Same curve of a smile
Billy stood up, put his hands behind his back and began to fill the silence of the room. At first he stumbled through his words, but then quickly pulled them together and with them the attention of the crowd. ‘I have been in care for 13 years and have had 16 placements’.
It should have been shocking, but a collective understanding flooded through the room. He was one of us. Many had walked in those polished black shoes. It was in the nods and the murmuring.
He talked about being in one placement for two and a half years. ‘I was neglected’. More nods. I, like many was hanging off his every word, while at the same time hanging off my own memories of my time in care.
It hurt, but at the same time here was a stranger who knew me and I knew him and yet we had never ever spoken. The fact that over fifteen years separated us seemed of little importance. His story, so familiar, but still no less powerful then took a turn. He found the Lodge. ‘I feel safe there…all my needs are met…they support me’. We were all with him. All on the same curve of a smile.
It may not have been us that had found the Lodge, but he gave people hope that such places existed. But then he took another turn. ‘They want to close it’…’There was no consultation with any of us [young residents]’. Saving pounds and pence seemingly more important than people’s futures. The place where he felt safe was now under attack and Billy was standing there in his dark suit fighting for himself and probably without even knowing it, for many others in the room and beyond.
At times, as I stood leaned up against the wooden panelled wall of the Boothroyd Room at the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Looked After Children and Care Leavers, it felt like war. On one side and showing in force young people living in care and with them the people that fight by their side. The care workers, social workers, volunteers, charity reps, care leavers, even the slick and humorous Edward Timpson MP. But there is no escaping, this side is outgunned and out manned.
On the other side, and far away from the room (even though it was in the heart of Westminster), the great hulking faceless machine. A machine that hides behind the overused words of ‘the system’. A machine that seems to have no real accountability. It doesn’t matter who is in government. This machine doesn’t care about political colours. Every now and again it gears up and spits out policies and slogans of what it might do, could do, but then sinks back into the safety of anonymity and shrugged shoulders, blaming the ‘necessary cuts’ we all must accept and how ‘we’re all in it together’.
If all that fails then the machine switches to the finger pointing game that goes on between central government and local government. Like two kids fighting over a toy, except neither wants it. The excuses and the faces have changed over the years, but not much else it sometimes seems.
Unfortunately this war that most in the room had come to fight is not one that is fought in the full glare of the media (even Iraq and Afghanistan struggle to make the news these days). It is fought behind closed doors, on phones and in forms and in offices and in bedrooms and in doctors surgeries and sadly often in silence.
I look down at the notes I made on the day, some are hard to make out now because of the state of my writing, but I see ‘care system lets people down…they fall through the gaps’. Further down the page, ‘lack of rights and entitlements…lack of remedies’. Hanging off the bottom of my page is ‘there is good practice going on out there, but people are not sharing it’.
Later on a care worker stands up and says he is happy to share what works for his area, but people are unwilling to come and see. Another care worker stood up to talk about a film he had made about the successes Hackney had achieved, but hardly anybody came to see it. ‘Why won’t they come?’ he asked.
But even in the darkest places hope can always be found if we go looking for it. Success stories were scattered throughout the room with people entering higher education, further education, finding families, finding flats and ultimately finding their voices (more than once I was in awe at the eloquence of how people spoke).
There is no doubting that the struggle for people in care will go on on so many levels. In heads and hearts. In schools and colleges. In the attempt to hold family relationships together. In the constant fights for funding. The fights for stability and consistency. The fights for good social workers. The fights for more foster families. The fights for good accommodation and so the list goes on. But being in care has a way of making you battle hardened and you learn quickly how to fight, but is this really what this system should be about? Is this really ‘care’?
In the end more is needed across the board and it is not just about money. It is as much about good organisation and serious accountability. The ‘decision makers’ must stand up and be counted. Too many good ideas are following too many young people down the gaps that exist in the system. The room all night demanded better than the recycled words that we’re so tired of hearing. We need action. As a man said towards the end ‘we need people to stop passing the buck because it’s been going on for too long’. Everyone agreed.
I left the meeting with Billy at the forefront of my mind. I had clapped hard for him after he had spoken. It is not easy to stand up in a crowd and tell your story. I was proud of him, proud of his will and proud of his eloquence.
