fostercarer
Growing up in the care of strangers
That’s the title of a book…. about care.
We haven’t read the book. But its authors are profiled over at www.fostercareinamerica.com, so that tells us it’s worth looking into. It’s available on Amazon but takes some time to be delivered to us here in Oz (and at some expense). So we hope the authors will forgive us for taking little more than the title, and a bit of information from the blurbs, and writing something about it.
You can read about the authors, Dr John Seita and Waln Brown, at www.fostercareinamerica.com, and they have a website for the book (which tells you a little more).
They and their contributors are foster care alumni. It is marvelous to see those who experienced the system capable of, and interested in, working in it. That’s one of their points. When is the system going to take on board advice from those who experienced it?
Business listens to its customers (or tries to) frequently. And there’s a whole wave of debate and discussion globally about Government transparency and interaction. And yet our experience of the foster care system is, quite frankly, that the ‘consumers’ of it – children and birth families – and partners in it – carers – often don’t get much of a say. Their ability to do so seems to be very much at the mercy of individual workers, and not enshrined in the system.
If we take the title of this book at face value, you shouldn’t have to grow up in the care of strangers, should you?
The word ‘strangers’ hit us hard because we have been strangers to more than one small, bemused child who landed on our doorstep. The dazed look on their faces was quite hard to face, and we remember our pleasure when we’ve watched it gradually give way to some expression as they become familiar with us.
It’s a good day for your child in care when the only strangers in their life are those outside your family and their birth family, and their circle of friends and acquaintances. Like most kids.
The answer to strangers is permanency. If a child needs permanency then it is up to the system to make that decision and make that decision for them, in a timely fashion. Every day counts.
Then, as carers, you need to hold the line. You will know which relationships mean what to the child. We’ve always tried to make sure workers understand that a child in care is a child who has a birth family they don’t live with, rather than a child in substitute care who needs to conform to some pre-defined relationship with their birth family. We have made sure that any child’s individual interests didn’t get swamped beneath the standard way the system does things. We’ve acted like the parents. Because we are.
We’ve said for a while that the foster carer base needs to be segmented. There is a vast difference between short and long term care – both in what a child needs from it and what a carer needs to be able to commit to and provide. All of which drives us to advocate more transparency about how this system works.
So our congratulations to every one of the contributors to Growing up in the Care of Strangers. Not just for what they have achieved in their lives, but for speaking out.
We haven’t read the book. But its authors are profiled over at www.fostercareinamerica.com, so that tells us it’s worth looking into. It’s available on Amazon but takes some time to be delivered to us here in Oz (and at some expense). So we hope the authors will forgive us for taking little more than the title, and a bit of information from the blurbs, and writing something about it.
You can read about the authors, Dr John Seita and Waln Brown, at www.fostercareinamerica.com, and they have a website for the book (which tells you a little more).
They and their contributors are foster care alumni. It is marvelous to see those who experienced the system capable of, and interested in, working in it. That’s one of their points. When is the system going to take on board advice from those who experienced it?
Business listens to its customers (or tries to) frequently. And there’s a whole wave of debate and discussion globally about Government transparency and interaction. And yet our experience of the foster care system is, quite frankly, that the ‘consumers’ of it – children and birth families – and partners in it – carers – often don’t get much of a say. Their ability to do so seems to be very much at the mercy of individual workers, and not enshrined in the system.
If we take the title of this book at face value, you shouldn’t have to grow up in the care of strangers, should you?
- Did you ever wonder where you might be sleeping tomorrow, or the next day?
- Did you ever wonder whether the adult giving you assistance or instruction really, really cared deep down for you, or were they just doing a job?
- Did you ever want just one person to tell you they loved you, just you?
- Did you ever think that, no matter what, there was one place and one person who would welcome you, any time?
The word ‘strangers’ hit us hard because we have been strangers to more than one small, bemused child who landed on our doorstep. The dazed look on their faces was quite hard to face, and we remember our pleasure when we’ve watched it gradually give way to some expression as they become familiar with us.
It’s a good day for your child in care when the only strangers in their life are those outside your family and their birth family, and their circle of friends and acquaintances. Like most kids.
The answer to strangers is permanency. If a child needs permanency then it is up to the system to make that decision and make that decision for them, in a timely fashion. Every day counts.
