Our fostering service
Children can come into care for many different reasons that requires them to have alternative care. Sometimes this is for a short period of time while for some children they may live with their foster family for their entire childhood and beyond.
Children and young people who are looked after have experienced trauma often through separation and loss, abuse or neglect. Each child is an individual with specific needs, therefore needing bespoke care. This is why fostering is vital - for many children and young people fostering is often their first positive experience of family life.
Our therapeutic fostering service
Break run a therapeutic fostering service where we provide high levels of support to both the foster carers and the young people. We provide a foster family for children and young people aged 7–17 who have complex emotional, behavioural and attachment difficulties.
Some children and young people need to have the intense care offered in a single placement and we aim to provide these young people with therapeutic foster placements to allow them to maximise their life chances. Each placement is carefully matched and planned to meet the specific individual needs.
The fostering team
The fostering team works closely with our Therapeutic services team whom provide therapeutic support, consultation and guidance to carers and young people. The basis of the therapeutic environment given by the foster carers is to build trust with the child in the form of a secure base.
The aim is that children and young people develop a sense of belonging within the family, and our foster carers are committed to the long term/permanency of the young person within their family. This secure base is achieved by giving the young person consistency and by the day to day “re-parenting” in a predictable, nurturing and caring way, with clear boundaries and expectations, modelled by our foster carers.
This enables young people to feel valued, contained and overall safe. From this, self-regulation and self-esteem will begin to emerge. The relationship between the foster carer and the child is integral, and developing a trusting and secure relationship is central to the therapeutic relationship.
Our foster carers offer commitment, love and care to young people and we are seeing tremendous progress. Given these vulnerable children have had a difficult start in life we celebrate the success our young people and foster carers create.
One young person settled into life with their foster family very well and has recently been accepted into the police cadets which was a long term ambition.
One young person in foster care has started a new school, is settled and very happy there. They have achieved a red belt in karate and went on their very first holiday this year, staying in a house which was painted in his favourite colour and enjoyed the castles, waterfalls and walks.
Another young person with a Break foster carer is now achieving at school with 98% school attendance over the last two years. A huge turnaround which will pay dividends in the future.
The Fairer Fostering Partnership
Break is a member of The Fairer Fostering Partnership, a group of charitable and not-for-profit fostering agencies across the UK that advocate for children in respect of regulation as well as representing its membership at central government.
If you would like to talk to Break about referring a child or young person to this or one of our other services please contact us or send a referral to referrals@break-charity.org today.