#54: A Big Heart And Spare Room Is Not A Care Plan, with Gareth K Thomas

“All you need is a big heart and a spare room” might be the most damaging sentence in foster care. I'm joined by Gareth K. Thomas, former foster parent and childhood trauma consultant (Clarified), to unpack why that kind of messaging sets carers up to fail and pulls children into yet another painful move. If we want placement stability and better outcomes for children in out-of-home care, we have to stop treating foster parents like the hired help and start treating them as the primary healing environment.

We talk about what trauma-informed fostering looks like on the ground: co-regulation, widening the window of tolerance, and the small “magic micro moments” that add up to a therapeutic bath no weekly appointment can match. Gareth shares why the best services don’t do therapy to children in isolation, they bring carers into the work and build a shared understanding across schools, social workers, and clinicians. We also dig into the uncomfortable bit, how “support” can become shaming training when a carer says they’re struggling, and why reflective space matters when everyone’s prefrontal cortex is going offline under stress.

You’ll also hear practical examples of the scaffolding that keeps families going: consistent short breaks, empathic listener phone calls, therapeutic supervising social workers, and peer groups where lived experience is treated as real expertise. Gareth closes by sharing what he wants from policy leaders, plus what he’s building next, including Trauma Space and a new book on therapeutic parenting for teens and tweens.

If this conversation helps, subscribe, share it with someone in the care sector, and leave a review so more carers and professionals can find it. What would you change first to make fostering sustainable?

Gareth's Bio:

Gareth K Thomas is a former foster parent and child trauma specialist. He’s a trainer, speaker and (soon-to-be-published author). He works as a trauma-informed consultant through his organisation, Clarified, and is in the process of launching Trauma Space, which will be a course collection and community for those parenting and working with children who’ve experienced trauma.

Links:

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Podcast Blog Site: https://thesecurestartpodcast.com/

Disclaimer: Information reported by guests of this podcast is assumed to be accurate as stated. Podcast owner Colby Pearce is not responsible for any error of facts presented by podcast guests. In addition, unless otherwise specified, opinions expressed by guests of this podcast may not reflect those of the podcast owner, Colby Pearce. Finally, all references to case examples are anonymised to the extent that the actual case could not be identified, or are fictional but based on real-life examples for illustrative purposes.

Transcript

Welcome And The Core Tension

Colby 0:00

Welcome to the Secure Start podcast brought to you by the Secure Start Aura apps supporting trauma-informed care and practice at home and in school.

Gareth 0:17

There quite often seems to be this idea that if a um foster parent raises their hand and says, I'm struggling, that they are sort of sent on training, but sent on training that almost views them as the problem, that it's like you're not doing your job well enough, you're struggling, you can't cope. And that's the you know, if you're going on training and it sees you as the problem, then it's never really going to work. Whereas what I would say about the approach, certainly that I have with with the training that I deliver, certainly on lots of the fantastic training that I've had access to, is that the parent is seen as the solution, not the problem. We have a major issue around how we recruit foster parents, I believe. Um there is still, you know, a hint of kind of, I mean, sometimes I literally see adverts that that say this, but um sometimes it's it's a bit more subtle. This idea that all you need is a big heart and a spare room. Um and that that equips you to be a foster parent and it's everything that you'll need. Um, and you know, of course, what you hope there is that you um recruit people who are really nice and in it for all the right reasons, and that also they have the space for the for the child to live. Um, so you know, I I know it comes from a good place, but it's really misguided because that is not enough. You you need uh a great professional network of you know people around you, you need uh uh you know an emotional support network of friends and family, um, or a mix of one or the other, or you know, whatever it is. Um, you need a huge amount of knowledge, you need um ways to take care of yourself because this is you know beyond standard parenting. Um and so what we're doing by by saying, you know, spare room big heart is we are recruiting people who are totally unprepared. They've been lied to. I mean, I really kind of want to make that very clear. And that's not how that's not how we achieve success. You know, I mean, if I if I apply for a job and they say, great news, you don't need any qualifications, and I turn up on day one and I'm you know carrying out surgery, then it's probably not gonna go very well. You know, I've been set up to fail. This has by far been the hardest thing I've ever done. If I got asked a hundred times if I wanted to do it again, I would say yes, every single time. That's the way that we recruit the right people because we want people who are up for a challenge, we want people that have that tenacity, that don't really give up, that will advocate for their kids, that will fight tooth and nail for them. Those are the people we want. And if you kind of, if you want a cushy life and an easy ride, then fostering isn't for you. We can't have kids going to newly approved foster parents day after day, week after week, with no chance of staying there long term because it was never going to work with the best will in the world. Um, quite often what we see from the rhetoric is that there is a recruitment crisis in fostering. I always make the point that there is a retention crisis.

Colby 3:09

Welcome

Gareth’s Path Into Fostering

Colby 3:10

to the Secure Star podcast. I'm Colby Pearce, and joining me for this episode is an inspirational former foster parent and foster care consultant. Before I begin this episode, I'd just like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands I come to you from, the Kaurna people of the Adelaide Plains, and acknowledge the continuing connection the living Kaurna people feel to land, waters, culture, and community. I'd also like to pay my respects to their elders, past, present, and emerging. My guest this episode is Gareth K. Thomas. Gareth is a former foster parent and child trauma specialist. He's a trainer, speaker, and soon-to-be published author. He works as a trauma-informed consultant through his organization Clarified, and is in the process of launching Trauma Space, which will be a course collection and community for those parenting and working with children who've experienced trauma. I do hope you enjoy our conversation. Well, Gareth, welcome to the Secure Start Podcast.

Gareth 4:34

Thank you for having me, Colby. Thank you.

Colby 4:36

And I um I can't help but notice that you're wearing uh light clothing and um yeah, it's more like we should be you should be in Australia and I should be in the UK where you are, I guess. Yeah, we've switched climate. Yeah, yeah, you've got it's it's really quick quite chilly for us as a um you know it's it's 10 degrees, it's yeah, yeah, no, quite the opposite here.

Gareth 5:06

We're we're sort of uh 30 and upwards at the moment this week.

Colby 5:09

Yeah, yeah. And it's a uh look, I feel for you because I um notwithstanding that I come from a very hot climate here in Australia, uh, in fact, where I am, we're it's the um hot, it's not the hottest place, but it's definitely the driest place uh in Australia, the driest part of Australia, and um and it does get very hot. It gets up into the mid to high 40s. But um I would all I would prefer that heat, that dry, really hot heat, a bit like going into a sauna um without people chucking the water on the on the stones. I would prefer that to the yeah, the stuffiness of the heat that you get there in the UK.

Gareth 5:52

Yeah. Yeah, I think it's just as well how unprepared we are for it. It's um, you know, a lot of our schools aren't air conditioned. Yeah, and you know, you drive to the supermarket, there's no you know, undercover parking or anything like that. So yeah, it's just um yeah, we don't cope well with the extremes in weather, which you know we we we get every so often, and obviously it seems to be coming uh more the case now.

Colby 6:13

Aye, aye, yeah, yeah. So um, look, I I became aware of you. I just let people know that through your activity on LinkedIn, where you're you're quite uh active in terms of talking about the experience of being a foster carer and and um the experience of children in out-of-home care. And I was delighted that you said yes. You're quite a veteran of podcasts, but I was delighted that you said yes and agreed to come on um to this podcast.

Gareth 6:50

Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, it's a pleasure. I mean, yeah, I um you know, the reason I write on LinkedIn, the reason I go on podcasts is that I feel like I was given this knowledge to be able to raise my three children. Um, and it's my duty to to share that with other people. So, you know, any any way that I can achieve that, I you know, I've been that person that's driving in the car thinking I don't know what to do, I'm all out of ideas, I'm really alone. Um, and listening to a podcast and have someone think, wow, they're you know, they understand, they they know they know what it's like. You know, that's really powerful.

Colby 7:25

Yes, people often think, oh, you have to talk about the good stuff, you have to, you know, really drum up the positives, but and you do, but but you first have to acknowledge the you know, some of the dark stuff, some of the really hard stuff, I think. Yeah, absolutely.

