Reflections on Foster Care

I was lucky enough to attend a one day seminar on therapeutic foster care recently, presented by Kate Cairns, a long time foster carer and social worker from the UK. What an engaging speaker she was.

Much of what she had to say focused on the effects that an unsatisfactory or disrupted attachment has on a baby’s development. None of this is new to me (I’m an avid attendee at seminars and conferences, and love to read parenting and fostering “text” books) but she had a very personal way of describing the process which really brought home to me how an attuned baby engages with his caregiver.

This engagement lays down patterns in the brain to ensure that they develop all those important life skills like how to form a trusting relationship with another person, how to self-regulate and to curb impulses and control rage, how to recognise and acknowledge their feelings and those of others.

Any foster carer can look at a child and see the behaviours that indicate “this child’s brain did not form the necessary templates in that first year or so of life”. The child very obviously demonstrates the consequences of this deficit: is unable to trust others or rely on them for help and comfort, needs to control everything and everyone around them, hasn’t learnt to check their impulses or control their rage, and shows no awareness of their own feelings and certainly is unable to show empathy for others.

I look at my own daughter Portia, who has been with us for all but the first year or so of her thirteen years of life and recognise that these behaviors still form a noticeable part of her personality. Her need to control members of her family, particularly her little brother and her dad, drive them both to distraction. She tells them what they should be doing, or how they should be doing it, with utter confidence in her own infallibility.

Luckily, she’s doesn’t get into a rage very often (although plenty of those hissy-fits that teenage girls seem particularly prone to) but she still has a great deal of difficulty curbing her impulses. Despite the guidance she’s had at home and school with the mantra “stop, think, do” we’ve yet to see that being consistently used although she’s not in trouble for scrapes, damage and breakages as much as a few years ago.

But I’m happy to say that Portia is learning how to recognise how others are feeling and to change her behaviour accordingly. At nine or ten she often had social problems at school and most of it stemmed from her own tactless comments and actions. It seemed at that stage that the only way to boost her shaky self-esteem was to put down everyone else and build up her own accomplishments with lots of bragging and showing off. I’d say she’s come a long way since then.

Certainly I now see a quieter and more genuine awareness of her own strengths. She doesn’t need to brag or compete as much as she used to, and when she makes a derogatory comment about someone she’ll catch herself and try to explain why it is she feels that way, which opens up the opportunity for a bit of a learning discussion on why people behave as they do.

When she came to us as a quiet, timid, undemanding, slow-developing one year old, I didn’t know about the effects of neglect and trauma as described by Daniel Hughes and Bruce Perry. I knew nothing about therapeutic fostering and reparenting, but I knew from parenting my own babies that this little girl and I needed to bond. So I did what came naturally, treating her as if she was a much younger baby, which wasn’t at all hard because she was a tiny little thing and nowhere near walking yet.

I wrapped her in a cosy bunny rug and snuggled her into my body as I rocked and sang to her (even though she seemed to never need soothing or to be settled to sleep). I carried her around in a baby pouch on my chest despite her legs dangling down past my waist and making it very difficult to go upstairs or climb up hills and rocks when bushwalking.

Eventually I transferred her to a hip sling which didn’t keep her quite so close but was a great deal more convenient. When giving her milk I always held the bottle and snuggled her on my lap. I would not let her hold the bottle, which she was used to. She needed to rely on me for that warm soothing milk, and trust me to provide it.

I managed to keep that routine going till she was over two, despite her little foster brother arriving in the meantime who also needed constant feeding and soothing. I played baby games with her at a time when most kids have moved on to more sophisticated pastimes. Lots of patty-cake and peek-a-boo games, riding horse on my crossed legs whilst facing me as I sang to her, silly rhymes that babies love, with tickling and blurting on bellies and pressing of noses. All attempts to regain what she’d missed in her first year of life: attunement with a caregiver.

Unfortunately for Portia and I this process of attachment was often interrupted over the next two years, mostly by failed attempts at reunification with her birth mum. This would sometime take Portia away from our family for days, weeks, and at one point three months. Also, as I mentioned before, baby Seth joined our family when Portia was not yet two and his withdrawal from alcohol in those early months of his life took a lot of my time and energy.  I guess that Portia, while getting plenty of care and attention, may not have been getting the intensive mothering that her early neglect demanded.