In the end I was most proud to be on the same side as Billy and everybody else that had come to be acknowledged in the Boothroyd room that night.
I may have left care, but it has never left me
September 14, 2010, 2:45 pm
Filed under:
leaving care | Tags:
APG,
budget cuts,
care,
family,
leaving care,
school,
social services,
support,
universityMy positive side says that going into care was ultimately for the best. I can see the path that was being plotted for me. All my school reports before I left home talk of wasted potential (this counts for secondary school too) and constant fighting. On one occasion my care file talks of me being restrained for an hour and a half at school before the police were called. I was ten.
At home violence was familiar to the point that when I saw my mum have her nose broken I thought it was her own fault. She just wouldn’t shut up, didn’t know when to stop and one of her male drinking partners thought he would show her how. Of course, even with the blood streaming down her face, it showed her nothing and they probably hugged and made up in seconds. That’s just how things were.
Those of you who have experienced stuff like this will understand what I mean when I say that I just got on with things. It wasn’t even that dramatic. It was the rough edge of normality.
But this life, and what I was seeing, was seeping into me and I was becoming it. Telling whoever I wanted to ‘f*** off’ at the drop of a hat, breaking into schools, fighting, generally not caring about anything or anyone. And if I had stayed I know it would have been hard not to go down the route that my home life was offering me.
In care, one set of issues was exchanged for another. Over time lots of memories from those days have faded away. The faces of carers and children I lived with have disappeared. But I know this is me remembering to forget because it’s often easier that way.
Unless you’ve been there you will never understand what it’s like to be abandoned in this world. When both your mum and dad turn their backs on you that cuts a hole that can never be filled.
As an adult I can now rationalise what happened to me, but the heart is not rational and the pain still remains. There are days when the positive side wins out and I’m happy that I managed to go to university and that my working life has been relatively successful. In my battle with my experience I win out mostly and refuse to let it dominate me, but it is still a big part of me. Take that part away from me and I will lose much of my identity. It’s the bitterest, and yet sweetest side of who I am.
I intended for this post to be about leaving care and it is, but it’s hard to find the finish line. And this can only highlight the desperate need to support young people when they leave care. Going from a controlled daily existence to then being put out into the world to fend for yourself is a scary thing.
Thinking back I’m not sure when I actually left care. Was it climbing out of my last foster parents’ car window and running away? Was it saying goodbye to Lee’s mum (see July’s post) in my university halls bedroom? I’m not sure because I did get a £500 cheque each year from Social Services while I was still at university, which I quickly spent on essential studying equipment… alcohol!
But seriously, I guess I was still part of the system because I also received a letter about independent living. No phone call, no visit, just a letter. Something so important deserved so much more. I had been in care since I was nine.
Recently I’ve been reading about the experiences of young people in care today and it saddens me to see that very little has changed. Support can be sketchy and there is often a lack of understanding from some of the people who are part of the system that provides this support.
Also I see a tragic fatalism that says that this is just the way it is. Complain about the dirty flat you move into as you make the transition from care into the real world and you’ll be told that it’s tough and that you should be grateful. I still feel like people leaving care and those who are in care are squashed into statistics and budgets and reports… people need to remember that we are often people with complex needs who need a solid support system.
I appreciate that we are living in a world of cuts at the moment, but the money and effort put in to support people leaving care could ultimately save money in the long run (not that decisions should always be made on a monetary basis).
The statistics concerning people who have been touched by the care system relating to academic achievement, the likelihood of becoming homeless and the likelihood of going to jail, alongside other statistics scream out that more has to be done. There are care leavers who go on to lead productive and happy lives. But I don’t need a statistic to know that this number is far too low.
I think the final letter I ever received from Social Services was to ask me if I wanted to stay on the independent living scheme, and that if so I needed to take up a flat soon. By then I was living in the Midlands and still had another year of studying. Time was moving on and the truth is I wanted to distance myself as far away from Social Services as possible, so I said no.
I was lucky because I had built a support network around me by then. But that was the last I heard from Social Services. For so long they had been this great hulking thing that had controlled my life, and then they were suddenly gone.
I’ve blagged my way through a lot of my life since then, but there are times when I wish I had been offered some kind of emotional support. Sometimes leaving care can be an elating experience, you can go through a honeymoon period, but down the track the demons can catch up with you. People need help in this department just as much as the everyday things like budgeting, filling out forms, paying bills, writing CVs etc. I never got that help and many others don’t seem to either.