Gareth 7:43

I agree, yeah, and I think that's that's tricky because um, yeah, that it does seem to be a little bit either-or sometimes. I think you know, I mean, social media is great at amplifying that uh sort of um divide, but yeah, you either seem to be in the camp where um everything with fostering is fine, and you know, we just need to recruit more people, and then all of our problems will be resolved. And then you also have a camp where it's like it's totally broken, everything's fallen apart, nobody should enter the foster care system because it's a total disaster. And uh as with most you know situations, that there is a mix to be had and a balance to be had between the two.

Colby 8:20

Yeah, yeah. So, how did you get involved in fostering and and yeah, tell us a little bit about what you've been doing uh more lately as well?

Gareth 8:31

Yeah, yeah. So I um feel like I've lived two very different lives. I uh before fostering, I was a co-founder of a travel tech company, um, and I ran that business for 10 years, loved it, um, but kind of got to the point where I was only working on the business and not doing anything else. So um heard a story about volunteering, thought, yeah, I can do that. Started volunteering with children from the very first session, loved it. Uh, and in particular, I noticed that I was drawn to children that found you know things a bit more tricky, and the adults found it tricky to respond to them. And I I found it quite easy. I thought, no, actually, they just need someone to talk to them, to listen to them, to build a bit of a you know rapport with them. Um, and yeah, so I kind of realized there's something in this. I actually then um several years down the line applied for adoption and was approved as an adopter, um, was about to be matched with two children, or in the process of matching, and it all fell through. Something changed for the kids, and uh, you know, it was kind of uh yeah, very difficult uh time. So took a few months away, have a rethink. And at that point, I understood the the care system better and thought actually, you know, I I probably more suited to fostering. Um that seems to suit my my skill set a bit better and what what I was hoping to offer. Um, so yeah, became an approved uh foster carer. Um with the work that I do, we we uh call ourselves foster parents, um sort of a slight uh uh difference. Um and then yeah, so with that um three children arrived. And so overnight I became, you know, went from being a single parent to a parent to to three children. And really, I think the the kind of the bit that links to the work that I'm doing now is that you know, I I loved those kids as soon as they arrived. As soon as they walked in through the door, I felt that kind of you know need to care for them. And and it only grew stronger with with every day that passed. And now here we are just over nine years later. Um, but within a few months, I I you know really began to realize that I didn't know what I was doing. You know, I was parenting in the way that I was parented, which worked very well for me. Um, and I could see that it worked well for other families with lots of love, lots of nurture. Um, and sometimes it really felt like I was getting it wrong, and I didn't know why. So I went out on this mission to find out what's going on here. How does trauma affect a child? How does neglect um affect children in their in their early life and how do we respond to that later down the line in a way that really helps them to you know start on that journey of recovery from from that early life trauma? Um, and I just yeah, absorbed everything, went, read every book, went to every conference I could find, uh, did every online event and you know, anything and everything, um, and really kind of gathered it all together. Um, and yeah, sort of really feel like now at this point in time, I'm holding all of that knowledge. My children are growing up, they're a bit older now. Um, we still, you know, I still parent therapeutically. Um, you know, it's because it works, it's not something

Learning Trauma The Hard Way

Gareth 11:40

that I'm just gonna ditch or you know, we never reach the point where we're done. But I really want to um share that with other people. I know that there are other people out there that are in that same situation I was nearly a decade ago, um, and it's them that I speak to.

Colby 11:53

Yeah, yeah. It really comes through, I have to say, the care that you have and uh toward towards your children and the care that you have in the work that you the that you do in terms of advocating around the needs of children. So um, yeah, that that to me that really comes through in how you uh communicate on LinkedIn, uh, which is where I have the have had that that exposure to you. I'm just wondering Yeah, you you said that you you um you kind of threw yourself into the literature and the conferences and and so on. I wonder what what did you find to be, was there anything that particularly stood out that you found was of most benefit to you in your um your growth as a as a foster parent?

Gareth 12:45

Yeah, so I would say that um one of the most beneficial things, and it's uh you know a bit of a postcode lottery, we're really lucky where we are that there is um access to a developmental trauma service. Um specifically for children that are in the care system and their families, and they use a lot of DDP um, you know, sort of approaches. Um, and yeah, just absolutely, utterly brilliant. And I I really, you know, it's um it's based in Cardiff where we are called NFIS, which is Welsh for uh Rainbow, um run by uh clinical psychologists called Dr. Libby Erin. Um, you know, people if you're working at a governmental level, uh to get that to get her on. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Oh, yeah, absolutely have Libby on. Yeah, just a real font of knowledge, but also, you know, I think there's quite often a sense that um, you know, children come into care, you know, there's an acceptance that they have this early life trauma and that and that therapy, clinical therapeutic intervention is something that we do to children. And it's like, well, actually, there is a very different approach. If we accept that trauma is relational and that now this child is in a secure relationship that is building and lots of rupture and lots of repair and all of those things that we know about, why don't we involve that that adult in the child's therapeutic journey and make that you know integrated? And so my journey with with NFIS was that I went there for a consultation, was offered some training, kind of did a block of training, went home and changed the way that I was parenting, saw that that worked, then kind of went back again back and forth, um, as and when needed, as and you know, if life got busy, then could put it on hold, and then we could go back. And then when it was suitable for each of my three children, they could go for some sort of therapeutic intervention that was themed entirely around them. Now, that I think to a lot of people, if you aren't familiar with how these systems work, that kind of perhaps seems a little bit obvious, or you know, of course it would work that way, but that's really unusual that it works so well. Um, and it really saved us.

Colby 14:49

I think the thing that stands out is that you is that the accessibility issue was kind of was good for you. A lot of a lot of um people who care for children in this space, uh, their experiences it's quite that that there are barriers to accessing what I'm imagining was the the kind of trauma-informed service that you um that you had access to. So I mean I mean it's awesome that you had that.

Gareth 15:18

Yeah, I mean, I think as well that a big issue there is that there quite often seems to be this idea that if a um foster parent raises their hand and says, I'm struggling, that they are sort of sent on training, but sent on training that almost views them as the problem, that it's like you're not doing your job well enough, um, you're struggling, you can't cope. And and that's the you know, if you're going on training and it sees you as the problem, then it's never really going to work. Whereas what I would say about the approach, certainly that I have with with the training that I deliver, certainly on lots of the fantastic training that I've had access to, is that the parent is seen as the solution, not the problem. And actually, if we provide that scaffold in that support so that the parent can do what only the parent can do, um, you know, then then we stand a chance of success, then.

Colby 16:06

What does that look like? That difference between the parent is part of the problem, perhaps, versus the parent is the the solution, is the intervention as such?

Gareth 16:17

Yeah, yeah. Well, it's interesting, it's on my mind at the moment because tonight I'm delivering some training on um compassion fatigue, uh, which is something that we've we've worked quite a lot on. And yeah, I think there's there's really this sort of sense that um, you know, if we want to help children, we need to help the adults. Um, you know, if we think about I I I mentioned um before that uh someone that I know, Johnny Miller, who runs Nervous System Mastery, fantastic course, not nothing to do with necessary um childhood trauma uh or developmental trauma, but but you know, working with adults to understand their nervous systems. Really lovely guy, British guy, lives in in America. Um, and um I can remember being on a course with him before, and he offered lots of really fantastic different ways to you know help calm and regulate your nervous system. And he went through all these different options. Some of them I'd I'd not heard of before, some of them have still stuck with me. And I thought, yeah, that's really, you know, that's really interesting, want to know more. Lots linked to kind of polyvagal theory and emerging concepts as well. Um, and then someone asked a question and they said, Well, what's the one thing? You know, what's the thing that stands out? And very, very quickly, Johnny answered and said, co-regulation, you know, that that's it. It's co-regulation, you know, if if you only had to pick one, like co-regulation will do 98% of the work that you're looking for. So in my mind, if we have that focus, that if that adult, that parent

