One of the hardest aspects of being a foster parent is being part of a team of professionals that perhaps doesn't consider us, as foster parents, real members of a professional team. Because of this how often do we get a chance to share our true feelings with the team and actually feel heard?
While we want to be honest and respectful in how we speak to our foster care social workers, sometimes we may feel that it is best to just keep quiet. Maybe we stay quiet because we're afraid that we won't be understood, or that we can't say what we want to say without emotion. It is important to build an effective partnership with your foster care social worker, even when you don't always feel heard. Take this opportunity to tell social workers what you want them to know about foster parenting. This is just an opportunity to send a mass message to any and all social workers so that they may get a clearer picture of how foster parents really feel.
Whether you are a foster parent, a foster child, a birth parent, or perhaps even another worker - what do you wish you could tell a foster care social worker? How would you finish this sentence,
I was thinking maybe foster care social workers feel the same way, so for the social workers, foster children, and birth family out there, how would you finish this sentence,
Take this opportunity to open up lines of communication and get an idea of how the 'other side' of foster care really thinks and feels.
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