Then, as carers, you need to hold the line. You will know which relationships mean what to the child. We’ve always tried to make sure workers understand that a child in care is a child who has a birth family they don’t live with, rather than a child in substitute care who needs to conform to some pre-defined relationship with their birth family. We have made sure that any child’s individual interests didn’t get swamped beneath the standard way the system does things. We’ve acted like the parents. Because we are.
We’ve said for a while that the foster carer base needs to be segmented. There is a vast difference between short and long term care – both in what a child needs from it and what a carer needs to be able to commit to and provide. All of which drives us to advocate more transparency about how this system works.
So our congratulations to every one of the contributors to Growing up in the Care of Strangers. Not just for what they have achieved in their lives, but for speaking out.
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Contact with birth families is good
We are in favour of contact with birth families – 100%.
There are many reasons why it is beneficial for a child to know their birth family. Here are some of them.
‘Who is my birth mum and/or my birth dad?’
Knowing my origins - It is very difficult for a child, particularly when they start to attend school and families are on the curriculum, to cope with a complete blank where a birth parent’s identity might be. As a carer you need an explanation that increases in detail as the child matures.
‘Why isn’t my hair dark brown like yours?’
A sense of identity - This can be important physically, as the child begins to want to emulate or be part of their second family.
‘I’m only living with you because my birth parent is a rock star’
A sense of reality – as a child grows older they may want to know why they are not with their birth family. Contact can help prevent a fantasy life evolving around a birth parent. This in turn may prevent any ‘play-offs’ between birth and second families. It can be quite devastating for an older child to meet a birth parent and experience their shortcomings. Acceptance from an early age is helpful.
‘Why did my birth parents give me up?'
Understanding and communication - An opportunity for child and birth parent to communicate on these issues can be good. It’s tricky territory, for a birth parent may not be prepared to answer the hard questions, or may be in complete denial about what actually happened and their responsibility for it. That in itself is a useful conversation for a trusted person to have with the child.
So what is the issue, for the child, around birth family contact?
BALANCE
You can completely undermine a child’s sense of security if contact with birth family overwhelms them and over-rides their daily life. Let’s state the obvious – access for a child who has a good chance of restitution with their birth family, should be very different to that of a child who has been put into the care of the Minister until they reach 18 years.
We believe that the PURPOSE of contact should be an item on any case plan.
The frequency of contact is usually covered, but we’ve not experienced an open and frank discussion about the purpose. We’ve seen this come unstuck when a worker thought they were meant to re-establish the child/birth parent relationship, when the appropriate purpose of access was to ‘maintain contact between child and birth parent’. There is a world of difference between those two objectives.
Understanding the purpose of contact will help you know how access should run.
We saw that world of difference played out in the behaviours of worker and birth parent. The workers pushed a level of interaction, and a set of rules, that alienated the child and increased her insecurity. It also resulted in a birth parent believing they had far more say in the child’s life than was the case. It was left to a more experienced worker to do damage control, and remind birth parent of the reality of the situation. It wouldn’t have happened if the issue had been discussed properly.
Understanding the purpose of contact will help you help the child manage their response to birth parent.
It will help you know which behaviours, from child and birth parent, to support, and what you should hose down. You know the child best, and you know what their life is now, so you are best placed to understand the impact access with a birth parent may have.
We’re going to have the purpose of access firmly on the agenda at our next case conference. We recommend that you discuss this with your worker until you are really clear about what it means. We think it is a useful discussion for any birth parent to participate in. And we especially recommend it as a discussion with any new worker who wants to change some aspect of access.
Posted by EssentialMum
There are many reasons why it is beneficial for a child to know their birth family. Here are some of them.
‘Who is my birth mum and/or my birth dad?’
Knowing my origins - It is very difficult for a child, particularly when they start to attend school and families are on the curriculum, to cope with a complete blank where a birth parent’s identity might be. As a carer you need an explanation that increases in detail as the child matures.
‘Why isn’t my hair dark brown like yours?’
A sense of identity - This can be important physically, as the child begins to want to emulate or be part of their second family.
‘I’m only living with you because my birth parent is a rock star’
A sense of reality – as a child grows older they may want to know why they are not with their birth family. Contact can help prevent a fantasy life evolving around a birth parent. This in turn may prevent any ‘play-offs’ between birth and second families. It can be quite devastating for an older child to meet a birth parent and experience their shortcomings. Acceptance from an early age is helpful.
‘Why did my birth parents give me up?'
