by Angela Hart
Some studies have suggested that what’s ‘normal’ has been established in a baby’s brain by the age of six months. So a baby who has been subjected to fear, anxiety or any other kind of abuse will grow up to accept levels of stress other people would find very difficult to deal with. A knock-on effect of that is that it takes a very high level of stimulation to make the child react.
I find it very interesting to read about these studies, especially the ones that help to explain some of the issues we’ve faced with the children we’ve cared for over the years. I have learned that it takes a very long time for the nerves in the brain to develop new pathways. And until that happens, you can’t expect children who have lived their entire lives in threatening, abusive, frightening environments to learn within a matter of months, or even years, to behave differently.
Having that knowledge makes it much easier to understand why a child like Maria can sometimes switch from good humour to full-blown temper tantrum at the slightest provocation. Instead of processing the message with the cool, reasoning part of her brain, it goes to the so-called ‘hot’ part and she responds to the perceived threat by overreacting. That’s why children like Maria need a lot of support. Children don’t choose to behave badly. They react in certain ways to certain triggers because they’ve been neurologically primed to do so. So they have to be taught a different way, and by repeating something to them over and over again, you can help them to create new neurological pathways that they can then follow automatically. I think of it like finding a good, new, hazard-free route through a forest and using that same route for long enough to create a new path. I know from experience that it works, but it takes a long time.
The question was, now that Maria’s time with us was coming to an end, how would she fare in her next foster home? And how long would it take for her to become a more balanced, stable and happy young person?
‘Do you think she’ll ever be able to get over what she’s been through?’ I said to Jonathan when we talked about the implications and practicalities of her full care order.
‘Honestly, I don’t know. I have a horrible feeling Maria will always be haunted by her past, to a greater or lesser extent.’
‘Haunted,’ I said thoughtfully. ‘Unfortunately that’s a good word to use. Gerry is spooky, isn’t he? He has scared the living daylights out of Maria.’
‘Yes, and Christine is, well, I suppose she’s a bit of a ghostly figure, isn’t she?’ Jonathan replied. ‘I mean, she’s not quite there, as a mum. She’s appeared in Maria’s life when she’s felt like it and then – poof – it’s like she’s disappeared into the ether. It has been so unsettling for Maria, not knowing if her mum is going to be there for her.’
I gave an involuntary shiver. ‘Sorry, my skin just crawled,’ I said.
‘I know that feeling,’ Jonathan replied.
In time, after many weeks, Christine did phone her daughter again, telling her she’d changed her mind about cutting her out of her life, but giving no explanation as to why.
‘That’s good,’ Maria said, looking as if she didn’t know whether to smile or cry. Instead she chose to run, as soon as the call ended, dashing out of the house and across the field. Jonathan gave chase, to make sure she was safe, but luckily Maria didn’t go far.
‘Sorry,’ she said when he caught up with her. ‘I couldn’t help it. I just did it, without thinking.’
‘It’s all right, you’re safe, Maria.’
‘Am I?’
‘Yes,’ Jonathan said. ‘You are safe, Maria.’
She nodded uncertainly and they walked back to the house together.
27
‘I thought it was him!’
Jess, our social worker, informed us that it may take ‘a little while’ for Maria to be found a new long-term foster home, and of course we told her we’d willingly look after Maria for as long as necessary.
‘We love having her,’ I said. ‘And in fact she has already asked if she could say, so I know she’s not in any rush.’
‘That’s a great compliment to you,’ Jess said. ‘It’s a shame that can’t happen, though. You know how much we need to be able to call on you for help with the teenagers, Angela.’
‘I totally understand, and it’s right that Maria moves on to the right type of foster home. I wish you luck in your search.’
While Jess and her colleagues were working behind the scenes to find a permanent foster home for Maria, Jonathan and I were working hard on making sure she enjoyed her remaining time with us.
One weekend we went to a theme park – the one Maria had tried to win tickets for at the local festival when she first stayed with us – and it proved to be a great success. Maria went on all the rides for younger children, while Tom and Dillon went off together to try out all the faster, scarier rides.
Maria hadn’t ever been anywhere like it before and she loved every minute of it, particularly the 3D cinema, which was her favourite activity. When the chairs moved and water shot out of the seat in front of us, I was taken by surprise and screamed, which made Maria hoot with laughter. And Jonathan and I laughed too, as we watched her reaching out to try to touch things she thought were actually there, becoming more and more bemused when she couldn’t find them. In fact, she enjoyed it so much that we ended up going back to the 3D cinema twice, although after the first time she sat on the step that didn’t move, so that she didn’t get wet. Tom and Dillon were not so careful, and when we eventually caught up with them we found them to be soaked to the skin after going on every log flume and water ride they could find.
We had such a good time that when the children spotted a poster for a Halloween camping event near the same park, Jonathan and I readily agreed we could return and stay over for the weekend in the touring caravan. There was to be a fancy dress party at the campsite, and Maria cracked us all up laughing when she decided she wanted to be a ‘little devil’.
‘Is that what you call typecasting?’ Dillon laughed.
