‘Angela! Guess what? Maria said excitedly one day. ‘Mum’s moving again and she wants me to go with her.’
I was taken aback but not entirely shocked, because I’d learned that Maria’s moods could change like the wind, especially if her mum was pulling strings in the background.
It seemed Christine and her baby were going to go and live hundreds of miles away, with a man Christine had met online and apparently scarcely knew.
‘Mum says I can go with them, as soon as she’s settled in her new home, which will be great, because I really want to get to know my little sister better.’
My heart sank. This did not sound like a good plan, especially with Maria’s GCSEs looming. I was also saddened to hear Maria say she wanted to get to know her sister ‘better’. The truth was, she had never met her, and had only seen one photograph Babs had at her house.
As Maria was still on a full care order she wouldn’t be able to live with her mother without the agreement of Social Services, and possibly also the court. I had to talk to the social workers about this offer from Christine. She’d been checked by Social Services and they obviously thought she was capable of looking after her baby, and safe to do so, and for that reason I reasoned they might also agree for Christine to care for Maria again, despite what had gone on in the past.
Though I didn’t want Maria to be upset, ultimately I was relieved when Social Services refused to let her go. I felt it was the right decision. Maria needed to at least do her exams, and I didn’t want her to be subjected to any unnecessary upheaval if things didn’t work out as planned with Christine.
Jonathan also felt very sad when I told him about Maria’s initial reaction to her mother’s offer.
‘It’s upsetting, isn’t it, how Maria still wants to be with her mum, despite everything?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But there’s no accounting for the strength of the bond between mother and child, and how forgiving children generally are.’
Jonathan gave me a hug. Even though I have dearly loved the foster children we have cared for and I know many of them have loved me, I have never considered myself a ‘substitute mum’ in any way. I don’t even call myself a foster mother, in fact. I’m a foster carer, and over the years I have fully accepted and embraced the role, even though at times I have felt as I did now with Maria: completely crushed by the fall-out from that bond.
Social Services did agree to allow Maria to visit her mother and little sister, and in the next school holidays she and Babs excitedly took a train to Christine’s, where they also met her new partner, Ben. Social Services paid for everything.
‘My little sister is gorgeous and Ben’s really nice,’ Maria told us when she came back. ‘Almost completely the opposite of my stepdad in every way. He doesn’t shout and he laughs about things that are funny, not when someone hurts themselves.’
Maria told us she would like to go and live with them after her exams, when she was sixteen. Social Services would have to check out the situation, of course, but ultimately if Christine’s new set-up was deemed suitable for Maria, then of course we would have to let her go with a smile on our faces and optimism in our hearts – what else could we do?
One of the things you wish for as a foster carer is that the parents of the children you look after will somehow manage to turn their own lives around so that their children can go home and live with them again in better circumstances. The paradox is that when you become attached to a child – which you very often do, even when they live with you for a relatively short period of time – the parents’ gain is, in effect, your loss, and it can sometimes be a wrench emotionally.
Social Services began the checks they would have to make before Maria was allowed to move back with her family, but unfortunately, before the process was even completed, I heard from a social worker that Christine had voluntarily handed over the care of her youngest child to Social Services. Maria was very upset when she found out about it. She locked herself in her room for a while, and then she told me, ‘Before you ask, I don’t want to talk about it.’
‘OK, but if you change your mind . . .’
‘I won’t. I was stupid to think it would all work out in the first place.’
Babs was typically nonchalant about the situation.
‘I told you – she loses interest when they become toddlers,’ she said with a sigh, although, at the time, we didn’t really know why it had happened.
Despite the fact Christine had put her baby into care, Social Services still had a legal obligation to facilitate contact between Maria and her mother, and Maria went again to visit her mum, with Babs. During this visit Christine suggested that Maria could still go and live with her, even though her sister was in care. Maria was interested in this possibility – her loyalty to her mother seemingly knew no bounds – and as a result Social Services continued their checks into whether or not they would allow this to happen.
They also paid for Christine to visit Maria, including paying for her to stay in a hotel in our town. Maria met her mum at Babs’s house, so we didn’t actually have anything to do with Christine on this occasion.
‘I told Social Services I could stay with you next time so they didn’t have to worry about putting me up in a hotel,’ Christine apparently told Babs. According to Babs, Christine said this as if she were making some generous gesture towards Social Services, which didn’t surprise me. In our experience, it was not uncommon for parents to feel incredibly entitled to have Social Services pay for their travel and accommodation to see their own children. We’ve fostered some children whose parents refused to see them at all unless Social Services paid the entire cost of their journey, whether it was just a few miles or halfway across the country. But at least Christine came.
While all this was going on, Jonathan and I were both very happy that Maria was staying with us at least for the time being, and she told us she was determined to do well in her exams, whatever happened. Unfortunately, Maria’s commitment to studying could be erratic, and she sometimes refused to follow the school’s rules.