Understanding and communication - An opportunity for child and birth parent to communicate on these issues can be good. It’s tricky territory, for a birth parent may not be prepared to answer the hard questions, or may be in complete denial about what actually happened and their responsibility for it. That in itself is a useful conversation for a trusted person to have with the child.
So what is the issue, for the child, around birth family contact?
BALANCE
You can completely undermine a child’s sense of security if contact with birth family overwhelms them and over-rides their daily life. Let’s state the obvious – access for a child who has a good chance of restitution with their birth family, should be very different to that of a child who has been put into the care of the Minister until they reach 18 years.
We believe that the PURPOSE of contact should be an item on any case plan.
The frequency of contact is usually covered, but we’ve not experienced an open and frank discussion about the purpose. We’ve seen this come unstuck when a worker thought they were meant to re-establish the child/birth parent relationship, when the appropriate purpose of access was to ‘maintain contact between child and birth parent’. There is a world of difference between those two objectives.
Understanding the purpose of contact will help you know how access should run.
We saw that world of difference played out in the behaviours of worker and birth parent. The workers pushed a level of interaction, and a set of rules, that alienated the child and increased her insecurity. It also resulted in a birth parent believing they had far more say in the child’s life than was the case. It was left to a more experienced worker to do damage control, and remind birth parent of the reality of the situation. It wouldn’t have happened if the issue had been discussed properly.
Understanding the purpose of contact will help you help the child manage their response to birth parent.
It will help you know which behaviours, from child and birth parent, to support, and what you should hose down. You know the child best, and you know what their life is now, so you are best placed to understand the impact access with a birth parent may have.
We’re going to have the purpose of access firmly on the agenda at our next case conference. We recommend that you discuss this with your worker until you are really clear about what it means. We think it is a useful discussion for any birth parent to participate in. And we especially recommend it as a discussion with any new worker who wants to change some aspect of access.
Posted by EssentialMum
Access
Reading our posts, you might suspect that all is sorted in our world. You might not, but in case you do…. We still have our days.
The week after access with birth family can be a challenge.
You might find that something is triggered in your child in care after visits. It might be hard to deal with because it comes from deep inside. The child may not understand it, and as you weren’t there in those early days you may have little chance of unpicking it.
We’ve seen children regress in that post access week. Behaviours will surface that belong to a younger child. Things that they normally take in their stride become major issues.
How do we deal? We don’t play. We move calmly on. We continue with our routines and normal practices. When a child is older, we might give them a look, we might even make a comment. If the child can handle it start the conversation with them about how they are feeling after seeing birth family.
Our single minded trudge through that post-access week (for some years now), is always important to the child, make no mistake. In a life that is probably marked by early change*, they need to learn that there is no change now as a result of seeing birth family. That there is no change with their new foster family. That’s a big step forward.
Posted by EssentialMum
* The kind of change we are referring to is where a child is moved, frequently, from short term carer to short term carer.
The week after access with birth family can be a challenge.
You might find that something is triggered in your child in care after visits. It might be hard to deal with because it comes from deep inside. The child may not understand it, and as you weren’t there in those early days you may have little chance of unpicking it.
We’ve seen children regress in that post access week. Behaviours will surface that belong to a younger child. Things that they normally take in their stride become major issues.
How do we deal? We don’t play. We move calmly on. We continue with our routines and normal practices. When a child is older, we might give them a look, we might even make a comment. If the child can handle it start the conversation with them about how they are feeling after seeing birth family.
Our single minded trudge through that post-access week (for some years now), is always important to the child, make no mistake. In a life that is probably marked by early change*, they need to learn that there is no change now as a result of seeing birth family. That there is no change with their new foster family. That’s a big step forward.
Posted by EssentialMum
* The kind of change we are referring to is where a child is moved, frequently, from short term carer to short term carer.
Welcome to fostercarer.com.au
07/01/2008 16:19 Filed in: general | EssentialMum
Welcome to fostercarer.com.au. For more information about us and why this site exists, please go to the About Us page. But we'll provide a short version here.....
We've been involved in foster care, as a family, for 40 years. Vastly different circumstances, different outcomes, and different experiences. But we've learned a great deal.
Agencies are called on to place children in a caring and safe environment where their family is unable to provide for them, and act as a conduit between government, the children and their families and foster carers. Agencies carry a lot of responsibility and are given a lot of authority. They can either be outstanding in their understanding and support, or add to the foster carer’s burden. We’ve experienced both ends of the scale. We believe that understanding carers’ experience and sharing that constructively with all parties - to enhance the quality of those interactions - can be of benefit to all concerned.
