Michelle and Matthew from Crossmaglen have been fostering for around 3 years. They have a 7 year old child and 3 grown up children. They are looking after a teenager on a long-term basis.
“We’d thought about fostering for quite some time. We were actually going through the process first time round, when I became pregnant with our son so we took a bit of time out. When he was 2 ½ though we thought it was time to get the ball rolling again and went for it!” says Michelle, a classroom assistant.
She continues: “We think its been really good for our son to share his home with another young person who needed a loving home and to understand that life can be difficult for some children.
Assessment
We actually found the assessment very useful – lots of people perhaps don’t think they have the necessary skills or experience – but we found looking into our past made us realise we had more experience than we thought.
Training & support
Being a working parent, I’ve found online training more flexible as we can sit in the evenings and take part at our leisure.
Fostering was very much a family decision – all the boys were so supportive of us taking on the foster carer role – they’re 100% behind us. Matthew’s cousin is also a foster carer so we spoke to her before we went for it – it really helped to talk to someone who is living the life of a foster carer.
Rewards
Our son idolises our young teen. They’re great Nintendo switch buddies! He is just part of our family and he’s settled really well. There’s been a transformation in him since he came last year and that in itself is reward enough.
It’s a fantastic thing to do for a child to help them become the best they can be and set them up for life as an adult. I’d say to anyone thinking about fostering, go for it!”