For example, we didn’t know Maria had stopped wearing her uniform until we received a letter from the school and discovered that, after leaving our house appropriately dressed in the mornings, she was calling in at her grandparents’ house en route to school to change into trainers and the baggy trousers she favoured at the time. Then, at the end of the school day, she would simply reverse the process and arrive home wearing her uniform again.
When I raised the subject with Babs she seemed uncomfortable for a moment, then looked me straight in the eye and said, ‘Maria does come here in the mornings, to have a cup of tea before she goes to school. And I let her change into her trainers because she doesn’t like her school shoes. They’re too small for her and they hurt her toes.’
Making sure that all the children we foster have shoes that fit them perfectly is something we’ve always been very vigilant about. So, although it was quite possible that Maria had used sore toes as an excuse to her grandmother, I knew it wasn’t true.
‘I wonder why she hasn’t said anything to us about the shoes hurting her toes,’ I said. ‘They’re definitely the right size. I can understand that Maria might not like them. But she has to wear them to school because they’re part of the uniform. Trainers aren’t allowed.’
‘Oh, I see.’ Her grandmother nodded, as if to imply that she hadn’t realised there was a school uniform at all. ‘In that case, I’ll make sure she wears them in future.’
Babs really did sound as though she meant what she was saying. But, even so, I was only mildly surprised when we received another letter from the school a couple of days later and I realised that nothing had changed.
Sometimes, ignoring what we’d said and going behind our backs to elicit the support of her grandmother backfired on Maria quite badly.
‘I’m going to get one of those home hair-dyeing kits and put dark streaks in my hair,’ she told me one day.
‘I’m not sure that putting streaks in is as easy as it might sound,’ I said, looking at her mousey-blonde hair. ‘It’s not as simple as changing the colour overall. But, in any case, your school won’t allow it. They have a strict policy on hair dyeing.’
‘That’s just stupid.’ Maria was already flouncing out of the room as she said it, leaving Jonathan and me to count slowly to five as we waited for the sound of her bedroom door slamming.
A couple of days later, Maria went to her grandparents’ house after school, where she used a cap with holes in it and a bottle of black hair dye to create a look that would have shocked even the most open-minded zebra! It wasn’t funny at the time though. It was exasperating to know that Maria’s grandmother had once again allowed her to do something she must have known we – or the school – wouldn’t sanction, and it was very sad to see how devastated Maria was when she realised what she’d done.
The one silver lining was the fact that Maria hadn’t managed to pull many sections of the hair closest to her scalp through the holes in the cap. A haircut – by a professional hairdresser – dealt with the worst of the streaks. Fortunately, we had a very good relationship with Maria’s school, having fostered quite a few children over the years who had gone there. So, after writing an apologetic letter explaining what had happened, it was just a case of waiting for the rest of Maria’s streaky hair to grow out.
After that incident, we asked Maria’s grandmother yet again, and very politely, if she could check with us before allowing Maria to do anything significant, such as changing her appearance in any way. And yet again Babs told us, earnestly, that she understood what we were saying and that the next time Maria asked to do anything we might reasonably be expected to have an opinion about, she would definitely say no, at least until she’d spoken to us.
Babs didn’t ever say no to Maria, of course. She continued to let her do exactly what she wanted to do, however negative the impact might be on Maria herself. For instance, Maria was still overweight, but Babs let her eat whatever junk she wanted. We knew this because Maria made no secret of it, telling us about all the different types of fizzy drinks, biscuits and crisps her grandmother kept in her kitchen. It was so frustrating, when all Jonathan and I were trying to do was guide Maria in the right direction so that she would be healthy, happy in herself and able to make good decisions about her life as an adult.
We told ourselves time and time again that, with a great deal of determination and persistence, it is possible to help children turn their lives around – some children, at least – and we didn’t give up, despite the way Babs carried on.
There were times when Maria seemed to be learning to make good decisions herself that would enable her to have the life she deserved, and that we knew she had the potential to achieve. And there were times when she didn’t seem to have the mental or physical energy to choose – let alone follow – any specific path at all.
Despite putting her second daughter into care, Christine seemed to settle into her new life on the other side of the country with her new partner. However, besides her occasional visits to stay with Babs and visit Maria, and some irregular phone calls, she and Maria had little contact.
Social Services ultimately decided that Maria should stay living with us until she was at least sixteen, when her case would be looked at again. By the time we heard this news Maria seemed to be resigned to that outcome, and was not upset or even disappointed.
‘Oh well, we knew that, didn’t we?’ Maria shrugged. ‘Maybe it’s for the best.’
Touchingly, she had knitted a hat for her little sister, with my mum’s help, and she told me, ‘I’ve already wrapped it up ready to post. I’ll do that tomorrow.’