But of course attachment is an ongoing process. Over the years I made extra effort to pull her in closer to me. It wasn’t always easy as through her toddler and preschool years that the quiet, mousy little baby was replaced by a willful, controlling, angry child. I always felt she was distant and detached from me. Even her younger foster brother Seth, who was with us from five weeks of age, developed a very normal secure attachment to me.

It’s sad but true that the more horrible your child’s behaviour, the more you want to distance yourself from them, and the more frustrated and discouraged you feel. Unfortunately this is exactly when you need to be spending more intensive time with the child to bring them in closer again.

Over the years I noticed a cycle. Portia’s problem behaviours would escalate and I would be forever scolding her, feeling cross and annoyed with her and would crave distance, retreating from the intensity of the frustration and stress. Then I’d recognise where I was in the cycle and realise it was time for some very significant bonding.

A child psychologist who saw Portia when she was five for just a few visits, helped me to realise how, when I was overwhelmed by her behaviours, I would pull back emotionally from her and she gave me a few ideas on how to regain some closeness. She encouraged me to simply spend more time with Portia, doing stuff she enjoyed showing her she was worthy of my attention. Playing simple board games, colouring and making things together, singing and dancing to a music CD, cooking yummy sweet things to eat together, standing outside watching her ride her bike up and down the footpath, sharing stories and making up our own.

It amazed me how much time I could find to spend with her once I’d changed my attitude. I concentrated on softening my tone with her, making sure I met her advances with a smile instead of a frown, decreasing my scolding and nagging and replacing them with encouragement and joy in her accomplishments. It felt so good to begin liking her again, and that was made easier by the fact that her horrible behaviour quite noticeably decreased and she did become more likable by everyone else in the family too. Extra bonus - they weren’t always yelling at her and sending her away from them anymore either. Everyone was happier.

This relationship and behaviour cycle continued over the years. Even now I sometimes feel myself slipping and I have to remind myself to seek out Portia’s company and conversation a bit more - a bit more difficult now she’s a teen who naturally tends to spend more time alone in her room with her homework or reading or just listening to loud music. But it’s still worthwhile working on strengthening that still shaky attachment and the rewards are gleaned by seeing a corresponding shift in her behaviour and attitude.

Nowadays the activities are a little different. Watching her play basketball or skate or dive with lots of encouraging words and gestures, inviting her to help me with cooking, or asking her to make her famous choc fudge cake for afternoon tea. It’s sharing funny things on TV or YouTube or reading an article out loud from a newspaper that I know she’ll be interested in (or listening to something she wants to read out, even though it’s not really that interesting to me) or telling her something funny that I think she’ll appreciate. Sometimes it’s just showing her that I am keeping her in mind, that she is important to me.

I sometimes wonder when Portia’s behaviour reverts a little to that impulsive, oppositional, tantrum throwing four year old that she was, could it have been different? Maybe if we’d managed to do more, known better or tried a little harder, focused just on her and not continued fostering (but then we wouldn’t have our sweet son Seth). Or should we just look at the long way she’s come and promise ourselves to never let up or give in, but keep working hard to make sure this kid stays connected to family and community, feels strong and worthy, has focus in her life (thank goodness for all those sports she loves) and do our best to get her through the teenage years unscathed, to successful adulthood.

Well, that’s certainly an outcome worth a bit of hard work!

With my oldest son’s birthday recently, and oldest daughter’s just a few days later, I tried to organise a time we could all get together to celebrate and share a cake. With three grown up children all leading busy social lives it wasn’t that easy, but we settled on Sunday brunch, giving everyone the opportunity to spend the afternoon as they pleased.

Portia wanted to make her famous all-time favourite gooey chocolate cake, but I suggested she bake a cinnamon tea cake instead, more suitable to finish off a morning meal. She’s really becoming great at this cake-baking! The rest was easy - hubby cooked sausages, bacon, onions and mushrooms on the barbecue, whilst I did grilled tomatoes and poached eggs in the kitchen, and grabbed an apprentice to make lots of toast. While all that was under way we ate warm ham and cheese croissants with orange juice for an appetiser. Breakfast was enjoyed by all, and there was plenty of time afterwards to just hang out together.

When we manage to have all the kids (and partners) together for a meal like this, it really reminds me how great it is being a mum to kids of all ages. Sometimes I get pretty bogged down in Portia’s and Seth’s needs and issues and the constancy of caring for a baby, so it’s a nice change to have all the big kids around the kitchen table, chatting about their jobs and studies, homes, pets, hobbies and holidays, comparing movies and books, and catching up on family gossip. I look at these adult children of ours and see how happy they are in their lives, how close they are to each other, how much we all enjoy each other’s company, and I feel amazingly fortunate.