Therapy With Parents In The Room

Gareth 17:40

is okay, and I'm talking about, you know, kind of having, you know, widening their window to use some of Deb Dana's, you know, sort of terminology, um, that they are feeling supported, not just being supported, but they feel supported as well. They feel that they've got people in their corner, um, people that trust them, that believe in them, that have faith in them, that can recognize when they're not doing okay and they just need a little bit of extra help, as we would for a friend or a colleague, then we can achieve really good things for foster parents and of course the children that are in their care. Far too often the approach is very shaming, very blaming. And so a foster parent, as I say, raises their hand and says, I'm struggling. And instead of being met with that kindness, empathy, curiosity, all those things that we advocate for with children, they are met with blame and shame. And it can be wrapped up in a very nice way. It can be a polite email, it can be uh a conversation from a professional that is actually a little bit condescending, that that kind of makes that foster parent feel, yeah, you know, I thought I was on my own and I am clearly right. So that that you know, that is a shift. I don't think, I don't think there's one thing that would sort of illustrate that, but it's every single conversation, every single email, every interaction, the way that you, you know, come around and and you know build relationships if you're a supervising social worker, um, the way that you honor a foster parent's time. I mean, you know, far too often, I'm not sure about for for for you guys over there, but far too often we we kind of have this situation where I've heard of stories where um foster parents are told that meetings are being held at their house and they aren't invited. It's a professionals' meeting, but there's no venues available. So the meeting's going to be held in their in their home. I mean, you know, that's an extreme example, but it gives a sense of how disrespectful that is, um, and it's not relational.

Colby 19:31

No. Very early in my career, and I've had a long career. One of the things in this space, one of the things that really bothered me was um the treatment of foster carers or foster parents, and I likened it. In my mind, I thought of it as them like and like them being treated as the as the hide help. Yeah. The children are the focus, the foster carers are the hide help to um provide an accommodation service, look after them, but major decisions that affect the children um are made within by the statutory agency or the statutory authorities, and um and it I think it was incredibly disrespectful the way in the the way in which the system kind of interacted with and saw the place of foster carers in the in the work, in the endeavours that we do. And what I'm what I'm hearing you say, I think, is that the difference that you're advocating and and that you found most helpful was is one where foster carers are seen as the primary uh treatment agent in a sense. You know, you like the the healing happens in the relationship between foster carer uh foster parent. Sorry, I'm a bit of a dinosaur myself. I try, but uh um yeah, but the healing happens in the home. And rather than perhaps the the the the professional view that the healing happens in the therapy session, you know, that that one hour uh a week or a fortnight between the trained therapist and the um and the child the child or children, and that um and the foster carer is there to be or to be instructed in in a way.

Gareth 21:37

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think the the phrase that or the quote that comes to mind for me quite often from Bruce Perry is about something along the lines of you know, um a thousand tiny doses of therapeutic intervention every day provide a therapeutic bath that one hour a week of therapy cannot. Now, I think what's really important to say is that what one of the sort of frameworks that I work from is that having In on a lot of meetings, not just for my children, but for other children that and families that I support as well. I have been, you know, not as often as I would like, but I have been in meetings where if we imagine that I'm sat at the table, the foster parent is sat at the table as well. Uh, maybe the child is in the room and you have education, you have you know, social work, supervising social worker, child social worker, uh, maybe a uh clinical psychologist or a therapist, you know, lots of people. We've got lots of people in the room. If we can get most of those people, or at least as many as possible, to understand trauma, then actually there are very, you know, there are much fewer arguments, there are much fewer um kind of difference of opinions, there's less um bussing around and doing things that don't quite make sense because everyone's kind of aligned. There might be a disagreement about how we do something or how often we do it, or you know, the the semantics of it, but that's fine. That's actually that's kind of that's collaborative work, and you know, that that works quite well. What doesn't work is that you only have a foster parent in the room and they are the only person that understands trauma. Uh, and they have may have learned that from their child. They may not know about it from official training or um, you know, you know, reading up on it or whatever. They they've learned it through their child. And to give kind of like a um real life example that comes up quite often is that a foster parent might hear that um contact arrangements for a child are suddenly being changed. And that parent, knowing that child really well, living with them day in, day out, will know that this isn't gonna work, that it isn't gonna work for family, it's not gonna work for the child, it's going to undo all of the hard work that's been done in education over the last six months or however long. Um, and you know, it's it's just gonna set everyone back further and cause, you know, utter chaos in the process. And it doesn't need to be done that way. The problem is that what is sometimes heard from that foster parent then is I don't want to do this. This is gonna make my life difficult. And so I'm, you know, I'm gonna kick up a fuss and I'm gonna say no. You know, if we understand the child, if we understand trauma and how that presents and how it's affected by things like sudden change, in particular around contact with birth family and and other people from their earlier life, you know, we we stand a better chance of of responding in a way that's that's appropriate and understanding each other. I think that that's a real core core element. Unfortunately, you know, in the last decade, when I started out, nobody, including myself, seemed to know very much about trauma. I'm sure there were clinical psychologists that there were, you know, people writing about this stuff, but in a quite an academic way, um, you know, you wouldn't find books on trauma on on bookshop, you know, on the shelves in in bookshops as bestsellers or you know, new releases or anything. Today, when I walk into the bookshop, I see about six or seven books that I've never heard of before that are you know really good and really interesting. And my bookshelves are overflowing now today. So we all know about trauma, but there still aren't many people that understand what it actually is. Um, and I think in some ways that's more dangerous because plenty of people are happy to put a sign above their door saying we're trauma informed. Uh, plenty of people, if you go to a meeting, you know, you kind of sat there thinking, oh, they've got the right words, they they're they're saying the right things, but it's harder then to unpick, do they really understand the meaning beneath that?

Colby 25:24

I think you you raise a really important point around the importance of alignment or congruence. Uh, is an another guest, um, Jim Anglin, he talk talks a lot about his work is very much uh focused on congruence, but alignment, other people talk about primary task or which is your purpose. You know, what is the purpose? What what is our collective purpose here in this meeting? What what is our our focus? And um I often think that I have a bit of a saying that that my observation would

Co-Regulation And Compassion Fatigue

Colby 26:00

be that too many times when you get a group of adults in the room for for a meeting such as you describe, the first perspective that is lost is the child's. As or because this is hard work, and and people um often in in in circumstances where it's hard work, they bring their own needs to the table. Um and the child child's needs can be lost in that. Um the child's needs, the child's voice, the child's experience. So I wonder you you talk about it in terms of having an understanding of trauma, but what I'm hearing you say is it it is that understanding of trauma enriches one's understanding of the children. So the children it where that exists, the children's needs become perhaps clearer, more front and center in the conversation.

Gareth 26:54

Yeah, and the and they're not they're not obvious. This is the problem. So child's voice is kind of um, you know, I I I do a lot of work around um, you know, ensuring that a child the child's voice is heard for individual families, but also, you know, systemic change. Um, working with a health board at the moment here in Wales. Um, and of course, we want that child's voice, but um, too often it's put down as a um checkbox exercise uh where you know um someone goes out to speak to a child, might be in school, it might be you know in the home. Um, and there's a space at the bottom to say, you know, what's the child's voice? What are they saying? Um, you know, are they happy where they live? Uh, do they want anything to change? These kinds of things. Um, and what the child says, you know, the words that they say are written down and put on a piece of paper. Um, that is not trauma-informed. We know for certain that children with trauma will um quite often look to shut down conversations that they find very uncomfortable. So if I'm if I'm being asked questions that make me feel really, you know, beyond uncomfortable, make me feel unsafe, a really good strategy is to say, um, okay, let me think about what you I think you want me to say. Um, if I say that, then the conversation's over and you can you can go and I'll be all right. Um so I think that's a major factor as well. But also um, you know, this idea that that you know many of our children are holding multiple feelings at the same time. So again, going back to the contact arrangements example, um, you know, it may be very true that a child wants to see their parent. What might be missing from that is that they want them to be the parent that they never were, they want them to be reliable, they want them to be trustworthy, or maybe they want to see them to know that they're safe and that they're well and that they're still alive and you know, these other things. And that that requires relationships, that requires a little bit of digging, and it requires a curiosity of going beyond the words that are said.