I actually did some research for this blog for a change and there are a lot of great ideas that can be found in various reports and articles about improvements that can made to support the transition from care to independent living. (Such as Ofsted’s report, Support for care leavers). Also the young people this affects are full of great ideas and practical ways to make the transition easier. For example, at the Associate Parliamentary Group for Looked-after Children and Care Leavers.
But, if there is nobody to coordinate these ideas and take responsibility in the higher echelons of government and the related departments and agencies, then the sense of abandonment many feel coming into care will only be further reinforced when they leave it.
A part of the family
July 8, 2010, 1:04 pm
Filed under:
Life in care | Tags:
care,
communication,
education,
family,
foster carer,
home,
leaving care,
relationships,
school,
social worker,
universityI remember so clearly the first time I ever spent the night at my best friend’s house. In the middle of the night we crept down four flights of creaky stairs, slipped into the darkness of the front room and found what we were looking for. We were all loud whispers, giggles and excitement.
The room flooded with light as I turned on the TV while Lee put in the video. Earlier in the evening we had both been attracted to its ‘18’ certificate. Lee’s mum had rented the Mickey Rourke video to watch with her then boyfriend when she was safe in the knowledge we were both tucked up asleep in bed. When we had first seen the video we had already started planning.
‘Did you see the video your mum got?’
‘Yeah, yeah.’
‘Anything with Mickey Rourke is bound to have sex in it or at least some violence.’
We both settled onto the sofa as the video began. After five minutes we soon became bored. ‘Shall we fast forward it a bit?’ I asked Lee. He already had the controls in his hand at the ready. ‘Stop stop!!!’
Mickey began to undress his beautiful co-star. We both watched in silence hoping for more than we got. A flash of breast, some inside thigh, but not much more. We watched the rest of the film in fast forward with brief stops here and there.
As we crept back upstairs we were both a little disappointed in what we had seen (or not seen), but I loved the adventure of the night. I loved being at his house, I loved the creeping about, I loved the flash of breast and thigh (I took what I could at that age) and I loved the fact that I almost forgot I was in care.
As I got older my placements in care became more difficult. I can sit here and give my biased reasons, and will, but others given the opportunity would probably throw a few more in.
At 15 I had been in the care system for six years (I had been in more than once on and off before this also) and it was beginning to take its toll. All the hiding your background and hiding even from yourself begins to wear you down.
Then you have puberty and adolescence kicking in. Hormones were racing, but I was also finding my own feet and voice in the world. All the things I wanted to scream about were suddenly finding a vehicle in words and some people didn’t like that.
I clashed with children’s homes workers and was moved on. I kept my mouth shut in the next home. I was a very small fish in a big pond.
I was then moved back to some former foster parents, but I had changed from when I was last there. They gave me so much, but they could not give me the space to grow, or the understanding to mess up, with the knowledge that that’s what you sometimes do as a kid. Mistakes I made were rammed down my throat and towards the end we were locked in what was nothing less than trench warfare.
One night it all fell apart and I found myself escaping from the clutches of my foster father, climbing out of a car window and running down the street. I had lived with that family for more than three years. They gave me so much and that was sadly the last time I ever saw them.
At fifteen I ended up back with my mum for the first time since I was nine. Disaster. We fought and fought and fought. We said horrible things to each other we did mean. The hatred for ourselves and each other spilled out and flooded that flat for the two weeks I was there. We were drowning.
One day I was at Lee’s house. I had stopped going to school. Lee’s mum was sitting at the table and began talking to me.
‘Why have you stopped going to school?’
‘Can’t be bothered with it.’
‘Why not?’
‘It’s a waste of time.’
‘You know it’s important.’
‘I can’t be bothered, its too far now anyway.’
The conversation ended with an offer. At this time mock exams were approaching and Lee’s mum asked if I would come and stay with her and the boys (Lee had a younger brother) for the two weeks that the mocks were running – on the condition that I went to school and completed all my exams. Can you imagine such an offer in my position, actually in any position… come and live with your best friend for two weeks. That’s fourteen sleepovers!!!
Those two weeks were filled with fun and football and laughter, and even a night here and there with school books spread across the kitchen table.