I recall that is why I started fostering in the first place, sixteen years ago - to share my family’s good fortune.

My older kids have taken on different roles with the young foster kids who have been in our family. Portia and Seth are lucky to have three older siblings (and now their partners too) as mentors and positive role models. I watch now as the two of them come and go, not prepared to sit all morning chatting like the adults of the family, but pausing on their way through the kitchen to tell a big brother or sister the latest news of school or basketball, scrapes or friendships. Little Angel crawls about at everyone’s feet, but every few moments someone picks him up for a bit of a play, or to share a tidbit with him. Seth grabs him to chuck him in the air and makes him chortle gleefully.

I’ve been a mum now for twenty-seven years and fostering for more than half that time. There are no happier times for me than having all the family around. I am a lucky woman.

Portia was suspended from school for the day.

Not a “stay at home” suspension, but a “stay in the office and work alone” suspension. As the teacher explained to me on the phone, even though her behaviour was not acceptable and had to be followed up with consequences, her intentions had been honourable.

“So why did you punch that boy?” I asked her later that evening when we were discussing the issue. Well, apparently that boy had been teasing one of her friends all day, and Portia had warned him that if he continued, she’d punch him. He did, so she did! This daughter of mine has principles.

We had the usual discussion (all parents of impulsive kids know the one I mean) reiterating the “violence solves nothing” and “how do we resolve conflict in our family?” but Portia showed no noticeable remorse. “Like, he wasn’t even hurt”, she said.

At thirteen Portia weighs in under 40 kgs and isn’t quite 150 cms tall, and I’m not sure she’d know how to throw a punch so she’s probably right. I think she felt like a champion of the underdog and an in-school detention was well worth the glory.

The image left in my mind after our discussion - of Portia all fired up with flashing eyes and gritted teeth, aiming a punch at the side of this kid’s head - left me a little dismayed but all things considered I’m not sure I should be too worried.

In over eight years of schooling, Portia has never been suspended before. I must say, in all their school years, none of my three older children were either, but then life was pretty secure and easy for them. Portia, on the other hand had a rocky start to life.

She spent the first twelve months of babyhood with her intellectually disabled birth mum who dressed her baby girl in pretty pink dresses, kept her clean, warm and safe by leaving her in her cot all day, but had no idea of the essential interactions between mother and baby to create a warm and secure attachment.

When Portia came into our care a few days after her first birthday she was a placid, quiet little baby who would just sit on the floor in a pile of toys never saying boo, or lay quietly in her cot, not bothering to sit up till someone lifted her out.

The next two years were unpredictable and disruptive for Portia. She was in and out of care for many months as her birth mum was given numerous opportunities to learn to look after her baby. Portia went to and fro between her mum’s home and ours, never seeming to care who she was with or who was taking her.

She appeared to have no attachment to her own mum, and little chance to attach to me as she was tossed back and forth in the attempt to give her birth mum every chance at reunification. Access was four times a week when she was actually living with us. Other times she spent the week with her mum, but in childcare every week day and weekends in our home.

Her birth mum was invited to spend the days at the childcare centre, learning how to interact with Portia, but usually just visited for an hour or so, sitting on a chair to watch her little girl play. She loved her daughter dearly but seemed incapable of effective parenting.

It didn’t stop the courts trying, however.

The two of them also had a number of stays in assorted family units in an attempt to teach mum to parent. We always stayed available for Portia to come back to us - she’d had a number of respite or emergency placements in her first year of life. We wanted her to have as much stability as was possible, even with all the to-ing and fro-ing. At age two and a half, one final gigantic effort was made. Despite mine and the foster agency’s protests, Portia left our home for three months to live in a family unit where it was hoped her mum could finally learn to parent her adequately enough to have her back home.

It didn’t work. At the end of three months Portia returned to our home, and never left again ( although it was almost another three years before guardianship was bestowed on us). She returned to us angry, defiant, insecure, frustrated and with the ability to throw our family into chaos.

She screamed at the big kids, got into their stuff and lost or broke things, interfered with their games and annoyed their friends. Her frequent meltdowns spoiled family outings and made her older siblings cringe with embarrassment. She tyrannised one year old Seth, pushing and hitting him when she thought they were alone, then patting him in a sisterly fashion when I arrived, explaining sympathetically how he’d fallen over (eventually he learnt to talk and put an end to that clever little act).

