Greetings, foster mammies and daddies!
And welcome to the Adventures of a Biological Foster Child! I am so thrilled to be welcoming you to this exciting new blog. It is only natural with any blog that the pilot post be one of an introduction – to get us all on our feet together so that we can lay out the directions we will go in throughout our fostering journey. This week, seeing as it is the first week, I will be talking about Adventures of a Biological Foster Child in Ireland; what it is about, why it was created, how it works, and how you can benefit from it. So, without further ado, let’s get started!
As you may have gathered from the home page, I am currently ploughing through a Master of Arts in Creative Writing at University College Cork. Before diving into the world of professional writing at UCC, I didn’t have the kind of support that I do now to channel my ideas into a tangible reality (which is fine – all the more time to plan something like this!). When I began my degree this September I finally had backing from other professional writers to make a start on my career. I knew from the get-go that I wanted to create a blog. As someone who is passionate about short stories, a blog seemed like the perfect way to go, and I had had an idea brewing in the back of my mind for some time…
But who exactly am I?
Well, my mother began fostering when I was two years old (although please keep in mind that your child must now be three years old if you would like to foster). My elder sister was already four at the time, but Patricia didn’t want to wait! Fostering was something that she felt called to her, and if she was going to take the leap she wanted to make sure her own children got used to it sooner rather than later (but don’t worry, you can start fostering when your child is three, thirteen, or thirty!). Alas, over twenty years ago now my poor father found himself being dragged through the front doors of Tusla, his wages in one hand and Patty’s hand in the other. If I sat him down in the local pub now and asked him if he regretted fostering, he would sup his pint and laugh and tell me, “Regret it? I would have switched you and your sister out for those wonderful children if I had the chance”.
From then to now, an amazing and whopping fifty-two children have, at one time in their lives, found themselves between the four walls of our terraced house in County Louth. They shared a room with us, went to school with us, and ate dinner with us while their parents figured some things out. Most importantly, they learned that foster care was not something you entered and never left, and that it most certainly was not their fault that they had found themselves in it.
I would consider myself a textbook case of how to raise your biological children alongside those you foster in the best way. Not too many years ago my mother would take me along to group training sessions with new foster parents (like yourselves!), where we would answer questions they had, and tell them of our experiences navigating a world in which many different forms of trauma moseyed through our home. At the end of those sessions, I would often find a queue of parents in front of me with questions about how I ‘coped’ with other kids coming into my house. Was I jealous? Did I feel like my mammy loved me less because she was taking care of other kids? What happened when a foster child told me a big secret about something bad that had happened to them? The questions were endless, and they stuck with me years after I’d heard and tried to answer them. I felt much like my own mother in this situation; I felt called to do something. I wanted to answer their questions, to put their fears to rest because I was fine! I loved my temporary companions! But how would I do that?
I had to put the idea on hold for a while – do my Leaving Cert, focus on a bachelor’s degree, party a little – and once I arrived home with my bachelor’s in hand I started applications for a Creative Writing Master’s straight away. This idea in the back of my mind had bullied its way to the front and was giving out stink to me for ignoring it for so long. If I waited any longer it was going to storm out the front door and leave me forever, and I couldn’t let that happen.
And so, here we are. I secured my place at UCC, drank in all the information about media writing that I could, and invested in a domain! But I didn’t want to pick through the haystack to find you all myself. I wanted to reconnect with those groups I used to talk to, so I reached out to Kerry Hession, marketing executive at Orchard Fostering and pitched her the idea for this blog. To my own delight she loved it, and has been the helping hand behind the scenes that has led you here!
How will this blog work?
In honour of the days when I would sit in front of you physically and give you the floor, my wish is to uphold that tradition in the virtual realm. With this in mind, I’ve designed this site in a way that gives you, the readers, the power. Each week there will be a new topic chosen by you through the question portal, where I will pile all your questions together and talk about the one that prevails. If your question is quite specific, or maybe hasn’t been asked before, don’t worry. I will be doing spotlight weeks where I bring these questions into the light as new ground to be explored, so you’ll get your answer!
For the time being, I will be posting a new blog bi-weekly on Wednesdays or Thursdays at midday. You can subscribe to the site if you’d like notifications when a new post goes up, so you don’t miss a thing. I am a glutton for feedback, too, so any suggestions you might have to make this community more open and welcoming to the needs of all who join are most certainly appreciated. At the end of the day this blog is for you, because we need more foster carers in Ireland. The percentage of unaccompanied minors entering the country is rising every year, and the ratio of foster parents to foster children is growing further apart as numbers climb. My sister and I are twenty-five and twenty-two now, and growing up in the world of fostering has made us headstrong advocates of child welfare. We already know we are going to foster, and we’re hellbent on convincing everyone we can find to take that route with us. I’ll admit, this is propaganda. I am propaganda-ing you to take the leap, because you won’t be taking it alone! Orchard Fostering will be holding one hand, and I’ll be holding the other.
I really hope you enjoyed this first blog post. As our following finds its legs, I have decided to choose the coming week’s (20/21 October) topic for us – Introducing Temporary Guests to Permanent Ones. There will be anecdotes and real-life experiences – what went well, what didn’t – and a space for us to have a chat at the end. After that, blogs will go up every two weeks as planned. I hope to see you there.
‘Til next week,
Naoise
Naoise McGuinness 