I knew that the end was coming. But I’m used to ends so I buried it. I would deal with it when it happened. But before it came Lee’s mum sat me down.
‘Look, I don’t want to promise anything because I know people have made and broken so many promises with you… and I don’t know how this will work, but how would you feel about staying another two weeks and we’ll just see how it goes. I can’t promise more than that, I want to, but I can’t. I know that’s not easy for you and you’ve had enough instability, but I want to be open with you’.
I remember the moment so clearly. It was one of the few times somebody had been truly honest with me. There were no clauses, no rules, no statutory this and that, no words hiding behind other words, forms to be filed (though those would come later)… This was somebody speaking to me and telling me what they could do and what they possibly couldn’t.
As a child in care there are a lot of words that come up again and again, but as meaningful as they might be to the system and to the social workers and to the law, they are generally meaningless to the child. Sometimes we want words that cut through all that and are just for us. I wish I could have had more words for me that were just for me.
I jumped at the chance of another two weeks with Lee and his family. Both my mum and I knew I had to leave the flat I had spent my early years in, for the sake of any future relationship we might have.
My then new social worker pulled strings and got into some serious form filling and soon I was living with Lee’s family officially.
Lee’s mum refused to take any money other than what it cost for my upkeep, she was offered more but refused it. I tried to get her to take the extra but she wouldn’t. I think it’s important that carers are paid a wage for upkeep and more, but if money is the prime incentive for getting involved then it’s likely these people will contribute to hurting the children in their care. They won’t even know its happening at the time. Children are great bullshit detectors, so don’t think you can pretend you want them there when money is your driver.
Every two weeks Lee’s mum and I would have the ‘I can’t promise anything long term, but…’ conversation and the ‘two-week stay’ would stretch out further.
Lee’s parents were separated. His father lived only a mile away with his wife and young family. Initially Lee and his brother would spend five nights out of fourteen at their father’s and I would stay in the house alone with Lee’s mum.
Soon Lee’s father and his family also took me on and I began moving between the two households. There were times when I felt like I was put on them a bit and they may not have had a choice. But I was never made to feel like that by them – these thoughts all came from my own head.
I wanted this piece to highlight what makes a good care placement and I don’t feel I’ve done that yet… so maybe I should just jump into that a bit here.
I think the first thing is being made to feel wanted. I spent much of my childhood not being wanted, or if I was wanted it was not for the reasons I would have hoped. Not being wanted, or only being wanted for financial gain, kinda sticks with you. It’s a monkey I’m forever brushing off my back even now, but he’s a pesky so and so and is always climbing back on. I’m getting used to him these days. We have an understanding.
One of the things that sticks with me more then anything about my time with Lee and his family is conversation. I spent hours talking to Lee’s mum about anything and everything. No topic was off limits… drugs, sex, politics, music, books, family, school, love… the list goes on.
I didn’t realise on how many levels this was helping me and was a real positive influence on my life. I was learning so much and I was soaking up the attention. I was loving the opportunity to express myself and to develop this skill of expression. And, ultimately it was beautiful to sit and talk and just as important to learn how to really listen too.
There were times when I felt different in the household because I was. It felt like people were tiptoeing around me and I was doing the same around them, but that all changed one evening.
Lee’s mum had asked us to clean up and we hadn’t. She was stressed after a late night at work. We were laughing and joking when she came in. She began by shouting at us… all of us equally.
We stopped laughing. We sat still on the sofa and just took what we deserved – and then she stopped and began to cry. After that day I felt I was part of the family. I had seen my mum cry a lot, but it had been a long time since I had seen real vulnerability like that from an adult looking after me.
In children’s homes and foster homes people often locked away their most extreme emotions. They were for private. But to feel part of something like a family, you need to see it all. That was an important moment for me… and we did clean up after the tears!
I need to wrap this up because I’ve talked way too much… I want to tell you about the holidays we all had in Greece and how even the extended family took me in. I want to tell you about Christmas in the Cotswold. I want to tell you about the battles between me and Lee’s mum’s boyfriend and how he was teaching me and testing me and I didn’t even know it at the time. I want to tell you about two of the happiest years of my childhood, but I don’t have the space here.