Despite all this, when the time came to call a family meeting to discuss the possibility of four year old Portia remaining permanently with us, it was unanimously agreed that, even though she was a little demon, her place was in our home and in our family. Even eleven year old Emily, who seemed to be the one who was most intolerant of Portia’s antics, didn’t hesitate to answer “Of course we should” when we asked the question.

The following years were never easy. Building up an attachment with this prickly child was an all consuming effort. It didn’t come naturally, and we sought professional help on a few occasions in an effort to ease the burden just a little.

At one stage she was diagnosed with ODD and attachment difficulties, and then a little later with ADHD and possible Tourette’s. We educated ourselves, managed behaviours as they arose, advocated for her at school, tried to think of creative ways to discipline her: to stop her stealing money, to stop her lying, to stop her provoking her little brother, to get her to do her homework. We encouraged her sports, her music, her friendships; gave her opportunities to feel good about herself. Sometimes we despaired, we often felt weary… but we always felt joy in her amazing energy and enthusiasm for everything she did.

After years of liaising with the schools on how to manage Portia’s behaviour (appropriate consequences and achievable reward systems usually worked) and receiving numerous phone calls that often began “We had a bit of trouble with Portia today….” I was actually a little surprised to get that call from school this week. It has been many months since we’ve had any complaints and what I’ve been hearing from the teachers has been really positive. In fact I’ve really been pleased with Portia’s progress over the past six months, even during the long summer holidays. After years of struggle and occasional despair, I feel as if maybe we’ve reached still waters and I’m enjoying the present calm.

Portia’s suspension has come and gone. She told me she actually enjoyed the day, and got up to date with her homework and started on her science project. So many kids I know are continually suspended from school (mostly kids like mine who were or still are in foster care).

Should I be worried that this might just be the first of many for Portia as she enters stormy adolescence? I don’t feel anxious. In fact, if anything, it’s made me reflect on the great improvements we’ve seen this past year that friends and family have commented on too.

Portia seems more thoughtful and considered in her actions, less impulsive than she used to be, and more appropriate too. She’s more helpful and reliable and even a bit more organised (she’ll always have a messy room, I guess) and occasionally I feel like we’re having a real conversation - that she’s not just talking over the top of me.

And what’s nice is that she’s recognising these changes in herself, and appears to enjoy the calmer, more mature girl that she’s becoming. Of course she’s still the active, sporty, tomboyish kid she’s always been, still refusing to wear a dress (even to her sister’s engagement party), always sticking her nose in everyone else’s business, and always knows best (she is a teenager after all) but who of us is perfect?

If she just keeps her fists to herself, I reckon I’d be pretty happy.

Seven year old Jaimee spent the weekend with us, as she does each month. I first met this little girl when she was an active and demanding toddler having occasional foster care with a friend of mine. When, due to personal circumstances, Jaimee required full-time care, my friend offered to provide that even though she already had a pretty full house. She had developed a supportive relationship with Jaimee’s single mum and really wanted to help this little family stay together.

Unfortunately, Jaimee’s aggressive behaviour caused great difficulties with the placement, especially as there was a younger child in the family who was constantly being bullied by this tiny, angry two year old. A decision was made to move her but, as so often happens, a suitable family in the area wasn’t readily available. Our family happened to be between placements - we had only taken babies in the previous few years. This seemed to suit the new dynamics of our family as Portia and Seth settled into being in their ‘forever’ family. As they were now aged nine and seven, I thought a nearly three year old could suit us. But I was wrong.

Over the next six months our family lived with almost constant chaos. Little Jaimee had significant emotional problems. Her rigidity and defiance, her frequent melt downs with shrill screaming , hitting and kicking meant she was constantly the centre of my attention and energy. Portia responded to the situation by regressing to her own “toddler” behaviour, and little Seth, who needed his environment to be calm and predictable, responded with tears and anger at all these people disturbing his peace. The six weeks of the summer school holidays were particularly difficult to manage, despite seeing some progress in Jaimee’s behaviour, as I tried to parent her with strategies gleaned from my training in therapeutic foster care. Our worker, although very supportive, agreed with our family that it might be better that three year old Jaimee be placed with a new family. In time (we didn’t hurry the process) a new but keen foster family with no other children at home accepted little Jaimee, and four years later she is doing really well in her long-term foster home.

