Fostering

Mate cant comprehend your stress levels!

Hang in there.

You're doing a great job. One day he'll realise it.

I’m in awe of what you do.

Your post worries me.

Take care of yourself.

The thing is, I’m not sure he realises this. The mother of all meltdowns tonight, five minutes later you’d have no idea he had been slightly upset.

How do we help a person that doesn’t understand that they need help?

We're a long way into our adoption and our youngest still finds the world around him such a tough, tough, scary place. Even when you do all you can to almost take on and absorb their emotions it still never feels to be enough.

Big support coming from me, fostering is such an amazing thing and it sounds like you've got a kid who has come from a place where they really needs it. Best wishes.

It’s been 16 months, we don’t want to give up, but a point comes where we surely have to hold our hands up and admit defeat. But then what next for the poor child?

You are being heroic.
Can your foster support help to get some immediate support for the boy?
This is not on you.

The council/agency/other body must - surely - have a responsibility to support you and the child.

Oh man. Sorry to hear this. I have no experience parenting, but can certainly empathise with going through an unending torrent of crap.

One day at a time....

We are trying to sort the support - he has no one at all , he came to us with a bin bag of clothes and a hamster. The hamster has died so now he thinks he’s got nothing left - begging us to ‘take him away’ which means let him die. So ****ing heartbreaking.

Sorry, I know I’m venting, I know there are no answers, just sharing the emotions. Tonight I’ve had too much beer, my wife has had even more way too much chocolate 😹

The meltdowns followed very quickly by seeming like nothing has happened feels very familiar to me. It is something I find very hard to cope with personally as the feelings that build up inside me when my little lad has got completely disregulated take much longer to subside. Especially when he has a series of meltdowns which continually knock me down. It's like you are left holding all that negative emotion with nowhere to put it other than take it on yourself along with a big side helping of guilt that you can't just wrap them up and hug it all away.

I've very much gone for the chocolate this evening! I hope things feel brighter for you in the morning.

Yep meltdowns to nothings happened have been a regular feature of parenting here too.

Incredibly tough to handle your own response to it. Hopefully you'll ride this out fairly quickly.

Van you get an crisis response team from CAMHS?

I ended up in A&E to get this to kick in. Might be worth considering. Same night I bought a drum machine, that wasn't great advice by the doctor, in fact it was bloody weird!

You're doing an amazing job btw.

The problem we have is that he doesn’t think there is a problem - CAMHS is at the bottom of the list of support he’d engage with (he won’t engage with anything).

And, TBF, a drum machine sounds the most sensible solution right now (having a daughter with some sensory issues that a drum kit worked for). I wish we hadn’t sold it when she came out the other side of her emotions.

Vent away. You are doing emotional and physical work above and beyond what many of us are capable of and you might not get many thanks but it's phenomenal. 16 months?How old is the boy? You don't need to answer that but get another hamster. 

He’s about to turn 13, he won’t want another hamster - he got that with his mum (who died) so there couldn’t be a substitute.

That makes sense. How about respite for yourselves? 13 is a tough age regardless. Hang in there buddy. I know there's all kinds of safeguards in place but if you/he are up for a bike ride just indicate whereabouts in the country you are and I'm sure something can be sorted. 

We do have a respite night tomorrow- if he goes -fingers crossed.

Right, bed. Sorry.

Right, bed. Sorry

Of the shit people post on here, no apologies are needed for this.

I couldn't do what you're doing, most of us couldn't. His life is better for it.

dangerousbrain x10000000000

That's a series of extreme boundary testing sessions. Everything so far has abandoned the poor lad and he wants to make sure that it's not going to happen again, or wants to get it out of the way quickly. Combined with raging hormones of the teenage years and it's all a bit Eastenders on Speed!

Good luck with getting some calm back in his life and pay for a therapist for the lad if you can afford it. Our youth mental health support is a disgrace nationally. Locally (East Suffolk) it's beyond disgraceful and would earn me an enforced rest from here if I were allowed to use all of my swearing!

I have a friend who has 2 kids of his own who are both affected by autism, his eldest has actually made several suicide attempts, his youngest is mostly nonverbal apart from the word 'sausages'..

I can be of no other help, but next time things are hard, just randomly inject the word sausages into your thoughts.

The council/agency/other body must – surely – have a responsibility to support you and the child.

They have a responsibility. They also have 50% less central government funding than pre-austerity. Situations like this are the harsh reality of those policies.

You are doing an amazing job, and deserve any and all support you can get, even if it just a bunch of internet strangers you can vent to.