‘Why are you laughing? What does typecasting mean?’
‘He’s laughing because it’s so appropriate,’ Tom said, ‘because you are a little devil, Maria!’
She took this in the good spirit in which it was meant, and when we got home we set about making the Halloween costume. It was easy really – a pair of black tights and shoes, a red dress that Mum and I made out of some cheap satiny material and then frayed the edges, all finished off with a pair of red horns attached to a hair band, plus a devil’s fork, picked up at the local supermarket.
The fun started at breakfast on the Friday morning of the camping weekend, when Maria could hardly contain her excitement. By the time I got back from school with her that afternoon, Tom and Dillon were already home and, as soon as they’d all had a drink and a snack, we began to pack up the caravan. By 6.30 that evening we were finally ready to leave.
Just half an hour into the journey Maria started asking, ‘Are we there yet?’
‘No, love,’ I told her. ‘We’ve got about another hour’s drive.’
‘Oh.’ She sighed and settled back in her seat – for about five minutes. Then she asked again, ‘Are we there yet, Angela?’
‘No,’ Dillon replied, before I could say anything. ‘Angela just told you it’ll be another hour yet.’
Maria hadn’t ever been to a fancy dress party of any kind before and she was far too excited to be patient. After she’d asked for the fourth time, I suggested, ‘Let’s play a game.’
I think Tom and Dillon were as relieved as Jonathan was by the prospect of doing something to try to take Maria’s mind off what otherwise promised to be a question asked on a continuous loop, and all three of them answered in unison, ‘Good idea!’ and ‘Yes, let’s!’
‘OK. You all choose a colour of a car and the winner is the first one to spot five cars of their chosen colour. But they have to be driving towards us. Cars parked in side roads don’t count.’ It was a rule I had added after having been caught out before by children appar
ently spotting cars in side roads that no one else had seen.
‘I’ll have silver,’ Tom said immediately.
‘Which is probably the most popular car colour,’ Dillon said sarcastically.
‘Oh really? How odd,’ Tom answered. ‘I chose it because I thought it would be almost impossible to spot any silver cars at all. Duh.’
‘OK, I’ll have blue,’ Dillon laughed.
‘I want silver,’ Maria said.
‘We can’t both have the same colour,’ Tom told her, ‘and I’ve already chosen silver. You’ll have to pick something else.’
‘But that’s not fair.’ I didn’t have to turn around to know that Maria was pouting. ‘It’s my favourite colour. Can’t you choose another one?’
‘OK, I’ll have white.’ I saw Jonathan catch Tom’s eye in the rear-view mirror and smile at him for having deflected what would probably have been a full-scale sulk. In fact, his good deed was rewarded when it suddenly seemed that every car that passed us was white.
‘That’s not fair,’ Maria said again, when Tom won after she had only seen one silver car. But at least Maria had been distracted for a while from asking, ‘Are we there yet?’ And it wasn’t long before we were.
The campsite where the Halloween event was being held was a farmer’s field, and there was a toilet and shower block quite close to where we set up our caravan. Despite having done it many times before, nothing seemed to fit when we tried to attach the awning to the side of the caravan. At first we couldn’t work out what the problem was, and it wasn’t until several people had scratched their heads and tried to help that someone finally realised we’d threaded the awning back to front. So then we had to start all over again, and by the time we finished it was past Maria’s bedtime.
Tom was sleeping under the awning, which he always liked to do, having spent many nights camping – in all weathers – with the Scouts. Maria and Dillon were in the bunk beds that each had their own private cubicle.
‘I want to go in this one,’ Maria said.
‘They’re both the same,’ I replied. ‘Can you take the other one as I’ve already put your bedding in there?’
‘I want this one,’ Maria insisted, tiredness making her sullen.
‘That’s fine,’ Dillon said, removing his bedding. ‘I don’t mind at all.’
‘That’s very nice of you, Dillon,’ I told him, grateful to him for being so amenable. ‘Isn’t it, Maria?’
‘I suppose,’ Maria said, before something made her add, ‘Thanks. I’m sorry. I am a little devil, aren’t I?’
‘No, sweetheart,’ I said. ‘You are tired. Sleep well.’
There were games organised for the following day like egg-and-spoon races, three-legged races and an obstacle course, which involved having to jump over little gates, slide through tubes and eventually sprint to the end.
All the races were divided into age categories. Being competitive, Tom and Dillon were obviously a bit put out when they didn’t come in the top three of their group, and I don’t think they were convinced when I told them later, ‘It’s the taking part that counts. Not the winning.’ Their scepticism wasn’t helped by the fact that Maria came third in the under-elevens and was so excited she spent the rest of the day – and most of the next one – showing us the medal she had won.
Unfortunately, Maria went into a mood when she didn’t win a prize in the fancy dress competition, and there was a rather disturbing incident when she saw one child dressed as a famous character from a horror film.
‘What’s he doing here!’ she screamed, running to hide behind Jonathan.
‘Who?’ Jonathan said.
‘That thing!’
We all looked over to see a boy wearing a Ghostface mask from the movie Scream.