In the end Lee and his family loved me. They gave themselves to me and I gave myself back. We had our ups and downs as any family does, but we’re still here. I still spend hours talking to Lee’s mum when we get together. I go to family and friends’ parties at Lee’s mum’s house where I sometimes drink too much and have to stay over (although not in my old bedroom because it’s now a toilet). We are all still family.
The day Lee’s mum drove me to university was a special day. Two weeks had become two years. My GCSEs had gone well and A-levels had been scraped through. We walked into the empty house I would be staying in for the first year of my studies. Nobody else had arrived so I got to pick the biggest room. We looked around for a bit and then it was time for her leave.
I don’t remember what our last words were on that day, but before she left we held each other tightly.
That’s a nice place to pause.
For the record…
March 2, 2010, 10:58 am
Filed under:
care records,
leaving care | Tags:
care,
care records,
children's home,
data protection,
family,
foster carer,
leaving care,
social services,
social workerI’ve been told second posts are ‘infamously difficult’, so I’ve given a lot of thought to what to write, but as these words appear I hardly know where they’re heading so bear with me, we’ll get somewhere in the end.
First of all thank you to anyone that read the last post and for all your comments. Since I started this blog my insecurities haven’t shut up (they’re big talkers) – they said nobody would read it and if anyone did they would think it was rubbish, but over the years I’ve built up quite a healthy relationship with my insecurities… they shout I can’t do and even though I often think they’re right, I try to show them I can. Sometimes they get it right, sometimes they don’t, trick is to keep trying to prove them wrong.
Recently I’ve started writing about my experience in care. I don’t know what all the words will become, but I’m enjoying doing it. As a kid I was never a big writer. I liked writing when I had to do it for school, but that was about it. But what got me putting pen to paper was getting my care file a few years ago.
Let me take a step back… one day I was sitting in a training session at work, one of those ones you have to go to that is normally a waste of time. It was on data protection (making sure you kept people’s addresses and dates of birth and stuff like that safe). I didn’t think it meant a lot to me, but in the session the trainer said everybody is entitled to see any data that anyone holds on them.
It got me thinking. I realised there must be loads of stuff held on me from when I was in care (social worker reports, carer reports, police reports, psychologist reports, school reports etc). I was living in Birmingham at the time, but phoned up Wandsworth Social Services and asked if I could have all the information they held on me. The woman didn’t have much of a clue what I was talking about, but said she would look into it. Time passed and I forgot about it.
About six months later a parcel arrived. I was late for work, quickly signed for it and stuffed it in my bag. That day it was pouring with rain. Typing now, it seems like yesterday. I remember I was still drunk from celebrating a promotion the day before. In the rush I put on the clothes I was wearing the day before. Great way to start the new job. Anyway, I ran for my bus, got it, sat upstairs at the front and remembered this random package in my bag. I opened it up and inside was a red folder. I was confused and wondered if it was for me. I began reading.
It was my life in care written by other people. It started with a chronology of all the places I had been and then there were pages and pages of different reports. I wasn’t ready for it. I put my hood up and sat on that bus for an hour and cried my eyes out. I read the whole thing and cried all the way to work.
When you live in care you block a lot of stuff out. Any of you reading this in care will know what I mean. There’s so much stuff to deal with that some things you just have to block out. It doesn’t stop it happening, but you make a place for it and you stuff all that shit in there (you don’t have to be in care to have that place, we’ve all got it, but some are just bigger than others). I’ve still got that place, but more and more as I get older I find myself visiting that place and remembering, trying to work stuff out. Some stuff I never will, but I think when you’re ready it’s good to go back and look at things with fresh eyes.
So back to the file. I got off the bus, dried my eyes and went to work. I hid the file away and didn’t look at it for a long time. One of the things that hurt was that in all the words that the file possessed, mine were missing. There was hardly anything from me. I don’t know, have times changed now? Do young people fill out their own reports to add to all the other people’s reports? Someone out there please tell me? Do young people get the chance to have their say and to write that say down on paper?
Words said out loud often get lost in time, but words on the page stick. These words in my file have certainly stuck with me and are still a big influence on me. But as I’ve got older I’m starting to find my own way around them and around my time in care.
I’m starting to build my own history. I’m more than the file. I’m more than someone that was in care. I once let being in care define me, but now I’m much more than that.
