Considering fostering

puddy

RacyRed wrote: »

I understand what you are saying, and in an ideal world would completely agree.

But.... there are children out there in need, there are many of us less than perfect adults who would love to help give a child a chance.

Personally, I'm fairly sure I have a pretty indepth understanding of myself, warts and all. I've been slowly learning about fostering, especially emergency fostering, wondering if I had what it takes, as I'd really love to do it. But there is no way on earth I could manage to submit myself to the sort of intensive examination you describe. I went through it once before for a different purpose, once in a lifetime is more than enough.

its not about being perfect, i certainly dont expect that, as as explained above, would be extremely suspicious of someone that tried to present that way. i about to present a case with LOTS of inperfections and thats what will (hopefully) make them excellent carers, they can really identify with the lives that these kids have.

but thats the point, its the ability to demonstrate to the assessor (who then demonstrates it within the assessment) that you understand yourself and the impact of your life on you now and therefore on your method of parenting. unfortunately we (as a service and carers sometimes) can do untold damage to the children who we remove from their homes if the right style of parenting is not put in place for that particular child. carers will often be working with entrenched difficulties, they need to build resilience, will be under scrutiny themselves, need to work with stressed and demotivated parents, so although perfection is not expected, an ability to really review and analyse the process of their parenting under very difficult conditions is vital.

perhaps you could have a chat with your local SSD or an independent agency to talk about your concerns about the level of involvement in the assessment to see if you would feel more comfortable. just because i have to be rigorous, it doesnt mean im horrible with it!!

RacyRed

puddy wrote: »

its not about being perfect, i certainly dont expect that, as as explained above, would be extremely suspicious of someone that tried to present that way. i about to present a case with LOTS of inperfections and thats what will (hopefully) make them excellent carers, they can really identify with the lives that these kids have.

but thats the point, its the ability to demonstrate to the assessor (who then demonstrates it within the assessment) that you understand yourself and the impact of your life on you now and therefore on your method of parenting. unfortunately we (as a service and carers sometimes) can do untold damage to the children who we remove from their homes if the right style of parenting is not put in place for that particular child. carers will often be working with entrenched difficulties, they need to build resilience, will be under scrutiny themselves, need to work with stressed and demotivated parents, so although perfection is not expected, an ability to really review and analyse the process of their parenting under very difficult conditions is vital.

perhaps you could have a chat with your local SSD or an independent agency to talk about your concerns about the level of involvement in the assessment to see if you would feel more comfortable. just because i have to be rigorous, it doesnt mean im horrible with it!!

Oh I'm so sorry, that isn't what I meant at all! I didn't imagine for a moment you are anything less than a kind and considerate person who is as tactfull and gentle as possible in finding the information you need.

It is the process that I think will be horrible, I would guess, from his posts, that ben1980 and his wife are subjecting themselves to some serious self examination, as am I, about what is motivating the interest in fostering.

The questions I have been asking myself for some time now are hard, and the answers even harder. Answering them with honesty has brought all my shortcomings to the forefront of my mind, leaving me asking myself who the hell I think I am to thnk I can offer children something of benefit. I suspect Mr and Mrs ben1980 might know what I mean by this, and they, like me, haven't even made official contact yet.

So the thought of taking that process even further, with someone not currently known and with whom I may or may not feel comfortable on this journey, is quite frankly, pretty daunting.

Do you not find that this is often the norm with prospective fosterers?

Alikay

RacyRed wrote: »

I've no problem at all with lots of care being taken to ensure the children will be safe, but I am not sure I understand the need to challenge self and life perceptions. That really does sound much too intrusive.

Just what does that, often emotionally painful, process gain that is of real benefit to a fostered child?

With a straightforward case, it's not relevant so of no real benefit to the child. But with a complicated placement involving court cases, highly hostile families, possible abuse or multi-agency issues your tenacity, commitment, emotional stability and support network are tested to the limit.

As a foster carer, I can't over-stress how challenging it can be. With children with special needs however it may be less so since everyone involved is more likely to want to work together for the child's benefit.

I'd have a chat with your Children and Young People's dept. fostering team for guidance

puddy

RacyRed wrote: »

Oh I'm so sorry, that isn't what I meant at all! I didn't imagine for a moment you are anything less than a kind and considerate person who is as tactfull and gentle as possible in finding the information you need.

It is the process that I think will be horrible, I would guess, from his posts, that ben1980 and his wife are subjecting themselves to some serious self examination, as am I, about what is motivating the interest in fostering.

The questions I have been asking myself for some time now are hard, and the answers even harder. Answering them with honesty has brought all my shortcomings to the forefront of my mind, leaving me asking myself who the hell I think I am to thnk I can offer children something of benefit. I suspect Mr and Mrs ben1980 might know what I mean by this, and they, like me, haven't even made official contact yet.

So the thought of taking that process even further, with someone not currently known and with whom I may or may not feel comfortable on this journey, is quite frankly, pretty daunting.

Do you not find that this is often the norm with prospective fosterers?

Yes, alll applicants are wary of that, its normal, in fact recently I did work with a couple, who were so blase about this aspect that there was a disconnect and it was hard to get a sense of them. It was hard to gather evidence. Along with other reasons, that assessment had to end.

