“I remember the first moment he called me mum”: Jodie’s story of long term fostering
From the age of three to sixteen, Steven’s life has been completely transformed by his foster parent, Jodie. She shares her incredible journey - from growing up in a fostering family to witnessing the life-changing impact of long-term foster care.
Jodie was destined to be a foster parent.
With parents who also foster, much of Jodie’s childhood was spent with foster siblings. She was just three years old when her parents first started fostering and, as she grew up, she just knew it was something she was also going to do. “It's something that I've grown up with. It's been a way of life. I've had lots of foster brothers and sisters, so as I got older, it just came naturally.”
Jodie and her husband, David, applied to become foster parents in 2010. Throughout their extensive history caring for children from the ages of 18 months to 16 years - through a variety of placements including short term, respite and long term - they’ve become highly experienced at supporting children with complex needs. Their current foster son, Steven*, was placed with them on a long term basis in 2011 and Jodie has talked about how she sees him as her own child.
“Our young person has been with us since he was just 3 years old and he's 16 now. He's just one of our children; we don't look at him any differently. And he looks at us the same way - His family is us. My parents are his nanny and grandad, he's got aunts and uncles. He’s part of our family.”
Long term benefits
It’s undeniable that being placed long term, and able to truly become part of the family, has been a life-changing thing for Steven, and Jodie has seen, fully, the benefits of long term care and the difference this can make to a young person’s life: “The best thing about fostering a child long term is seeing their growth - From where they've started to where you've helped them develop and grow throughout the years and the amount of progress that they make, not just emotionally but educationally as well - It is so rewarding to see. We've gone from having a child that couldn't function at school, wasn't learning at all, to a child that's now a teenager and doing really well in college. It makes you beam with pride. And knowing that, actually, without you that might not have been his journey.”
Another aspect that has been important in Jodie’s fostering journey, is supporting Steven’s relationship with his birth family. Jodie is very open and accepting of this relationship, and they are lucky that this part of Steven’s life works really well for them. “We always tell him how lucky is that?! He's got two families. We put pictures of his birth family up in the house and we include them in Christmases, birthdays, send them presents... That's important to have that relationship. He's always got us - we're there for as long as he needs us - and he knows he has got his birth family too.”
A full team of support
Steven is completely thriving in Jodie’s care and will remain with her past the age of 18, within a staying put placement. The difference Jodie has made to Steven’s life is remarkable, but she has also acknowledged the importance of a wider network of support:
“A really important thing about being a foster carer is it's not just you; it's the support network around you. It's all the social workers, the teachers, staff, professionals, even doctors and therapists that are involved. You make one big team. And I found over the years that if you all work together, communicate, it makes such a big difference for the child.”
That network of support you have as a foster carer can be the difference in whether a foster placement is successful; whether a child feels settled and secure, whether a foster parent feels valued and empowered, whether a foster family thrives. Jodie has been incredibly grateful for the support she has received from the team at Fosterplus:
“The type of support I receive from Fosterplus is second to none. This may sound a bit cheesy, but they are like an extended family.
"They're very supportive, always on the other end of the phone, 24 hours a day, which is fantastic. And it's not just for us, they are also there for the child. The training that we're offered is vast and, if there's something specialist that we'd like to do, they will look into that for us. If a carer has a lot of experience in an area, they then talk about that and give support to other carers as well. And all the staff are absolutely lovely, really approachable and very friendly.”
“I remember the first moment he called me mum"
With the support of her family, and the wider community at Fosterplus, Jodie has been able to realise her dream of becoming a foster mum. And, with Mother’s Day around the corner, she has shared a memory of Steven that is special to her:
“I remember the first moment he called me mum. He was about 5 years old. We've got a birth son who obviously says mum all the time, and I remember he was eating his breakfast and he just said ‘mum’ and it was like a really warm, fuzzy feeling. At the same time, he knows that I’m not his mum, but when I looked at him, he said ‘can I call you mum?’ and I said ‘of course you can, darling. If that's what you'd like to call me, that's fine’. And then he just did it constantly from then on.”
Thinking of fostering?
Fostering is truly something that changes, not only children’s lives, but the lives of the families who open up their hearts and homes to children who are in need. For anyone who is thinking of fostering, Jodie has shared the following: “The best advice I can give someone about starting fostering is to talk to other foster carers. The support that you have around you is really important. It's been invaluable to me, and I know a lot of other carers will say, especially when you start your journey, take as much support as you can. Socialise with other carers, talk about things. Attend as much training as you can. Be open and honest, and have a lot of patience. It's one of the best things that I've ever decided to do.”
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