Cathy Glass

We’ve all done it. We arrive at a support group meeting singing the praises of the child who has just arrived to live with us, and who had a reputation for very challenging behaviour but it is now an angel. We give ourselves a little pat on the back. It was easy really. We started as we meant to carry on and put in place the boundaries for good behaviour, and the child or young person responded. There was also some suggestion that there might have been a personality clash between the child and the previous carer’s family, so all in all the move was better for everyone. The child is settling in well and all is rosy.

With the long summer holidays shortly upon us I thought it might be a good time to have a look at the importance of play. Play is essential for children of all ages.

One of the issues I explore in my book Happy Kids is that of respect. So often when I see the children I foster with their natural parents, I see a complete absence of respect. Not only from the children to their parents, and vice-versa, but also between the parents themselves, and from the parents towards other adults. It is so sad, and it makes working with these families and trying to rebuild relationships difficult. No one listens to anyone else, as each person focuses solely on their own needs; shouting orders, commands and insults, oblivious to each other.

A couple of weeks ago I posted a small piece on the social networking website Facebook saying that a child I was looking after had been tied to his chair as a punishment. There was no risk of the child being identified but I was so incensed by the harm done to this child that I wanted to share what had happened. I feel it is important that the public are aware that this type of chastisement is still used sometimes and that it is very wrong. One of the reasons I write my fostering memoirs is to try and raise public awareness in the hope of reducing child abuse, as well as educating the public to report it.

I was recently asked in an interview why I began fostering and why I continue to do so despite all the frustrations and upsets that fostering can bring. The interviewer was a rather glamorous and highly motivated journalist who clearly had her sights set high.

I am often asked if it is better to foster for the local authority (LA) or an independent fostering agency. Once upon a time there were no independent agencies and all children who came into care were placed ‘in house’, that is, with a foster carer recruited by the local authority. For various reasons the LAs couldn’t match supply with demand - they couldn’t recruit or keep enough foster carers to look after all the children they were bringing into care so independent agencies sprang up to take up the shortfall.

“We are what we eat”. That is to say, the food we eat is absorbed by our bodies and therefore becomes part of us. But it is not only our bodies and our physical health that is affected by what we eat, but also our brains and central nervous system. While researching my book Happy Mealtimes For Kids, I learnt a lot. I thought I might share some of this with you.

When I was growing up the average person had never heard of ADHD, autism, Asperger's syndrome, bipolar disorder, attachment disorder, conduct disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, development delay, specific learning difficulties, or any of the conditions which now seem to be endemic in our children.