So how will this work? We want to share and so will do that through this site. There is opportunity for you to share as well, either through comments or feedback. We'd love to hear from you.
Posted by EssentialMum
We've been involved in foster care, as a family, for 40 years. Vastly different circumstances, different outcomes, and different experiences. But we've learned a great deal.
We believe there is a useful conversation to be had between carers and carers, and carers and agencies, independently of the children in your care. Over time those conversations may well extend to all aspects of being a foster carer. Many of those conversations happen in person. We think there is an opportunity in this networked world to carry out some of them online.
Agencies are called on to place children in a caring and safe environment where their family is unable to provide for them, and act as a conduit between government, the children and their families and foster carers. Agencies carry a lot of responsibility and are given a lot of authority. They can either be outstanding in their understanding and support, or add to the foster carer’s burden. We’ve experienced both ends of the scale. We believe that understanding carers’ experience and sharing that constructively with all parties - to enhance the quality of those interactions - can be of benefit to all concerned.
So how will this work? We want to share and so will do that through this site. There is opportunity for you to share as well, either through comments or feedback. We'd love to hear from you.
Posted by EssentialMum
Conversations
07/01/2008 16:16 Filed in: general | EssentialMum
What kind of conversations might we have?
Here are some questions that have come up along our journey. Questions we wanted answers to from other carers or some independent experts.
• What are the options for access and who can be there to support me?
• How flexible can I expect the system to be?
• Who determines the routine? Should my social worker set the rules or is it by mutual agreement?
• What do I do if I don’t agree with the way things are going? Do I have a right of recourse or reply?
• How do I handle childcare?
• How do I sort out financial support?
• What happens if I can’t attend the agency provided support meetings?
• What happens when the best interests of my foster child seem at odds with those of the birth family or vice versa?
• How do you juggle the needs of DoCS and your social worker, while holding down a full time job?
• I feel administration weary, is that normal?
• Of course my social worker needs to check how things are going, but what is a normal level of interaction and oversight?
• Can my broader family and support network help out where needed and who do I need to inform?
• My foster child is starting school, how do I help them communicate their unique family relationships?
• Who needs to know about our foster care arrangements - the school, the dentist, my neighbour?
• What are the arrangements for taking holidays?
• How do I find out about my foster child’s history? Is there medical or other important information that I need to know and how do I get access to that?
• What’s the best approach when my foster child asks questions about their past?
• What records of my foster child’s time with me do I need to keep?
• What are the legal rules and guidelines that I need to know about?
• What are the changes that have impacted the foster care area, such as the amendments to the Adoption Act? What do they mean for my foster child?
• Where do I go for more information?
We hope that as the site - and community – matures, carers will use it to ask questions and seek feedback from others. Grand plan hey?
Posted by EssentialMum
Here are some questions that have come up along our journey. Questions we wanted answers to from other carers or some independent experts.
• What are the options for access and who can be there to support me?
• How flexible can I expect the system to be?
• Who determines the routine? Should my social worker set the rules or is it by mutual agreement?
• What do I do if I don’t agree with the way things are going? Do I have a right of recourse or reply?
• How do I handle childcare?
• How do I sort out financial support?
• What happens if I can’t attend the agency provided support meetings?
• What happens when the best interests of my foster child seem at odds with those of the birth family or vice versa?
• How do you juggle the needs of DoCS and your social worker, while holding down a full time job?
• I feel administration weary, is that normal?
• Of course my social worker needs to check how things are going, but what is a normal level of interaction and oversight?
• Can my broader family and support network help out where needed and who do I need to inform?
• My foster child is starting school, how do I help them communicate their unique family relationships?
• Who needs to know about our foster care arrangements - the school, the dentist, my neighbour?
• What are the arrangements for taking holidays?
• How do I find out about my foster child’s history? Is there medical or other important information that I need to know and how do I get access to that?
• What’s the best approach when my foster child asks questions about their past?
• What records of my foster child’s time with me do I need to keep?
• What are the legal rules and guidelines that I need to know about?
• What are the changes that have impacted the foster care area, such as the amendments to the Adoption Act? What do they mean for my foster child?
• Where do I go for more information?
We hope that as the site - and community – matures, carers will use it to ask questions and seek feedback from others. Grand plan hey?
Posted by EssentialMum