Colby 28:49

Absolutely. I I think what if I put together the the bits that you're talking about, it it requires more than just a simple um response to the words that that children used. It and and beyond that, it actually requires a deep and sophisticated understanding of childhood trauma and the impact that it has on children and also on us as the people who who kind of are part of endeavours, I think, to look after them. But particularly, I what I'm hearing you say is that if we all committed to having a better understanding of the experience of children who have who have had developmental or relational trauma, then there would be less misunderstanding, there would be less misalignment, we would all be able to sing from the same hymn sheet, so to speak. We would we would we would know what what is the direction. Um and I think probably part of that to bring the other thing in is that we would be um, and this is something that I've been quite interested in of late, that that this um when I say of late, I've been writing about it a bit of late. I've I you know the interest and uh understanding goes back further, but uh that it's those moment by moment incremental experiences um that that are probably most significant in terms of of achieving um recovery and a bit and better outcomes for uh children in need of healing uh from from relational and developmental trauma.

Gareth 30:37

Yeah, I I call them magic micro moment. So they're they're kind of things that if someone was was sat in the room, um, even you know, some skill, they they may not observe that. And I'm saying may because I've worked with enough brilliant therapists and clinical psychologists to know there are some who are absolutely brilliant at seeing the the things that are almost unseeable. Um and I'm thinking here as well about you know, maybe sometimes when um therapy sessions are recorded and then like slow down afterwards and identified, you know, bits that were missed and all of those subtle changes. I actually think that that kind of um that ability to slow down and to tune in to body language, subtle movements is a real skill. It's it's easier to do, it takes huge skill, but it's easier to do in a clinical setting. It's almost impossible to do when you're also cooking tea and you're also doing the laundry and everything else. But I think there's there's an element of that where we we kind of I'll speak, you know, as myself, as a foster parent, former foster parent, um, because my children are with me on special guardianship orders now, but um I kind of in order to keep going every day, I have to protect myself somewhat. If I if I let it all flood in, all of my kids' history, everything that they're showing to me every day, even now at this stage, then it will overwhelm me and no one's having their tea cooked and no one's getting any clean laundry or any of those other things. But actually to to kind of open yourself to that, to have that again, curiosity is the is the word that always comes to mind for me. It's kind of like, what am I seeing here? And I I I often talk about the the um sort of moment of, you know, um, I mean, it used to be when all of my kids had gone to bed and the house was a little bit quiet and I was, you know, winding down before I went to sleep. Now my boys are old enough that they go to bed after me. But yeah, in that moment where I'm kind of, you know, just thinking about the day, I'm almost like replaying a few bits, not to beat myself up, not to um think here's everything that you got wrong today, but just to use that curiosity and think, yeah, do you know what? I actually they they mentioned that twice now this week. I'm wondering, I'm wondering if there's something in that. Are they are they kind of like trying to you know wave a little flag for me and say, you know, something you need to know about? I want you to ask me about this. Um and I think, yeah, that that approach, harder to do day to day, but really, really important.

Colby 32:58

I want to bring together a couple of things that you've said there. Um well, what you've just said now and something that you were saying a little bit earlier. But uh firstly, I think what you're describing is um having the opportunity to to actually reflect, to stop and think about what you're doing, what you know, what what the children are trying perhaps to communicate with you, and that's hard. It's it's a hard thing to do. And it it's not just foster parents who find that hard, it is people who statutory workers, people who work in this space find it really hard and have a lack of opportunities to just stop and play it back slowly, perhaps, but reflect um on what what's really going on here. Um what's going on for you, what's happening for me, what's the the interaction of those things. And that's really very and and that's why there's a lot of attention to reflective supervision and reflective spaces at the moment. Um because those

Getting Aligned Around The Child

Colby 34:10

those are those those opportunities to think about what we're doing are really, really important. Otherwise, we just kind of keep barreling through almost on autopilot, um, and perhaps perhaps not not um achieving to the the level that we would like to achieve in terms of our endeavors in this space. Um what connected with that is you said something a little bit earlier about your children and and and in part in your just now, and I wondered, I wondered, because I I learned a lot about being a clinical psychologist working with parents by parenting my own children. Um, sometimes it's a little bit controversial. You don't have to have been a parent to know about the butt gee, it helps, it really helps. And I I wonder what you learnt from your children.

Gareth 35:08

Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I mean, I I agree with that point because I see that made sometimes, or almost sort of the subtle suggestion that you you need to be a parent. Um, and also I think um sometimes I see we're we're very lucky. The the two I work across two fostering agencies, one that covers England and one that's in uh Wales. Um, a lot of our staff team are you know former foster parents, um, some are adoptive parents. That you know, there's that real um that we've got you know, our head of um of therapeutic services is a former looked-after um child themselves. Um, and yeah, I think sometimes there can be this sense that if you've not been there, you don't know what it feels like. One of the um sort of conversations that sticks in my mind is we just sat around with a with a group, a mix of of foster parents, I think kinship carers, uh maybe adopters as well, and and social work staff. And a social worker sat there, I think they've been you know in the job for 10, 20 years and said, I don't know what it feels like to be a foster parent. And every you can feel the energy like settle in the room where they're like, okay, great, once, once that's understood, then we can move forward. But if I think back over the many social workers that we've had over the years, far too many, um, you know, there's there's no there's no correlation between, you know, this person had kids and therefore they were great. Some of the ones who had kids were great, some weren't so great, and equally some, you know, yeah, there's no there's no correlation for that for for that for me. Um, but in terms of learning, yeah, I mean, I had no interest in in developmental trauma. I'd never heard of it before my kids arrived, which is shocking when you think, you know, I was a pre-approved adopter and uh an approved um foster parent. Um, but I really, yeah, I I kind of I'd always been interested in behavior. My my sort of role with the travel company was a lot around marketing, which is basically, you know, human psychology, human behavior. Um, and I've always been interested in things like behavior design. And it's only really, to be honest, several years after the kids arrived that I started to realize that there's a bit of a link there, the the psychological links. But um, yeah, you know, the whole reason why I've done any of this was for my kids. You know, I as I said at the start, you know, I loved them when they arrived. I've only, you know, loved them more with every day that's passed. Um, and I wanted to meet their needs. I made a promise to them that that I would I would be there for them and I would do what was right. And, you know, um that required me up in my knowledge, you know, up in my game. I I had to do that. So every everything that I've done, every course I've been on, every training I deliver, um, you know, every book I've read, it's it's all been for them. Yeah, yeah.

Colby 37:50

Lovely. Um I want to just kind of switch tackle a little bit and and talk about fostering, I guess, a bit more generally, because um I understand you have your work as a consultant these days.

Gareth 38:05

Um yeah, yeah, I I do I do far too many jobs. Um I so one one of the main things that I do day to day is that I work across those two fostering agencies uh that I mentioned. So I'm part of the therapeutic team there. Um, so I'm not I'm not a qualified social worker, I'm not a qualified therapist or psychologist or any of those things. I am in the process of finishing a psychology degree, but that that's kind of um, you know, sort of uh by you know an aside at the moment. Um so I do a lot of work there with uh families and and staff, you know, just really trying to share that understanding, um, to build that knowledge, deliver and training, you know, running support groups, all of that kind of stuff. Um, I also do some consultancy work across things like health boards, um, and I've done a little bit of work with Welsh government as well. Um, so yeah, kind of at that higher sort of systemic level, um, which is uh fun. I don't think I could do it full time because it it kind of takes you away from the the work on the ground, which is you know, um it gives you that sense of purpose. I think you're you're quite far removed at the at the systemic level. Um, and yeah, then I I do a few other bits and pieces as well, but but all around that same theme.

Colby 39:17

Yeah. And you mentioned the social worker before who the uh who said, look, I I'm I'm not a foster parent. I don't I wanna I wonder what you say to uh say to someone whether they acknowledge that lack of direct experience or not. What do you say to them about fostering? What what what is involved, what it entails? How do you what do you how do you educate them about the experience?