We felt quite guilty at having to disrupt a placement, as foster carers often do. However, seeing Jaimee gradually adjust to her new home and build up an attachment with her new Mum eased my conscious somewhat. The relief felt by all the family when Jaimee left and the work I could put in with Portia and Seth to “mend the bridges” reinforced the rightness of disrupting this placement. But I felt an ongoing commitment to little Jaimee, and we have continued to have her back with us for regular respite (even though we don’t usually do respite foster care).

The advantages are felt by everyone. This little girl has a second family with whom she feels comfortable. A weekend is manageable. With a lot of hard work, and knowing we only have to sustain our efforts for 48 hours, the family stays relatively calm. This has become significantly easier as Jaimee has responded to a stable long term family and supportive therapeutic care from a number of professionals (she was put into an intense fostering program a few years ago) and her behaviours have become so much easier to manage. We have gained a lot of satisfaction from seeing this little girl grow and settle, and from being important in her life. We provide a stimulating family environment with slightly older and younger children to interact with, contrasting to her own home, where she is the only child. I am proud of Portia and Seth who, despite sometimes groaning when I announce it is our turn to have Jaimee, go out of their way to play with her and accommodate her in their busy weekends. And I know Jaimee’s foster parents appreciate the time they have ‘child-free’ knowing their little girl is happy and secure in one of her other families (my friend who first had Jaimee in her care, also offers regular respite). In fact, I would go so far as to state that regular respite is essential for the continuing success of Jaimee’s long term placement.

Most importantly, for Jaimee, it means that the three separate placements in foster care that she has had are still all connected, as with an extended family. Her life story book has no photos of strangers, of placements forgotten. Even if she doesn’t really remember living in our home for that six months during which she turned three , she feels like she does, because the photos of that time are filled with familiar people, pets and places - all of whom she still sees regularly. If for no other reason we will continue to have Jaimee for regular respite, so she retains that sense of continuity, and so that as she grows to adulthood, she still has someone of whom she can ask “… what was I like when I was just two years old?” and we will happily tell her.

My husband introduced me to blogs quite a few months ago. My first reaction was “I don’t have time to read about other people’s lives…I’m too busy and immersed in my own!” But I couldn’t help myself, and once I’d found a few foster carer’s blogs, especially those whose children’s special needs matched so well with my own kid’s, I was hooked. So, I became a lurker…. reading archives, choosing who to subscribe to, chasing links across the web, formulating comments in my head but never actually submitting them. But it’s time. I am no longer satisfied being the wallflower - I want to join in. Maybe I can share with you the Australian perspective on fostering and its related issues.

My family has been fostering sixteen years. Around fifty children have been part of our family for varying lengths of time, mostly babies to preschoolers. Two have permanently joined our family. “Portia” is now thirteen and came into our care at twelve months. She was nearly six when we got the Permanent Care order which gave us guardianship. In Australia we don’t have the system whereby the legal termination of parent’s rights leaves the child available for adoption, so a P.C order is the next best thing, in the state of Victoria, anyway. “Seth”, now eleven, joined our family at six weeks, and his Permanent Care order went through when he was three. As we already had three biological children, we’ve been a pretty busy household ever since, especially as we usually have one or two foster children in our care as well . Our current little angel is nine months old, and has been with us six months - he doesn’t look like going home any time soon.

Our oldest two children have moved out of home with their partners, so we just have one adult child still living at home. Luckily the others both live just a twenty minute drive away, so we see them fairly often. Our oldest son Ben also works in the family business with his Dad, so they get to ‘hang out’ every day - they’re both well and truly into I.T. so you can imagine the computer talk that goes on there. Our oldest daughter Jessi is a social worker and recently started working at my own Foster Care agency. We talk or email or see each other often - and our themes usually revolve around foster kids and the myriad of issues that go with them. She’s a great support to me. Our second daughter, Emily is studying Photography at Uni, just about to start her third and final year. She’s become the family photographer, so I’ll post her pics occasionally (not the foster kids though, which is a shame, because they’re just so cute!)

If I had time to spare, my interests would be crafts (and I do manage a bit of simple knitting or sewing occasionally, but not the embroidery and smocking I used to indulge in) reading (belonging to a book group does mean I read at least one book a month) and scrapbooking (still working on my daughter’s 21st album, and she’ll be 24 soon!). But the home and kids and a range of fostercare committees and meetings keep me busy, and I love to share times with my husband and friends, watch the occasional movie, and spend some time each day on my computer…. so all the rest just fits around that. And now I’m going to try and include a regular blogging…. I guess I’ll see how I go.