If parents can’t care for their kids, why do they get to see them?

Family contact is a hotly debated issue that is not easily explained in a short blog post. But let's consider this the start of the conversation and we’ll regularly come back to this topic over time. People question why the parents seem to have ‘all these rights’ that may seem at odds to the needs of the children; unsettling them when commencing a new placement to arrange contact visits, limiting their ability to engage in weekend sports or disrupting school hours to see parents.

Carers see children become anxious, stressed, disrupted in their behaviour when contact is coming; they also then see children dysregulated after contact, upset to be away from their family of origin, angry they’re in foster care, away from siblings or neighbours or friends. Carers can be frustrated at last minute cancellations; limited notice when contact sessions are cancelled; sometimes having to supervise those contact; parents giving too much sugary treats or snacks; or even case workers giving kids Maccas on the way home after contact, leaving the kids not hungry to eat their healthy dinners (or making other kids in the home, including foster carers’ own children, jealous or disappointed that they don’t get the same ‘special treatment’). Sounds like a mine field, right? So they why do we support family contact?

Think about everything that is important to you. It could be your pet, your childhood ‘bestie’, your grandma’s special recipe, that family tradition that involves filling a bedroom with balloons for when your child wakes up on their birthday. Traditions, values, beliefs, days of celebration, ways of communicating, foods, music, arts - many of these (if not all of them) are influenced by our upbringing. We may actively seek to change them (like choosing not to smack our kids, despite this being a prominent part of our own childhoods), or actively embrace them (like going on camping trips with neighbours and friends). Or we may be less conscious of why we have certain things that are important to us, or not so.

Children in care often have SO many important ‘things’ taken from them – a special toy, a special meal, a unique smell of a perfume or flower at their home, a special song their older sibling would sing to them to help them block out unhappy noises at home. Some of these are ‘things’ they can remember and are tangible – maybe they can bring their toy with them, maybe they can be reminded of the song by a sibling if they enter the same placement, but many, many things, sometimes all of them - are taken away from the child when they are removed from their birth family. This leaves them not only without their parents; but their siblings, their neighbours, their school friends, their special items, and even their pets. Any opportunity to help children remain connected to their family through contact (and when we mean ‘contact’, we don’t just mean with birth parents, we mean siblings, aunts/uncles, grandparents, cousins and even friends and community members). These connections help children in SO many ways.

1. It assists with reunification or restoration (when children go ‘home’ to their family of origin). If this is their case plan, having minimal contact makes it harder for children to remain connected and know the other members of their household - making the transition back to that home even harder after being away. It’s the same for parents. Imagine trying hard to prove you can care for your child, without being actually able to evidence this because the child isn’t in your care! Seeing them 1-2 hours a week is very different from being their 24-7 parent again, so contact should and for the most part does increase when reunification is getting closer, to we don’t set up the parents (or the child) to fail!

2. It helps with attachments! Everyone has attachments to others – whether healthy or not. But attachments to birth parents tend to be life long, so severing these without any form of contact can be destructive for a child. Research is clear that even if a child enters into a long-term foster care arrangement until they become an adult, their attachment to their parent remains part of their foundation for how they connect with others and impacts upon their ability to build resiliency (the ability to ‘bounce back’ and handle change and challenges in life) required for later in life.

3. Connections with family are critical to a child’s sense of identity as well. Children need to have an understanding of who they are, why they are in care, where they have come from so they can understand why and where they are going in the future, so as to become young people and adults with a positive sense of self.

We’re not saying they shouldn’t be taken into foster or kinship care. When its evidenced and proven in court that a child is at an unreasonable and unsafe level of harm or risk of harm, absolutely their safety is paramount and they need to go to a placement that can provide for their every need until they have a parent willing and able to care for them as they deserve. However, like a parent has a right to try to improve and change their lifestyle to ensure their child will be safe in their care, that child has a right to be connected with their family, within their community, surrounded by their culture, wherever possible too.