Gareth 39:47

Well, I I mean I think as well, just just um before I go on to that point, that there's because there's an element there about empathy, isn't that? There's kind of I think sometimes people confuse empathy with I know what you're feeling. Well, that's not really empathy, because the idea that two people could feel exactly the same thing. So instead, really what I always say is that I can see that you're feeling something, you know, really overwhelming, and I'm trying my best to feel it with you. I'm I'm kind of you know drawing on my own life and and kind of what I know about you, and just trying to put myself in in, you know, maybe 10% of what you're yeah, exactly. And I think again, that's that's the thing. If if if I was going to be allocated a new social worker today for my children, I would want them to be filled with empathy. I I don't really care what their early life experience is that much, because you know, it can be whatever, and if they've got that empathy, they can they can try to feel what we feel and where we are. Um, so then yeah, going back to your your original point.

Colby 40:40

Sorry, remind me that the point was around kind of how we what would you yeah, what would you say when when if someone said, Well, I don't I I've not been a I'm a social worker or I'm I'm a professional, or I'm even considering fostering. You know, I'm I'm considering becoming a what what do you say to them that you think what do you think needs to be said to them about um the role of being a foster parent?

Gareth 41:08

Yeah, so we we have um we have a major issue around how we recruit foster parents, I I believe. Um there is still you know a hint of kind of, I mean, sometimes I literally see adverts that that say this, but um sometimes it's it's a bit more subtle. This idea that all you need is a big heart and a spare room. Um and that that equips you to be a foster parent and it's everything that you'll need. Um, and you know, of course, what you hope there is that you um recruit people who are really nice and in it for all the right reasons, and that also they have the space for the for the child to live. Um, so you know, I I know it comes from a good place, but it's really misguided because that is not enough.

Child Voice Beyond The Checkbox

Gareth 41:50

I mean, that is the you know, it's not even the bare minimum, really. Um, you you need uh a great professional network of you know people around you, you need uh uh you know an emotional support network of friends and family, um, or a mix of one or the other, or you know, whatever it is. Um, you need a huge amount of knowledge, you need um ways to take care of yourself because this is you know beyond standard parenting. Um, you know, of course, all parents need a break, of course, all parents need their, you know, their own interests or you know, something that that recharges them and allows them to keep going. That is massively amplified when you're parenting children that come from a trauma and neglect background. Um, and so what we're doing by by saying, you know, spare room big heart is we are recruiting people who are totally unprepared. They've been lied to. I mean, I really kind of want to make that very clear. And that's not how that's not how we achieve success. You know, I mean, if I if I apply for a job and they say great news, you don't need any qualifications, and I turn up on day one and I'm you know carrying out surgery, then it's probably not going to go very well. You know, I've been set up to fail. It's gonna be a total of the colour.

Colby 43:02

That's a very good analogy, yeah.

Gareth 43:05

Yeah, so I think um I think the first thing that we can do is be honest with people. Um, and again, this this goes back to that balance that we were talking about at the start of kind of it's not all doom and gloom, but it's not all you know, roses and and walks in the park either. Um, if we're really honest with people, and and I I say to people, you know, this has been by far the hardest thing that I've ever done. And I've done hard things before. Co-founded a travel company at the age of 21. I'd run a couple of businesses before that as well. I'm, you know, I'm not against a bit of hard work. This has by far been the hardest thing I've ever done. If I got asked a hundred times if I wanted to do it again, I would say yes every single time. And so that kind of tells you something. And I think that's the way that we recruit the right people because we want people who are up for a challenge. We want people that have that tenacity, that don't really give up, that will advocate for their kids, that will fight tooth and nail for them. Those are the people we want. And if you kind of if you want a cushy life and an Easy ride, then Fosterin isn't for you, it's not. Um, so that I think that's the difference. We we can be honest and and find the right people.

Colby 44:08

You almost need yeah, right. The the slogans need to be need to start with are you up for a challenge? Do you want yeah, can you see yourself fighting for a for a brighter future for for children in need? Yeah. Uh can do you do you have um can you can you see yourself being able to draw on support from friends and family? Are you open to are you open to um learning? You know, are you are you open because that there's some of the things, probably, you know, at least some of the really important things that that foster care uh parents need to know about the role. I I agree with you. When you as soon as you said that they're being lied to, I was like, yes, we they're they're sold a dummy. Right, you know, I I've I've been very, very deeply concerned about that for a very for a very long time. That they're just yeah, they're just not told. Foster, well, you're one. Um the foster parents are just not told the truth about because we're because we're frightful, we don't want to scare them. Such is our need that we don't want to scare anyone away.

Gareth 45:25

Yeah, and and we want to be let's be really honest about what happens when we lie to people. I mean, of course, you know, let's think for a moment about those adults that are, you know, recruited in at huge cost. They they are given training at, you know, there's a question there of whether that training is enough or it's appropriate or it's helpful um or it's honest or any of these things, but it's expensive um to recruit people and get them to the point where they pass a panel and uh are approved. Um for those people, they they've probably made significant life changes to bring themselves to that point. A child is now going to come into their home and potentially for the next however long into the future, their life is gonna be turned upside down and they're gonna be unprepared and they're not gonna be able to manage, and they are going to potentially then leave the fostering system and never come back and tell all of their friends, don't come, you know, don't do it, it's not worth it. It's you know, it's appalling. Um, that is really, really damaging. I mean, I think in to distance myself from the pain of it, I'm thinking from a business perspective there, it's really bad business, you know, kind of wearing that that sort of uh business background hat, it's really bad business to recruit people and then lose them very quickly. But the bit that really you know tips the balance for me is that in amongst that is a child or children who have been sent to this home of a newly approved person. And I was newly approved once, like I, I, you know, that that was me. Um, but that person's unprepared, they've been lied to, they've not been given the truth. You know, we see that again with with children's files where you know elements of that child's past are omitted, where it's kind of, you know, let's paint a rosier picture. Again, I would just be very honest with people, get that match to work, make sure it stands every chance of being successful, because we can't have kids going to newly approved foster parents day after day, week after week, with no chance of staying there long term, because it was never going to work with the best will in the world. So we really need to change that. And I think the other thing I quite often say around this is that um quite often what we see from the rhetoric is that there is a recruitment crisis in fostering. I always make the point that there is a retention crisis. If we can get it right where we look after foster parents, where we, you know, genuinely help them meet their needs so that they can meet the children's needs, then of course you're gonna, you know, people age out of fostering. Um, you know, we as agencies, we see a lot of long-term success where children, such as mine, because I used to foster with the agencies that I uh uh now work with, um, where they leave the care system on special guardianship orders or adoption orders or whatever it is, because you know, that that's long-term. We're not for profit. So we're able to support with those decisions because they're in the children's best interests, um, which isn't always the way that it works, but it does, it does for us. So obviously, we we we need to recruit, you know, we need to bring people

Recruitment Myths And The Retention Crisis

Gareth 48:20

in, but we can do it honestly, um, and we can set them up for for success. You know, that there's no reason why it can't work that way.

Colby 48:27

Yeah. So beyond that, beyond being honest with them, attracting the right people who at least have some sense that you know we're not we're this is going to be a challenging role. Um, and hopefully they they're reflecting that they feel like they're up for it, they're up for a challenge. Um then what? What do you what do you think um needs to happen to uh I mean yeah, let's say we that we didn't lie to them because I I mean it's very this is very blunt language we're using, but how awful is it for a child to be pla or children to be placed with new carers who are go who their reaction at some point and perhaps very early on in that placement is this is nothing like we were told it was going to be. This is we were we were deceived, we were hoodwinked, we were we were lied to here. There's multiple casualties there, isn't there? There's the there's the those foster parents themselves, but the children. It's you know, like it can't be more serious than we are set we are setting children up here to be casualties of not properly representing and preparing people for that for the role of foster carer. So we we need to do that. I wonder I'd like I'd like to hear a little bit more about what you what you how you think they should be prepared and then what what what foster carers need ongoing.

