing a stable relationship.
One paragraph really struck a chord:
‘When is the right time - if ever - to restore children to their biological parents? How is it possible to weigh up children's stability and their attachment to their long-term foster carers against the potential enduring benefits of growing up in their biological family, knowing their siblings and their culture?’
Listen to the language of that paragraph. Biological parents. Biological family. Siblings. Enduring. Adele Horin is using the terminology the system uses.
The problem is – that terminology is loaded with meaning and riddled with assumptions. We all use that language daily and it instantly evokes, for most of us, a sense of right and entitlement and relationships and outcomes.
The people these children have lived with for the last 4-5 years – the bulk - of their lives are referred to in the paragraph as ‘long term foster carers’. The article later explains that for one of the children the foster mother is ‘the only mum he's known’.
The foster carers lost out in that paragraph, big time. The language does not describe any emotional connection with the child that most of us can relate to. Attachment? Carer?
Here’s how it might have read with one small change:
‘When is the right time - if ever - to restore children to their biological parents? How is it possible to weigh up children's stability and their attachment to their second mum and dad and siblings against the potential enduring benefits of growing up in their biological family, knowing their siblings and their culture?’
The child leaps the divide – giving you their heart, their trust, their love. You become their mum and their dad. And yet the system is unwilling to acknowledge the shift. We could be cynical, and say that it helps the system justify the movement of children back to biological parents. You start by using language that maintains a distance between child and new family.
So, having trouble recruiting foster carers? No wonder. There is nothing in that story to reassure any carer that the child they have parented will be with them until the child is able make a decision about their future.
Until prospective carers hear language from the media and the ‘system’ that recognises the emotional bond we ‘carers’ create with these children, it will continue to be difficult to attract quality carers.
Posted by EssentialMum
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