But the file is still important to me. It’s like an anchor to my childhood. It’s like a map of where I’ve been. So I started this blog saying I wasn’t sure where I was going and here we are and I think I’ve already written too much. I just want to finish by saying to anyone who is in care that you have the right to see all the stuff people write about you. That’s your right. But be careful if you ever want to see your file. I wasn’t ready when I got mine. I didn’t get any warning and to be honest it messed me up for a bit. But now I’m so glad I did get it and still have it. Now I see it as a gift. It’s not an easy read, but as much as there is a lot of pain in there, there is also a lot of joy. I’ve been given memories that would have been lost.
Now I’m not saying that I agree with everything in the file, some of it is outright lies. You know how social workers and foster carers can be. They don’t always get it and their version of things is sometimes not how it was, but nobody’s perfect. I know my version of some things is definitely not perfect. It’s funny looking back now at the file because sometimes the people writing the reports so didn’t get it, so I would advise maybe keeping your own file, writing down your own thoughts (of course just for yourself, you don’t have to share them with anybody) so that when you get your file one day like I did you can have something to compare it to.
Well that’s me and the ‘infamously difficult’ second post. If you keep reading I’ll keep talking. I’ve got loads if you’re interested, but I would really love to hear from any young people who are in care. I’m sitting here tapping on the keys for you. If I don’t hear from you then I might as well stop.
I want you to tell me how things are in care for you. It’s been a while since I was there. I’d like to think it’s changed and the clothing allowance I used to love has gone up (though looking back at the silk shirts I bought I’m not sure I spent the money very wisely!), that they’re paying for holidays to Hawaii at Christmas and everyone gets a car when they leave care… it’s a hard life living away from home, we at least deserve a car for our troubles!
Finding my feet
Not sure what brought you here… perhaps you’re a young person in care, a foster parent, a teacher, a children’s home worker… whatever it is thank you for coming and I hope you will keep coming. I also hope everyone will get something out of this blog (I’ve never written or read a blog in my life so bear with me, I will get better!), but first off I want to say I will be talking to young people in care primarily… sorry everybody else, but feel free to listen in, you might learn something. I’m hoping I will…
My name is John. I was once in care. I hated it. I went into care when I was very young and was in and out at first, but then at age nine I just stayed in. As is often the way I was bounced from foster home to children’s home to children’s home, sure most of you know what I mean.
Along the way I smashed a lot of stuff up… was very angry and often felt totally alone (but I didn’t tell anyone this). There were always people about like social workers; foster carers, other kids etc, but crowds can be the loneliest places. People didn’t get me, they didn’t listen and that made things worse. I was ashamed about being in care. I hid it from people at school as long as I could, but they found out and took the piss. So I became a bit of a class clown and made people laugh and that seemed to make things easier with the other kids, not so much the teachers. I got in trouble a lot and spent a lot of time outside classrooms, but I still kept up with my school work. I needed an out. I needed to feel good about myself and I got this from school. I didn’t know it then, but I see that now looking back.
There are lots of ‘outs’… sport, music, books, friends, computer games… whatever it is make sure you find yours. The smashing stuff and the anger and the loneliness may still hang about (I never quite shook those off), but find that place to escape. They can take you away from your family for whatever reason that may be, but they can’t take away your ability to find that ‘out’, they may even help you get there (social services paid for my brother’s ice skating boots)…
I’m really scared of sounding like I’m preaching and I’m not here for that… I’m just here to pass on my own experiences. Maybe you will related and take something from them… maybe they will sound familiar…or maybe not.
Being in care was once my whole life. I felt like a prisoner. But now things are different for me. My time in care is still a part of my life, but it’s just that… a part. I used to be ashamed of it, but now it’s something I’m proud of because it’s from this experience that I’ve become who I am today. It’s been a rough ride at times but it’s from being in care I gained my inner strength, understanding of other people and perspective…also if you ever need a window smashing in I’m your man! When you’ve come through being in care you can pretty much take on most things… throw some real effort in and you will be amazed where you might find yourself standing one day, maybe you’re standing there already.
I hope that you will contribute to this blog and pass on your own experiences. Sometimes I forget what it was like to be in care and looking back as an adult maybe I’ve forgotten stuff. So please educate me and remind me. Nothing is off the agenda, so if you want to discuss anything fire away. Without you this will not work. I need you, so please get involved.
