Bristol Fostering

Fostering needs you. There is a crisis in fostering. There is no way to sugar coat it. More and more children are coming into care than ever before, including higher number of asylum seeking children, whilst the number of carers is steadily declining. According to the Fostering Network, in England there are around 43,500 fostering households, but about 7,000 more are needed to meet demand. Without fostering families children can end up in group homes, or for older teens – shared flat style accommodation – and even places like caravans have been used by some local authorities.   Children brought into care have already had a difficult start. They really deserve to have a new home to live in. I full realise not everyone interested in becoming a foster carer can do so, however if you have a spare room, please consider it. So what can you do to help? FOSTER There are lots of options –  including the below. Respite carer – this is where you ...

Hello! For those of you unfamiliar, I offer respite foster carer and cover emergencies. Respite is where you give either another foster carer or a child's family a break by having their child for usually 1-7 nights, quite often just one or two nights. Emergency placements are where Social Services phone you and ask you to take a child that night for at least one night. I've done this a few times and least notice I've had is 30mins and most 5hrs. A couple of these kids have stayed just one night; longest was five nights. I've decided to start twice a month keeping a diary of my fostering experiences as such a carer. Monday - no kids So I am 'on call' all of this week as I have no kids planned to stay with me. In the morning I send my social worker a long boring email catching up with lots of things. I've completed my fostering standards (a long work book where you show you understand what fostering is with lots of examples) so I send her a ...

To most people my garden looks like a wild mess. To some people it looks untended, unkempt and unloved. To a few people, those who pause taking the time to sit and listen, they see its full of bugs and birds and hidden flowers. To me, I see my garden as a work in progress. I don’t see the snapshot others see. I see where it came from. Yes it was wild before, but a different kind of wild. It was harsh. It was brambles, ivy, overgrown hedging and a fallen down tree. I see the flowers growing where before were knots of ivy tendrils and vegetables sewn where previously only thorns were found. I see a repaired greenhouse and a rediscovered path. I see a new seating area, ponds and a bird bath. I see the potential shape of the garden in years to come. I see the jobs that need doing over summer, into autumn and over winter so that it shines again next summer. Why does this matter at all? Well because I know that years of neglect take time to heal. A garden no...

Imagine you are a child who is not living with their biological parent for whatever reason. It may be that home life was unsafe, or you were neglected or your parents just didn’t have the capacity to look after you. Imagine then you get taken into care and end up sleeping in an unfamiliar house, room and bed. Not only that but about once a month you are then expected to stay at a different strangers house, with its own oddities. Again, not your house, room or bed. So is it reasonable to expect this child to sleep through the night in a strangers house. No. Not at first anyway. Whilst you are still a stranger, and your home foreign, then I think it would be more realistic to expect there to be some bedtime woes for a bit. Woes like not getting off to sleep easily, waking up repeatedly (and waking you as the carer up too), getting up early and perhaps bed wetting too. And not just four 4yos, and I mean for any child who comes into your home. Children will react diff...

When you’re a foster carer you know that kids wont stay with you forever, normally. There are cases where children enter long term care and fully integrate into your lives such that when they leave you care at 16, 18 or whenever it is, they’re still your kids. They still come over for Christmas and check in on you. However the vast majority of children who come into a foster carer’s life will leave at some point. Whether that’s to go into independent living, move onto a different carer or to go back to their birth family. Whatever the reason for them leaving you it is a difficult event for sure. If they’re going back home, regardless of how much the courts and social services say it is safe for them, you do worry what kind of life they’ll be returning to, and you wonder if they will bounce back into care in six months’ time, and if so what kind of effect this will have on the child. If they’re moving to a different carer it could be because that carer has another sibli...