Gareth 50:04

Yeah, so I mean I you're right about the language, and I wouldn't normally use language like lied to, but I think it's because of that that child that's at the center that it's kind of, you know, I I want to be really clear with people, you know, that we can't do this, we we can't fail kids, you know, over and over and over. Um, and so that's that's why I use that language. I think, you know, when we're talking about um, you know, your newly approved, child arrives, what's the one thing I wish I knew? What's the one thing I, you know, I wish I understood? It's relationships, definitely, definitely, definitely. I mean, you think of a therapeutic approach, it's all about making sure that the relationship stays intact. Um, Dr. Libby Erin, that I mentioned earlier, said something to me many years ago as I was kind of, I think I was like leaving a session. I'd I'd probably been there complaining about, you know, kind of, oh, you know, uh, one of the kids does this and I don't know how to respond to that. And um, she said to me as I was leaving the room, um, you know, you need to remember that they are always thinking, are we okay? Is this relationship between us okay? Is it solid here? And that is something really, when I look at everything that I deliver, every training, every training that I write, that I, that I, you know, when I speak to people, it's having that sense of that, that strength of that relationship between parent and child, that that is at the core of everything. Now, I think that's true for all families. Where in most families, it's a given. It's something that that child is born with, and it only gets stronger over time. That that child, most children, if they've not experienced you know, separation, um, you know, attachment difficulties, um, you know, early life trauma, whatever it is, they've kind of just got that inbuilt sense that this relationship is strong. I could do anything, and my mom or my dad or whoever it is will still be there for me, will still keep turning up, will still show up for me. Um, I don't want to disappoint them, but I know if I did the most awful thing on the planet, you know, and we see that, don't we, with with you know, parents that that still visit children who are in prison for committing awful crimes, you know, that there's that that strength of that bond. Um for children that have had that that you know, that initial bond, that primary bond broken, severed, um, and you know, potentially before that, um, you know, I'm thinking about when they came into care, but before that, that bond was was really probably quite unhealthy as well. Um, that the child is desperate for that bond to work. They know that attachment is needed for their survival, but either that uh bond is not reliable, it's not predictable, um, it's really unsafe, it's actually you know actively causing them harm, whatever it is, they bring all of that with them into the care system. It doesn't just get left behind. Sarah Naish, um, who I'm very lucky to work with, and I should say as well, Sarah Nash and Sarah Dylan um are both coming to Australia uh later this year. So, I mean, if anyone is is interested in anything that I'm talking about here, you absolutely need to go and follow their pages. They're on Facebook, um, LinkedIn, um, follow along with what they're doing. I think the dates are going to be announced. They're on a tour of Australia, so they'll be in multiple locations. Sarah went last year, but she's uh going back, we're taking Sarah Dylan with her this time. That their combined knowledge is incredible. And Sarah Naish, um, uh, you know, former social worker adopter of five children who are all adults now, has this analogy of an aeroplane. That if the if the plane is flying through the sky and the children are born on the plane, and um you see the person, you know, is there's nobody in control of the aircraft, you know, no one's at the at the controls and it's nose diving and you know, near misses, and the you know, cockpit door is swinging open, and then the food trolley comes around, but there's no food on the trolley, and then the you know, um gas masks, the you know, the oxygen masks pop down from the ceiling, and then the the you know, all of this chaos. And then one day the plane lands, and a lovely social worker steps on board and says, Come with me, kids, you're going on a new plane. So they get onto another plane and the plane takes off. It's not enough to just look at those kids and say, you don't need to be worried now. This is a this is a different plane. You know, you know, you you you you know, that was another that was an old plane, this is a new one, and it's everything here is fine. So, I mean, that for me really is like actually the way we would approach this now is think maybe it's safer to leave the cockpit door open so that the kid can see that the adult is in control. Maybe, you know, we expect them to try and wrestle the controls off us sometimes, but we can reassure them and say, I can see that you're worried that you know things aren't under control. Come, come here, have a look, see that everything's fine. It's not enough to say, don't worry, there will be food later. Let's put a sign up on the wall saying breakfast is at 9 a.m., lunch is at 12, and this is what's for tea. Monday, Tuesday, and it's going to be the same thing every week. So I think you know, that's a big part of it. But but ultimately, as I say, going back to the start, relationships. That's the one thing I wish I understood. I think I kind of knew it by default, but I doubted myself. When I look back, all of the decisions that I made for my children were about protecting the relationship that I had with them. So if that meant I needed to fall out with school, I would do it in a heartbeat. If it's a choice between, you know, um, you know, kind of sticking with what school say or sticking with my kid, I choose the kid every time. Um, if um, you know, it's a new social worker that says, you know, we need to do things differently, then okay, we might do things a bit differently, but the relationship is still prioritized and protected. That that's what these children have missed. So everything comes back to that relationship. It's prioritizing, protecting. Um, loads of loads of rupture. I talk about rupture repair a lot. It's kind of one of those things that I think really resonates with people because with um a lot of the therapeutic approach, you can kind of feel, oh, I'm not doing that very well, or I don't do actually for most parents, you see rupture all the time. It's just something that happens. Yeah. Coming in with repair, coming in early, being reliable, making sure that it's adult-led, these are the things that protect that relationship and help it grow over time.

Colby 55:53

Yeah. I'm also thinking about the services that that exist around you as a foster parent. And I um, you know, what what do you think foster parents need from them from those from those those services?

Gareth 56:07

Yeah. So I mean, what I would say, and I'll I'll I'll say we for this because I I sort of I I always try to be honest with people and say I'm a former foster parent because I'm now a special guardian, but uh, you know, I I definitely think of myself as a foster parent still. My my kids are still here, you know. I still feed them every day, so it kind of still feels like that. Um, so yeah, what I would say is that um, you know, we need a lot of support. We we need a huge amount of support. And that's not that's not because we're bad at it, that's not because we're not up to the job, it's because it's really, really tough. Um, and we are dealing with lots