Family contact doesn’t always have to mean face-to-face contact that is unsupervised. There are many levels of different types of contact. Foster carers will have to be mindful of whatever contact plans are put in place by the state’s child protection department or the court. This may include:

• Face to face, unsupervised contact

• Face to face, supervised contact, supervised by a third party/family member/friend

• Face to face, supervised contact, supervised by a practitioner/professional

• Face to face, supervised contact, supervised by the foster carer

• Phone or virtual contact, supervised or unsupervised

• Letter/written contact, supervised or unsupervised.

But there are also other ways for children to have ‘contact’ with family that is indirect.

• Talking with children about their families, what they liked about where they lived, what meals they enjoyed, activities they did, music or TV they would listen or watch together. This helps children know you value their parents or family of origin and that its ok to talk about them, given they may miss them terribly.

• Putting together photos or scrapbooking of the child’s time with you to share with the family of origin, talking together about what mum or dad might say or think, helping the child feel at ease to know that the important things in their lives (like their new home, their new pet, their new school or new friend) will be recorded in some meaningful way and shared with their parent.

• Drawing pictures of family – both of their family of origin and of their foster family – and sharing these at family contact sessions or through their departmental worker, can be a great way for children to remain ‘connected’ with their family without actual physical contact established.

• Even when contact is not allowed for some reason, helping children write a letter, keep a diary or journal, or do a video log that captures how they feel, what is important and what is going on for them on any given day while away from their family, is something that can help offer reassurance that one day, their parent may get the chance to read it or see it.

I remember working with a young girl who wasn’t allowed any contact due to the nature of the harm and abuse she suffered. During the time she was in the care of a foster carer I worked with, she was not encouraged to talk about them; they were almost a ‘he-who-shall-not-be-named’ situation. Sadly, over time, she began to romanticise and fantasise about who her parents were and what it would be like to return to their care. All of the ‘bad’ things were forgotten; the daydreamed empty promises about being flowergirl at their wedding, being allowed a puppy, having a Barbie Dreamhouse were all cemented in stone for her and she built a ‘story’ of their brilliance to sustain her being away from them for so long. So, as soon as she reached the age of 15, she became running away from her carers’ home and self-placing at home.

There she was swept away with their lifestyle which involved drug taking, violence and more empty promises, until she too became a ‘statistic’ – a foster child who did not finish high school, who battled drug addiction, experienced homelessness and had a child herself, who was removed and placed in foster care.

Other children I’ve seen struggle through difficult contact over the years yet have had better outcomes. They’ve had carers who could have easily blamed the children’s behaviours on the sugary treats or the inconsistent attendance or the disengaged parent who spent contact entirely scrolling Facebook on their phones. But they didn’t. They swallowed any negative views, keeping them to themselves, reminding the child their parent loved them in their own way, but maybe just weren’t able to care for them ‘right now’. That they were special and loved and valued by their parents, but that some people show love and care in different ways.

That they could talk openly about missing their parents, but maybe also actually starting to like living with their carers, where they knew what to expect, were fed well and encouraged to go to school. Those children learnt they didn’t have to CHOOSE between their parents and their foster carers – they could love and care about both.

One young person I worked with at 15 talked openly with his carers about his mum’s mental health, about his worries for his siblings still in her care, about his love for her, but his mistrust in her too. His carers were simply present, engaged, neutral, respectful. And when he turned 18, yes he jumped on the first plane to move in with her. But after 1 month, after she had spent his hard-earned savings, tried to get him to do and buy drugs for her, treated his siblings poorly, and been a challenge to live with, he also knew he could call his carers (which he did) and ask them to send a plane ticket for him to come back to them (which they did). He went on to tell me, “I know and love my mum, but I don’t have to live with her or be like her!”

So when people tell me ‘parents seem to have more rights than the kids’, while it may seem so at times, remember - it is a human right for children to have contact with their family members (including siblings!!) when it's safe to do so. Carers have the incredible, difficult but powerful job of supporting contact in some form, in the vast majority of cases. Let's remember as well - long after we are gone (professionals, and carers too) these children will still have their family of origin. They may or may not choose to connect with them, but their mum remains their mum, and their dad remains their dad. If foster carers are supportive and respectful of children’s birth families, then they too will be remain their family, long after the child ‘needs’ them to be.

See you next time.

Mel (Co Founder)