What happens when you get in touch with SSD, is that they will do an 'initial visit', if they recommend the next stage then you go onto the skills to foster course (prep group), if they then feel that you can continue, you then go onto either another visit (dependent on authority) or straight to the assessment. So you're building up gently and learning as you go, so you're not plonked straight in front of the nosey worker, there is a build up and lots of opportunity to voice fears which usually lowers anxiety.

Alikay is quite right, for complex cases this work is vital. The problem is that due to the thresholds in work nowadays, most placements (not all) are complex, especially if you work for an independent agency because they are often the hard to place children that end up being placed with agencies. The problem is that there isnt any such thing as only having non complex cases in placement because many children come into the care system with unassessed need because we simply dont know enough about them at the time of removal. So you may think you have a sweet compliant child who is a bit lacking in confidence, and then suddenly find out he's a fire setter or has sexualised behaviour or whatever

RacyRed

I understand better now, thank you all, especially puddy.

Am also feeling very guilty about butting in so much on Ben's thread. I hope you forgive me Ben and are learning as much as I am about the process.

I really hope you and your wife pursue this Ben.

lostinrates

Ben,

I have asked questions on here about fostering, the advice I received was useful.

what I would add is that the agencies I spoke to would rather work with people who have been parents or had a lot of direct contact with children e.g. teaching assistant, teacher, volunteer with youth group. The most positive agency suggested I volunteer with the Girl Guides for a year(which I'm sorry to say didn't appeal to me, and other suggestions I made..e.g.being a volunteer in a local school/reading etc were not considered suitable as too formal.) It seems right to me though that the contact with children is important. Its worth pointing out I used to au pair/nanny as a student, have two nieces who lived with me ten years ago and was a volunteer for RDA for about five years upuntil 8 years ago so they really do mean a LOT of extra experience as that wasn't enough! That DH and I are both graduates was not a bonus, in fact we were told in no uncertain terms we were''too middle class'' by one agency on an initial enquiry call. The lack of enough direct parenting/authority figure experience was more of an issue in these initial conversations than the ill health I suffer, so think your wife's surmountable physical issues shouldn't be an issue.

Good luck!

edit: noteworthy might be that I have only spoken to agencies, not SS directly. One agency did suggest I might be better contacting SS dept because of the lack f parenting experience. I thought an agency would specifically be better in my situation because of the support offered. If we think about it again I think I would try not through an agency for an initial conversation,to see how that might ''feel''.

jcr16

good luck with it all. fostering i think is amazing. ahts off to you.

my hubby would like to foster when were older. maybe late 40's. i'm sure thos in 20 odd years time it will all be changed.

travelgran

People interested in fostering might like to look an article in the Guardian newspaper last Saturday. It's headed 'A Year in the Life of a Foster Parent' and can be found on the Guardian website. Do a search for foster parents and it's about the 5th article on the list. I take my hat off to all foster carers out there.

If you find you can't go forward with fostering would your experience be useful in a mentoring role?

RacyRed

travelgran wrote: »

People interested in fostering might like to look an article in the Guardian newspaper last Saturday. It's headed 'A Year in the Life of a Foster Parent' and can be found on the Guardian website. Do a search for foster parents and it's about the 5th article on the list. I take my hat off to all foster carers out there.

If you find you can't go forward with fostering would your experience be useful in a mentoring role?

HERE is a direct link to the article.

LJM

ben1980 wrote: »

I notice there have been a few threads on here about fostering so I hope it's not inappropriate for me to ask a few questions.

My wife and I are thinking about applying to be foster carers. We are in a slightly unusual situation and I'm not sure how our application would be regarded.

I used to work with hearing impaired adults (and occasionally children) in the NHS. I lloved working with patients and especially enjoyed seeing them develop over time. I left to do a degree in nursing and planned to work in the community, thinking that it would offer similar experiences but with more prospects. Two years into my degree, I came to the conclusion that although I loved certain aspects of nursing, I really didn't like working in the wards and community nursing posts were scarce as hen's teeth. It was not at all what I had hoped to do and I was really unhappy. I decided to take the credits I had gained and complete my degree at the Open University in Health Science. This is what I'm doing at the moment. I was thinking of doing post-grad study in Learning Disabilities or similar.

My wife has completed a Foundation Degree in Health and Social Care and is doing a top-up year to make it into a BSc Hons. She has never had a proper full-time job as she is disabled. She is severely sight impaired and has joint problems, although she is fiercely independant and copes very well. She also had some mental health problems when she was younger (largely due to horrendous bullying at school) although she's been fully recovered from that for years. She has lots of experience as a volunteer with a youth project and as a telephone advisor with a helpline.

My wife would love to work in a caring role but it's hard to find any role that she could apply for that could easily be adapted to her special needs.

We were discussing this problem and the idea of fostering came up. I feel that we would have lots to offer in terms of our life/work experiences. It would mean that we could work together to support each other, I would be able to help with things that she can't manage whilst allowing her to use her skills and talents in an environment that was already adapted to her needs. Also, I think we might be particularly suited to caring for kids with sensory impairments as we both have relevant experience.

And yet, I wonder what an agency would make of a disabled, blind applicant with no work history and her university drop-out husband ??!!

Does anyone have any advice for us ?

go for it is all i can say if you can help even one child have a loving caring home for the time they need it then hats off to you good luck xx