Welcome to Fostering Fridays!
Our hope is that you will be able to get a taste of what it's like to foster by reading our experiences and thoughts!
We all know them....the child who throws a fit because they don't get their way or they feel like they don't have a choice....the parent who mistakenly asks, "What do you want?"
It's so simple, but believe it or not, it took me a little while to adjust my brain to it. For one, with my typical, biological kiddos, they were usually content with my answers or decisions on things. They had been raised to know that mom and dad have the last say and that we would try to arrange some things so that they got some choice on things. They also knew that we had their best interests at heart. Thus, there were rarely meltdowns when they didn't get their way.
It's different with our foster kiddos that may also have some special needs. Typically, these kids come from very tough situations. They have no choices about anything in their lives. And frankly, they may not have had anyone in their life thus far that has had their best interest in mind when they decided things for them. As little as even a year old, they start letting their caregivers know that they want a choice in things, which can cause frustration.
It may happen this way:
Little Suzy is demanding. She wants her choice in her clothes. Foster mom really wants Suzy to wear something nice to go to school but she makes the mistake of asking Suzy what she wants to wear. She points at the closet and says, "Suzy what do you want to wear?" Suzy grabs her favorite stained shirt and sweatpants. Foster mom insists that she cannot wear that and the meltdown happens. Before too much time goes by, Little Suzy is screaming, foster mom is frustrated and the morning is off to a bad start.
Let's try this:
Little Suzy is still demanding and insistent on choosing her clothes. But this time foster mom says, "Suzy, do you want to wear the pink shirt or the blue shirt?" Instead of pointing at the closet, she has limited Suzy's choice to something she, foster mom, would be happy with either way. Suzy still gets a choice and is happy that she gets to choose.
We had one kiddo who would still pout about the choices once in a while. When this happened, we would say, "I will count to 10. If you cannot choose, I will choose for you." He did NOT want to miss out on choosing and would jump up and choose.
We have used this tool for time out even! One child would throw a fit about having some thinking time. We would say, "Would you like 5 minutes or 10 minutes?" He still got his time for thinking, but he got a choice about how long. We were fine with either one. One time he chose 10 minutes. Afterwards he said, "I'll do five minutes next time." I had to smile at that one!
This is a tool that can have some amazing benefits. Try it this week and see what you think and let me know!
Till next time...
Have a blessed day and embrace the craziness in your life!
Heidi
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Heidi