Relationships First Rupture And Repair

Gareth 56:40

of you know, interacting systems that quite often don't talk to each other very well. Um, and so what we need is we need this this you know big solid network of support. And I'll give you some real sort of specific examples of that that we do across um Safer in Wales and True in England. Um so we have child support workers. So these are people who are employed where their primary goal is to build solid relationships with children. So again, it comes back to that relational stuff. Um so they may be involved in providing um, so we don't use the term respite, we we call them short breaks, much more, you know, sort of child-friendly language and more appropriate that it's just, you know, it's a break for the kid, it's a break for the adults, and and normally, you know, it's it's something enjoyable. Um so they might turn up on a Saturday, take the child out, you know, they might go bowling, they might do, you know, whatever it is. It's the same person each time, pretty much. It's someone that they know really well, that they build that relationship with over time. Our child support workers are highly qualified, they do all of our training, they understand trauma, they know what they're looking for. Um, they can be that consistent approach if there's a change uh for the child, um, you know, moving from primary to secondary or you know, any of these kind of situations. Um, so so we've got those child support workers. They will also help um uh quite often with uh taking children to contact arrangements so that that home environment. So again, it's the this is where the detail is important because that can be seen as, oh, well, the foster parent doesn't want to do the travel, you know, doesn't want to spend the money on fuel or whatever. I can tell you, I know our foster parents really well. They would do anything for their children. So, in fact, what's going on here is about saying the best thing I can do as a foster parent is keep home as a safe environment. They go, you know, maybe mom doesn't turn up to the contact arrangements, um, maybe it doesn't go well. Um, the child can come home, walk in through the door, and I'm safe again. There is this boundary drawn between. So, you know, again, trauma informed in practice, what it looks like on the ground. We also have empathic listeners. So these are people that have lived it, have been there before. Some of them still are, some of them, you know, are perhaps um, you know, towards the end of their fostering journey and they're at the end of the phone. They're normally arranged to do phone calls perhaps once a week. Um, and their job is to listen. Um, of course, they can provide some feedback and you know, comments or whatever if it's helpful, if it's asked for. But sometimes when I'm in the thick of it, when I've just had another email from school and I know that there's another changer social worker coming, I just need to offload to process everything that's all jumbled up in my head, to spend an hour doing that. And I always say about this thing of um, I know that when I'm stressed, I will just talk. I know it's really rude. I know I'm not giving the other person a chance to speak, but I'm like, I my head is about to blow, so I'm just gonna keep going. Well, this is a way of doing that where it's like, yeah, that's the purpose of this. You're allowed to do that here. And then what I always think about is like we arrange that, you know, two o'clock, they finish up at about three, um, half three, that child then walks through that door and the parent looks at them and connects with them and gives them a hug and you know, says, you know, those problems haven't gone away, but I've shifted them a little bit, I've got them out of my system. Um, so I'm also thinking then about supervising social workers. So all of our social workers uh within the agencies are highly therapeutic. They again do all of our training, uh, lots of lived experience as well. We have regular supervision, we have regular team meetings, and it's uh, you know, an air of curiosity. I mean, obviously, we wouldn't be able to share those calls because they're so confidential, but I wish that we could at times because um you really get a sense of how it operates, how it works. Um, we also then have a therapeutic team, which I'm part of. So there's myself, there's Jane Mitchell, there's Jen Wilkins, um, and it's all um overseen by by Sarah Dylan, who I mentioned is is coming to Australia. Um, and our purpose is just to make sure that we are working in a therapeutic way for parents and professionals. Um, and ultimately, I always say, you know, we we don't work for parents or professionals, we work for the kids, we work for the children, um, and that's kind of how we approach things. So that that's kind of that's how it works day to day. We do um this morning, actually, we've got uh um virtual catch-up. So we run uh two of those every month, one in the day, one in the evening. Uh, welcome for anyone to join. But we also run local in-person groups where people can turn up. Sometimes there's a you know bit of training conversation, but it's quite um it's quite collaborative. I think most people are shocked by that, where I don't go with a PowerPoint presentation normally. I will go and say, I've been thinking about this lately. What are people's thoughts? And we kind of go around the room and people say, Yeah, but for my child, this doesn't work. And someone else will put their hand up and say, Oh, you know, we we had that problem three years ago, and this is what we did. Oh, yeah, okay, great. We'll try it. So we we, you know, everyone's equal there. You know, there's people with far more fostering experience than than I have. Um, and also I think, you know, we talked earlier about lived experience, but no two lived experiences are the same. Just because I've raised three children doesn't mean, you know, I I definitely work with families who are raising one child that requires a lot more support, a lot more intervention, a lot more round-the-clock work than my three children have for one child. So it's kind of you know, um taking that balance into account as well. But yeah, hopefully that gives you some sense of there's a lot going on, but it requires a lot.

Colby 1:01:57

The question this is a question without notice, I think, but very much uh based on on what you're saying. I'm I'm wondering how it feels to be able to be there and and just be that sounding board that um to to to be there for a carer, a f but a foster parent, but be there for them with those phone calls almost be be that lifeline for them. I'm I'm wondering and as someone who has been there, has been been been a foster parent, how do how do you how does that feel to then be able to perform that that support role?

Gareth 1:02:45

Yeah, I mean it's the best job in the world, like it really is. I mean, I you know, it's it's interesting doing work where you just wish there were more hours in the day or more days in the week. Like I when I get to Friday, you know, yeah, definitely I'm sometimes exhausted, and then my kids have kind of got uh you know decided to uh destroy my plans for a quiet weekend or whatever it is. But um, yeah, it it feels it feels incredible to do that work that you know constantly every day that what you're doing matters. You know, I think we have this strong belief across our agencies, but I would also say it's it feels like a duty. It feels like um, you know, for me, with my background, there are other things that I could do that would probably be easier and give me an easier life. Um, but I have a duty to do this because other people did it for me, and that's why we're still here today, that's why we're still together as a family, it's why my children can go on to have like healthy, happy relationships with birth family, with friends, with you know, relatives or whoever, um, because those people helped me. So it's it's my job to pay that back.

Colby 1:03:49

Yes. Look, it um what's going through my mind, and this comes this comes back to something that we talked about very early in the conversation, was um respect, respect and value for that is accorded to foster parents and respect for their their knowledge and expertise and creating or facilitating an opportunity for them to, as you say, give back to be to be able to be there with uh to support other foster parents. And that's in stark contrast to some of the you know some of the things that we've talked about uh today. And

Real Support That Keeps Placements Stable

Colby 1:04:40

I I um sometimes when we talk about we're when we're in a a consultant role, and my own supervisor talked to me recently, we had this conversation recently that sometimes as a consultant you almost need to be an insultant. You know, you need to there are things that just need to be said, yeah. And or there's you know, you may you may put your foot in it because you're just not aware of all the the sensitivities, but you you there are things that need to be said. And um, I can't remember the the the full name of the person that he was referring to that uh as coming that idea coming from it, but it de vrize was the surname. I can't remember the rest of it, but the the consultant as an insultant. I think sometimes you just have to call a spade a spade, don't you? Yeah, don't you? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think you know, as I said, it was my my observation very early in my career, and I'm talking 30 odd years ago now, that that I just I just saw foster parents being treated like the hired help. And you know, the main game here was what statutory authorities were doing and organizing on behalf of the children, and perhaps what the therapist was doing. And and I don't say that to upset anyone. And we certainly don't want to upset people now, but you know, these are these are some of the things that need to be said, I think. And what I'm hearing really come through very strongly is respect. Respect and valuing of foster parents. That will get you a long way, including retention, keeping people in the system.

Gareth 1:06:29

Yeah. I the only thing I would say is that I think respect sometimes can be um kind of uh interpreted as um, you know, making sure that foster parents know that they're valued, making sure that they, you know, know that they're gonna doing a good job. So perhaps um, you know, and it's not to say that these things aren't important, but you know, award ceremonies, um, you know, uh vouchers, um, and and kind of you know, this this language that refers to foster parents as sort of heroes or you know, saviors or something like that. Like that's not me. That's not the people that I work with. When we're not um, you know, we're not Mother Teresa, you know, we're not we're not kind of you know, people that have been given this divine inspiration to go and do good in the world. We recognize that we have a skill set that actually works really well with children that that really need it, and we've applied ourselves to that. And and of course we work incredibly hard, but I don't want a parade in my name or or any of those things. What I want is to be understood and to be seen. And actually, what what kind of what you've made me think about is how a therapeutic approach, a trauma-informed approach, um, whether it's for children or whether it's for um, you know, parents and professionals, is quite often misunderstood as um a softer approach. And actually, what we're doing, again, I'm gonna mention relationships. I know I say say the word a lot, but if we have those strong relationships, we can actually get away with quite a lot. And by that I mean um, you know, so as a professional, if I need to go out and speak to a foster parent about something that's happened that that kind of, you know, as you say, you need there's things there that need to be said. If I've got that strong relationship with them, if if we're pretty stable, it it may take a little bit of a knock, but but we've got that capacity to do that. And again, with with children, you know, a therapeutic approach is not ever about a child, you know, you've just watched the child um, you know, give their their sibling a hit across the head, and you think, okay, well, you know, that shouldn't have happened, but I'll I'll step back and I'll, you know, kind of be gentle and I'll make them a uh you know thing of hot chocolate or you know what? No, that that is never a therapeutic approach. It's always about addressing the things that need to be said, but it's about doing it in a way that's constructive, that actually brings change. Um, far too often, what I see with foster parents is that um something has gone wrong. And and you know, maybe maybe the foster parent is is you know partly to blame. Maybe something has, you know, they've made a mistake or whatever, and a heavy hand is brought in to shame them and drag them over the coals. Like, who is that helping? Because I can tell you for certain it's not going to help the child. And this isn't about, you know, we of course we need to keep anyone that works with children, especially those that are incredibly vulnerable, needs to be held accountable, needs to be, you know, um, sort of, you know, working at the absolute best level that they possibly can. But again, this is a way of achieving that and and going in and shaming and blaming is the opposite. And it actually it tears families apart, um, and it it's a mess in the process.