Some of this may be "regular" teenage issues, but turned up to 11 due to his background*. And some of this will be boundary testing, in his own way testing how you react and how much he can rely on you to stick by him, which is both extreme and potentially counter productive.

*friends have two sons who gave them a wild ride in the teenage years

I hope, for the sake of all in the household, things do start to improve for you.  Venting is good, do it, if this feels like a safe space for you to do so then use it as much as you want. 

I've read most of the recent posts on the journey you're on as a family and we can all see the struggles you have, but also the passion you have for supporting him. Don't lose sight of that. 

I can relate to your situation but on a minor scale. Son is 12 and is undiagnosed ADHD, possible autism too. Meltdowns in school are daily and uncontrollable, recently he's been in for 75 minutes if he's even bothered to go at all. I have no real support for him as I don't trust him to behave for others and his mother isn't interested because he's too much hard work for her. Picked him up from school after him kicking doors and walls, threatening to hit staff etc and by the time we got home it was like nothing happened. It's an environmental thing for him, once he's in meltdown he needs to be removed from the area to calm down. Whilst he's on the way to meltdown he recognises this but school don't, so he goes full meltdown and then they can't get him back. I'm pretty much the only person who can. It's hard, he's said bad things during meltdown, but never a hint of it otherwise. It's heartbreaking, stressful, a constant worry and now affecting my health too after a prolonged period of this. But I can't lose sight of the fact that he's just a kid, struggling with his emotional regulation with major changes in his life in the last year (mother kicked him out at 11 to live with me, change from small primary to big secondary, hormones kicking in). I know this will continue but he doesn't accept that he needs help. Knowing what to do best is hard when you've tried so many things and nothing seems to make any difference. 

You aren't alone, feel free to message if you want to talk/vent if it will help you. 

@johndoh pretty sure the drum machine is sat in the loft. If I can find it you're welcome to it.

Sounds like a tough time, but you guys are doing an awesome job from your previous posts.

Is there an Independent Review Officer (IRO) you can contact to try see what other support can be implemented? Put some pressure on somewhere for support. 

The system is shit - we have 3yr old, placed with us 18mths ago  for adoption and we are finally about to get support for his additional needs. They wonder why people won't adopt/ foster when support is so lacking 🤷‍♂️ the system is well and truly broken.

I think everyone here will agree, come on and vent as often as you need, you and your family are doing an amazing and challenging thing and nobody would begrudge you needing to vent or look for support. 

Vent away OP, what you do is quite remarkable.

I have some very wealthy friends who could choose to chuck some cash at charity, but they foster (and adopt).

I'm genuinely in awe of folks like you and them who give their time, energy and sanity to improve the lot of kids who have had a grim start in life.

Sorry, I know I’m venting, I know there are no answers, just sharing the emotions

Please don't apologise. You're doing something amazing, and I hope this place is somewhere for you to get things off your chest.

Johndoh I hope your respite goes ahead and you enjoy a much needed break. 

From personal experience regular respite can be a big help getting through tough times. 

Keefezza sounds like you could also do with some additional support. Does the school have a SENCO that would support you with starting the process of a possible  ADHD or ASD diagnosis?

Foster carers are such unsung heroes, I can't imagine how hard it must be trying to look after a child who had a bad start in life. Particularly older children.
Mrs CD is a fostering social worker on the foster caring side. The stories she tells are heart breaking and the lack of money and therefore support makes us so angry. Children put a risk through now support. Foster carers and their families put at risk of physical harm by children or the children's birth family. Should it all go wrong in will be the foster carers and on the ground social workers that carry the can. Not the head of service or the government.

Sorry, that was a little rant and not helpful to you. I just think it's important that people know that most fostering social workers on the ground are doing above ond beyond also with no support. Thank you for everything you do and I hope you get the respite you deserve.

ADHD diagnosis is underway for my boy but it's not quick, trying to get an appointment for beginning asd diagnosis is proving hard work but it will be happening. I've asked for help from anybody and everybody so I hope at some point there will be something in place. 

👍keefezza hope you and your boy get the support you both deserve. 

I know the whole referal process and support provisions are an absolute nightmare, especially in terms of waiting times and refusal of support due to budget constraints. 

There also seems significant variations dependent on where you are in the UK. 

So - fresh head this morning (well, slightly hungover but a gym session has blown that away).

Thank you for all the replies and support - I know I am only venting and nobody can have a 'silver bullet' of an answer, but I just wish the boy could step back from himself and realise what he is doing. Had he started to settle and behave with a level of normality, we'd consider keeping him as a long-term placement and support him into adulthood. My wife is doing an astounding job of dealing with him and he *has* come on massively (as I am sure I have said before, he was non-verbal when he came to us but now he does communicate and, on a good day, actually engage with us.

