Sam was only with us for a weekend but they changed our life --[Reported by Umva mag]

You are questioned and analysed for nearly a year. You undergo hours and hours of training.

Then your first day arrives and you feel like you’ve forgotten everything you know, and you keep asking where the toilet is, even though it’s in your own home. 

This is how my partner and I felt as we nervously chatted through our first car journey as foster carers. It was awkward.

Sam*, the teenager in our care was silent in the backseat and we were overcompensating.

Like bad first dates, we garbled away and eventually slid into a quiet we usually reserve for hangovers and post-argument reflection. This was going to be a long couple of days. 

We were to have this young person stay with us over a weekend and – despite the thoroughness of the vetting process and support networks we were gifted – I kept expecting someone to chase us down and explain to all three of us that there had been a terrible mistake.

That, even though we had all the paperwork, of course a couple of idiots like us wouldn’t be allowed to care for children four years and over.

You see, when you start the process of enquiring about becoming a local authority foster carer, you’re likely a year away from meeting your first young person.

Throughout the process, you’re moving towards that nebulous occasion and even though every day is a lurch toward it, it never stops feeling like something on the horizon, like paying off your student loan or fitting back into your favourite jeans.

The process of assessment itself was as long, intrusive and as thorough as you would hope.

We started with a ‘skills to foster’ course, which is a broad overview of what it is to be a foster carer and a chance to ask questions about scary things like first aid.

Of course, over time we have learned that the scariest thing is actually the quality of the coffee in council-owned buildings. This is where most people who will drop out, do.

The stark reality of what the day-to-day looks like as a foster carer, the predictable troubles and heart wrench you’re likely to encounter puts plenty off.

Not for us though. I attribute our staying power to the hubris you can only have when you don’t have your own children to care for and the fact we’re both the youngest in our sibling groups. 

Then we got Sam.

The three of us arrived back at our house, unfamiliar to all of us. They’d visited briefly the week before with their carer to see that this weekend-long placement was likely to work and to put a moving face to the smiling pictures on the ‘about us’ document they received.

The house seemed alien to us because it had been tidied into oblivion and the unfamiliar smell of Zoflora wafted through our farmhouse kitchen. We hauled deceptively heavy bags up to the room they picked the week before, it was big and airy and seemed simultaneously welcoming and wholly unsuitable.

We left Sam to settle and began preparing the dream dinner, helpfully tipped off on favs by their foster carers. An army marches on its belly and so do teenagers – this is where we shine.

My partner and I shared a smile and a portion, as we weren’t expecting Sam to have seconds too.

And just like that – after a few days – Sam’s short stay with us was over. Ever since, we’ve hosted a range of teenagers on short breaks that have lasted anywhere from a few hours to a few weeks.

Like lots of folk with new children in their lives, we started with puritanical ideas in terms of meals, screen time and presence.

We would both always be there, we’re a team, a double act. It means there’s always someone to bounce a worry off, always someone to use as a sounding board and someone to discuss the day’s events in bed at night.

Was I too chatty? No. Did they feel pressure to have another portion? No. Did you see it when I made them laugh? No. Gutted. 

No phones. That’s been a tricky one. Not just because I spend a lot of time googling things like ‘Is Fortnite safe for 14 year olds’ and ‘What is a Camilla Cabello’, but also because – as someone with ADHD – that dark little rectangle is where I keep my dopamine.

Thankfully, my partner’s stern stare is far more effective than any of the time-limiting apps I quickly come up with workarounds for.

It turns out that caring for a young person and trying to give them the space, time and fun you think they deserve is actually more stimulating than Facebook – it’s about the same as Instagram though, to be fair.

As time has gone on, we have relaxed a little. It’s fine if we’re both not there 24 hours a day when we have someone staying. Adding new dishes to a young person’s favourites list is a lovely win but ultimately if they go to bed with a full belly, that’s the goal. Oh and phones, still a no-go until bedtime. 

When we were being assessed as a couple by a social worker – through many interviews – we were asked tough questions. When we passed the assessment stage and made it through to the final stage panel, we were grilled by a group of experts.

There was no part of our lives that escaped interrogation and yet nothing prepares you for the questions you will receive from the young people in your care. ‘What are we going to do that’s fun today’, ‘Do you have a proper job’ and ‘Did you know you have 11 dead things in the living room?’

Fair point – taxidermy isn’t easy to explain but I also think it wasn’t very sporting to include the houseplant on the windowsill.

These young people are often hyper vigilant and not much gets past them. This can be scary at first but it also forces you to really think about what you’re saying and doing, so the fear of accidentally muttering an expletive at the chicken who’s wandered through an open door and into the kitchen really forces you into the present. 

It’s been a thrilling, challenging and edifying three years and the more we do it, the more we realise this is exactly what family looks like to us. I’m also increasingly convinced that if more people knew more about fostering, they’d realise it was the perfect fit for them and will enrich and vitalise their lives – like parental wild swimming. 

There is one thing that is an issue and it’s not the amount of time it takes to train, it’s the fact that the number of children who need foster carers has risen every year for the last decade and is now over 100,000.

Fostering will change your life and you might just find yourself welling up in a car as you, your partner and the first child you ever cared for sing Taylor Swift at the top of your lungs after an amazing weekend together.

You will survive and you might just find that you thrive.

*Name has been changed for anonymity

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