Tom chuckled. ‘It’s not the real character!’ he said. ‘It’s just a boy dressed up.’
‘I didn’t think it was the real character!’ Maria snapped. ‘I thought it was him!’
She started looking all around, as if anxiously checking whether or not she was being followed or watched.
‘Can I have a glow stick, Angela?’
‘Of course you can, sweetheart.’
I took her by the hand to the stall, and while we were waiting in the small queue, Maria whispered, ‘Gerry used to put on a mask like that, just for fun, to scare me!’
‘For fun?’
‘It was fun for him, and Frank and Casey. But not for me.’
My heart sank. It was awful to think of Maria being scared like that and I wondered how anybody could take pleasure from frightening a little girl, least of all her own stepbrothers. Seeing Tom and Dillon treating Maria so well only added to the sadness I felt. Why could Frank and Casey not have been the caring big brothers Maria so desperately needed?
Despite the mask incident, it was a really good weekend, topped off with a day back at the theme park. On the journey home late on the Sunday afternoon, all three children chattered excitedly about everything they’d done.
‘We’ll have to plan the next trip,’ Dillon said. ‘Didn’t you have a magazine from the Caravan Club, Angela?’
‘Yes, it’s here,’ I said, fishing it out of the glovebox. ‘Good idea; they list all the events where you can take the caravan.’
‘Can I come?’ Maria asked, rather nervously.
I turned around just in time to see her bottom lip wobble.
‘Sweetheart, I can’t make any promises,’ I said, chastising myself for being a bit slow here, not pre-empting this as soon as Dillon mentioned the ‘next trip’. ‘I hope so, I really do.’
Maria had put the glow stick from the previous evening around her neck, like a necklace, and now she suddenly took it off. It still had a faint pink glow, and I wondered what she was going to do with it. To my surprise she opened it up until it made a half moon shape and put it in front of her face, making it look as if she was wearing a big, bright smile.
‘I hope so too,’ she said. ‘I would have a smile this big if I could!’
28
‘We’ll take legal action’
Social Services had been advertising for suitable carers for Maria and eventually came up with four possibilities. One couple sounded as though they would be particularly suitable, and I think they had got quite a long way through the assessment process when something cropped up and we were told they weren’t going to be accepted as foster carers for Maria after all. None of the other three sets of potential carers were accepted either: every time it looked as though things were going well, something seemed to come to light that resulted in another couple being dropped from what is, quite rightly, a very rigorous process.
The first step to becoming a foster carer involves filling in a detailed application form. Then there’s an initial visit by a social worker, who looks at where you live and how many bedrooms and communal areas you have. They ask you questions about your understanding of what’s involved in being a foster carer and about your reasons for wanting to foster children, and answer any questions you may have. If you get through that part of the process, the Form F assessment begins, which is carried out by a specially qualified social worker who might visit you anything between half a dozen and a dozen times.
Everyone aged eighteen and over who lives in the same household as someone who wants to become a foster carer is included in the assessment, which involves what used to be called a Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) check and is now a Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check, as well as a local authority check and a medical examination. At some stage during the assessment process, potential foster carers also have to participate in a two-day or three-day Skills to Foster training programme.
If they pass all the checks and examinations, they attend a fostering panel, at which they’re asked questions by panel members who have a broad range of knowledge and experience related to childcare. Having examined the Form F and compiled their own report, the members of the fostering panel will then make a recommendation about the individual’
s suitability as a foster carer. And when the local authority or an independent fostering agency has looked at all the evidence and information, the person concerned will either be approved as a foster carer or not.
Jonathan and I had gone through the lengthy process many years earlier, in the late eighties, but it was still fresh in my mind because I was nervous and extremely keen to be accepted. Fostering felt like something I really had to do, even for a short time. I imagined that it might be something Jonathan and I did until we perhaps had children of our own, but of course life doesn’t always turn out the way you expect.
I think the worst thing for Maria during this time was the uncertainty of not knowing where, and with whom, she would be living for the next few years of her life.
‘How do they “advertise”?’ she asked me one day, as she had heard a social worker talking about the process when she came to visit us at home.
My heart sank. It seemed dreadful to imagine a child being advertised, and even worse to have that child standing in front of you, wide-eyed, asking what it meant and how it worked.
‘Oh, they just write out a little bit about you, so they can match you with the right foster carer.’
‘And they read it and see if they like me?’
‘It’s not if they like you, it’s if they feel you would fit happily into their household.’
‘Oh.’
Thankfully she didn’t ask any more, and when I later saw that Social Services had placed an advert in the local press and relevant magazines, I was of course incredibly careful to keep it out of Maria’s sight, just in case she recognised herself. The advert gave her age and read:
Described as lively and alert, will challenge if not happy. The foster family she joined a year ago enjoy looking after her, saying she is generally well behaved, and she has a healthy appetite. She seeks hugs and cuddles. Attends mainstream school, having recently changed school, where she is now thriving. She has made excellent progress over the past year, and has also thrived since joining the family. Needs firm, clear boundaries.