But then he has these meltdowns, sometimes over nothing or other times just being unreasonable. Last night's outburst was over a change of name – he was born a girl but lives as a boy. He wanted to change his name by deed poll but social services refused - we fought hard to make them do it as we felt it would be a step towards leaving his birth name behind. So it happened and we got the official document (thankfully only a copy) to show him, expecting him to be happy. However, the document has his old name listed (which obviously it has to do so it can match up to his birth certificate). He had an almighty screaming meltdown that lasted almost an hour of screaming and shouting and eventually holding a knife to his hand. He would not (find still will not) accept that it HAS to have his old name on it, it is official documentation. He then ripped it up into small pieces, soaked it in water, wrapped it in kitchen roll and tried to flush it down the toilet. My wife had to retrieve it (we didn't want a blockage). So he then dried it out in the oven and eventually burned it.

Once he'd done that, you'd have not known anything was wrong. I am sure it all felt a reasonable response in his head.

We immediately called (no response) then emailed out support team but we still haven't heard back from them.

So today we have to deal with his dead hamster (which will not go well) then I have to somehow try to get him in the car and take him to the respite carer for a sleepover.

Exhausted!

1 day / 1 task at a time. Small chunks, try to move on from the negatives as quickly as he does and have a reset. This is how I'm working it, works some of the time but isn't easy. I tend to dwell on things for a little while then move on so putting things immediately behind me is a new skill for me to learn.

The boy is finding himself and must have gone through hell. Credit to yourselves that you've seen the progress you have, he may thank you for it one day.

The boy is finding himself and must have gone through hell.

He has gone through an extraordinarily hideous childhood, but he needs to accept that he has issues that need resolving and that there are people and organisations that are available to do just that. But he won't accept he has issues and will not engage with any professionals at any level. Thirty minutes until I call him from his room to take him to the respite carers. I wonder how that one will go...

Hey johndo

We've been doing what you've been doing for the last 14yrs or so - so I can understand and empathise.

I don't, however, have any magic solutions.

I don't know what the rest of your household consists of. Whether you have kids of your own or other kids  placement?

We've had situations where the issues for one child caused such negative impacts on other kids and our family as a whole that they had to move on.

It sounds like you guys have done all the right things and you've built a relationship with him so, obviously, the best place is with you. If you can sustain it.

It just depends on how much you can sacrifice to keep it going. Everyone has a limit.

We’ve had situations where the issues for one child caused such negative impacts on other kids and our family as a whole that they had to move on.

we are concerned that his behaviour is effecting one of our girls (we have twin 14
yr olds) - she is becoming socially anxious so is seeing a therapist. Whether that’s his behaviour or just her getting to the age where these things can manifest (she’s always been quiet and shy).Obviously if we thought it was because of him, he’d have to go. Social Services are trying to find him a permanent home but no-one is willing to have him (we’re short term carers and he knows this).

I've got nothing to add of any value except to say that you have clearly done an amazing job so far and you have opend your home and life to provide a safe place and have cared for a child who has benefitted massively.  

Keep going as long as you can but know that you have made a difference to their life already. 

Vent away mate, vent away.

He absolutely does need to know that the issues he struggles with need to be addressed. But he's very young and it could be that those issues are just so painful to bring up, the example you shared of the name change is a fine example of this, that he can't bare to discuss anything with professionals. He'll get there, but for now enjoy the respite as best you can.

Nuff rizzpeck johndoh, is there a fostering mentoring/community group you can reach out to?

hope the respite goes ok, you’re doing sterling work team Doh

(we’re short term carers and he knows this).

I wonder if this might be part of the issues he is having. He may be reluctant to make an effort as there is a fear that he becomes settled and content and is then moved on through the system ?
Just a thought

Have you tried PDA techniques?

if he is neuro divergent which sounds very likely then the issues with his behaviour and deregulation are not ones he can control.  Telling him they are issues is not going to be helpful and will have an adverse impact on his self esteem.

i have utmost respect for you and recommend that you try and find a support group with parents who are on a similar journey. Happy to suggest some - PM me.

There is no silver bullet if neuro divergent.

I wonder if this might be part of the issues he is having. He may be reluctant to make an effort as there is a fear that he becomes settled and content and is then moved on through the system ?

it possibly is (probably is TBF), and we have always avoided ‘promising’ anything to him and we can completely understand why he feels the way he does, but it would be nice if he did stop and think about others around him. I guess he’s just nowhere near that place yet.

Ohh, he did go to respite carers tonight, our girls are at a party and my wife and I got to be a couple for a few hours. Which was nice.