In this lesson, you will learn:
- The impact of separation and loss on children
- Ideas to keep children connected and maintain family ties
- How to make a lifebook with a child
LESSON TWO: Why Is Continuity Important?
Why is it important to maintain ties? Isn’t it just easier to keep a child separated from his parents, away from the turmoil and the abuse?
Unfortunately, "out of sight and out of mind" does not work with children. If the goal is reunification, children in care need to keep contact with their families. If the goal changes, children need to be able to talk and have someone to help them resolve those feelings about the loss of that relationship.
Imagine yourself a child. Imagine if someone came to your home and ask you to leave quickly and unexpectedly with no warning. You were being taken somewhere but you weren’t sure where. The person who is leading you looks very official and seems to have authority tells you leave with him. “We will take you to a safe place. Don’t worry. Trust me.” The official takes you away and takes you to a home that looks unfamiliar to you. You feel very lost. You want to go back home. But everyone continues to tell you not to worry.
If you were a child, what would your fears be? In your learning journal, write down at least two examples
In the exercise above, what did you write down as your possible fears? Some fears a child might have include:
- Where are my parents?
- When will I see my family again?
- Have I been abandoned?
- Is this forever or will I be able to go home soon?
- What did I do wrong to be punished like this?
- Do my parents know where I am?
- Will they come looking for me?
- Do they care that I am gone?
- What is going to happen to me?
- How long do I have to live with these people?
- Who are these people and will they be safe? Will they know how to take care of me?
- Will I see my brother again? Can my dog come live here too?
- Is my mom okay?
When children come into foster care, they lose their center of security. They run the risk of losing their ties with their family, their community, and possibly their culture. The process of separation can hurt a child’s sense of safety and attachment. Even though we protect a child from harm, we may also be causing severe stress and anxiety. These ties become even more important if a child is moved from one foster home to another.
The Importance of Family Connections for Children in Care
In the book, Maintaining Family Ties: Inclusive Practice in Foster Care, author Sally E. Palmer says children need either contact with their parent or at the least, a chance to resolve the feelings they have about their parents. It is important that connections with the birth parents be acknowledged either by encouraging them or by talking about them.
Some highlights of the extensive research covered in the book include the following:
- Children who have been abandoned or have a hostile relationship with their parents require help to come to terms with feelings and the relationship. These children need therapists and caregivers who are not afraid to talk to them about their parents.
- If children can’t have a relationship with their parents, they may have trouble forming relationship with substitute caregivers because they are afraid of being disloyal. Children need to know that their foster parents accept their family ties, or else they will feel conflict and stress.
- Children need to maintain ties if they are to counter the feelings of separation and keep a connection to their family. This is critical in successful reunification
- If children don’t have contact with their parents, they may begin to feel abandoned. This may lead to an idealization of parents and an unrealistic longing or pining for parents who no longer visit them.
- Children have extended family as well including cultural ties. Even if they are not able to have a healthy relationship with parents, they still may have healthy relationships with siblings, extended family members, grandparents and their culture.
This will not be able to happen unless resource families believe in the importance of supporting the connections between a child and his family. Sometimes social workers may be hesitant to have birth families and resource families work together. Birth families may need to be farther along in their treatment before they are able to accept contact with a foster parent. But children need the adults in their life to accept the connections they have been forced to leave behind and to make the efforts to keep the healthy ones alive.