Foster Care Stories
Katie and Andy’s Story
“You have to view each child like a blank sheet of paper; you can’t start with any judgements or assumptions.”
Katie and Andy are Yorkshire based carers who’ve now been with Team Fostering for nearly two years.
For foster carers Katie and Andy, their journey to foster care was a long one, but full of experience and expertise that shaped them well for the new changes in their lives. Having raised 6 of their own children to adulthood, and with a wealth of experience from their careers working in mental health and disability services, their decision to become foster carers came from a desire to help Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children. Moved to help by stories of young children in desperate need, Katie and Andy looked into the ways they could get involved and were informed that they would need to become registered Foster Carers in order to be able to help. But what was important to them was that they wanted to find an agency that would match with their own personal values – and after a ton of research, they learned about Team Fostering.
They said: “For us, the ‘not-for-profit’ nature of Team Fostering is very important, as we strongly believe that nobody should be making any financial profit out of the care system – particularly when it comes to the welfare of children”
In joining Team Fostering, they found they were pleasantly surprised by the training and support being provided by the staff team from day one. From the earliest Skills to Foster training right through to their regular fostering standards training, they’ve found that even with a wealth of experience from their backgrounds working previously with children and in social care, they still found new areas and skills to learn.
So far, they’ve had three young people placed with them and it’s been a real learning curve throughout.
They said: “You have to view each child like a blank sheet of paper; you can’t start with any judgements or assumptions, and that’s very different to how you behave with birth children.”
“There’s always more you can do with fostering – so it’s a continual learning process. Ultimately though, it’s about being safe, warm, kind and respectful to the young people.”
If you have experience working with children and young people and think that fostering might be the right next step for you, leave us your details on our enquiry form below and a member of our friendly recruitment team will get in touch.