Colby 1:09:26

I often think the challenge that I would put to people whenever they're embarking on any decision making or any endeavour in this space is that you fit the first question I think you need to consider is what will be the child's experience of this. Yeah. Relate I agree. I don't I I mean, award ceremonies and things are are nice as well, uh, in my view, but I as well, yeah. Yeah, as well. I think when I talk about respect, I it's it's about a way of being with and being together with, and and you've you've mentioned relationships a lot, and I think it these are relationships that where there is an equal footing, where they're you know, they that that uh foster parents feel like they are part of the team, they feel like it, they're treated like it, because the reality is there's no team without uh without them in a sense. They are they're vital to the team. And I I I think I loved hearing what you were just saying before about I think they're you know about putting them on the phones, you know, being like the social worker said, I I I'm not a foster parent, so I you know I can only imagine I can only imagine what it's like. I haven't been there and and done that experience, but uh performed that role. But it is such so much so respectful, I think, of foster parents to put them on the phone. So you know what? At the end of the day, you are you you you are such an important um part of our system here that that and and you know so much about being a foster parent that what we would love for you to do is is give up a bit of your time to be on the phones and speak to foster parents who are going through a bit of uh a challenging time. And I I just think that there is a respectfulness there in that dynamic. It's really, yeah.

Gareth 1:11:36

But it's also quite freeing, I think, because I think as a foster parent, you you sometimes, you know, well you often doubt yourself, you you have this internal monologue that says, you know, I can't do this, it's too hard, it's too much. You know, I mean, what what happens typically in a fostering household within a week would be more than would happen in most households in a year. Um, you know, I I could say that for certain. Um, so actually knowing that all of this, you know, if you're newly approved, you you might be taken aback by that and think, oh God, this is, you know, this is an hour of support here, and you know, then I'm doing two hours of training, then I'm doing this.

Advice For Government And System Change

Gareth 1:12:10

Um, but you're going into it thinking that that is the approach that we need to take. So when you need that, you don't feel bad. You don't feel like you're doing something wrong. You're like, oh yeah, actually now, now I see why all of this is is actually needed.

Colby 1:12:24

Yeah. And you know, um, because it it is challenging, the role is challenging, and and sometimes like the self-efficacy, I think, is a really important concept here. That that that feeling of of being of being on top of it, of you know, doing the right thing, of uh, you know, fulfilling our mission, our purpose for the children. What I've noticed in when uh I've uh supported kinship carers and foster carers is that when you're doing it in a group, it's it can sometimes be really hard to reflect on and um be able to generate uh a good understanding and solutions for the problem for some of the challenges in your own home, but it's comparatively easier um to to call it to help some of the other people around the table. Do you know what I mean? Like it's hard for me to see the wood from the trees, but when it's someone else describing what's going on, you know, it it's it's much it's obvious to me, and I I and that's a really good way of of building self-efficacy is is giving foster carers, foster parents, kinship carers the opportunity to feel to feel knowledgeable, to feel yeah, that they've got something important to give.

Gareth 1:13:50

Yeah, it's such a good point. And I think um, yeah, so I mean it's worth saying that, you know, of course, I I give support to um families and and you know, um children as well, but uh actually we still receive support as well. And it's exactly that sort of situation. I mean, I've I've said before that you know, when I would go to school meetings for for my children when they were younger, um, I felt like I didn't have full access to my brain because I'm so emotionally invested, and then I'm hearing someone, you know, what feels to me like they're attacking my child, of course they aren't. What they're trying to do is is figure out how you know how we find a way forward. But I'm I'm becoming defensive. I'm starting to go into this sort of stress response state. Um, and and yeah, I kind of might, you know, part of my brain or all of my prefrontal cortex is like going offline. Um, sitting in on meetings and advocating for other families where, of course, I'm invested and I you know want them to do well, but where I have full access to my brain, it is like a superpower. Yes. Oh wow, this is really you know, this is really great.

Colby 1:14:52

Yeah, yeah, love it. Yeah. Um, I I wanted to ask you what advice you'd give to Josh McAllister, the children's minister. We probably covered a lot of it. Uh uh, uh, but um actually what would what advice would you give to Josh McAllister? I know the care system is very, very much part of um his focus as it should be as the children's minister, but he's very active and out there at the moment.

Gareth 1:15:23

Yeah, I I think that's good. I mean I you know I regularly see photos and you know videos and things of him out and about meeting with people. Um, you know, that that's got to be good. You know, that that that's got to be a good thing. Um I hope that he meets with more people. Uh I mean, as far as I'm aware, in England and Wales, we have the highest stability rates for children across the two countries. Um, you know, you would expect that someone might pop around and and see how we're we're achieving that. So our doors are are very much open. We would love to be able to share some of what works for us. We're not protective over kind of, you know, this is the way we do things and nobody else can copy us. Like we want we want everyone to work in this way and and you know, help us figure out other ways of working that that are really great. And um, you know, that that we would we would really welcome that. Um I would I would uh you know not knowing too much about the political side, I would say, you know, can we please go easy on on the reviews? Like it always feels like every year there's another review, and we're gonna gather you know information and gather you know feedback and and then we're gonna you know sort of see how we interpret that. I think I think you know that's helpful, but it's not helpful to just just do that. Um and yeah, I mean I think you know it goes back to the point I I'm seeing again this um sort of language of you know a recruitment crisis, we need to recruit X thousand more um you know foster carers uh you know in in the sort of you know near future. Um I would really you know and I think what really frustrates me is there is um this sense of um you know most people just aren't aware that they could foster. They're not aware because of their sexuality, or that they're single, or that they live in rented accommodation, or that they work part-time, um, or you know, any of these things. And actually, like I speak to people about fostering all the time, day in, day out, across England and Wales. Not many people say to me, Oh God, I just never really realized that I could foster, or I just never like I realized that 10 years ago as a single man living in rented accommodation that I could foster. Like I it didn't really cross my mind that that would have been a major, you know, sort of stumbling block. And it's it's a phone call or it's a look online, and and you know the answer to that. So I think, you know, I'd I'd like a bit more honesty. I think I'd like you know everything that we've talked about today. You know, if we're really honest, if we if we put our cards on the table and say these are the things that really aren't working, that we we know how to change, and we are in the process of changing them, and we're not quite there, but we're working in that direction, that's a much better start to to bring more people into fostering, but it also helps us keep the brilliant ones that we've got. We're losing far too many great people from fostering, and children's lives are torn apart in the process. It doesn't need to happen.

Colby 1:18:13

It's almost like we need a retention campaign.

Gareth 1:18:18

As much as a recruitment campaign. Well, that would that would solve the recruitment crisis then as well, if the if you know, if that is the case. So if we're retaining people and it's working well, what you then have is people saying, Oh, I've been fostering for the last five years. You know, it's tricky, but I absolutely love it. We're really well supported. Um, you know, you you should definitely think about it. That that recruitment issue, I'm not saying you know, you don't need some, you know, um, you know, posters on the tube or you know, a TV ads or whatever, but we have a lot of that at the moment. I mean, you know, driving around Wales, pretty much every roundabout is, you know, what you you know, are you aware you could foster, you know, sign up for fostering. We we are we are drowning people. Everyone knows now that they can foster, everyone knows that that is an option. We've we've got that achieved. Um, now what we need to do is is be honest with them and sell them on the reality. And as I say, you know, I I've talked a lot about the things that don't work today, but I've also talked about what works really well. I have seen children's lives transformed, you know, utterly, utterly transformed. This is possible. We we can achieve it. It doesn't need to be quite as hard work as it is right now. We can we can make it easier if we all understand where where children are at and where they're coming from, um, then that makes everyone's lives easier. But, you know, it's absolutely possible to do that today. Um, I don't see any good reason why we're not.

Colby 1:19:37

Yeah, yeah. Awesome. What's the future hold for four-year Gareth?

Gareth 1:19:43

Yeah, so um, yeah,

Trauma Space The Book And Goodbye

Gareth 1:19:45

I'm I'm as I mentioned, I'm kind of doing lots of lots of different things. I'm gonna finish my um psychology degree in the next year, so I'm really looking forward to that. That was kind of a way of I went in on the deep end in terms of uh, you know, I quickly had to learn what happens when child development doesn't go to plan. So I thought, well, it might be worth going back and seeing how it should work and um you know what that looks like and understanding some of the theories and you know, lots of uh work on attachment that that kind of helped help some of the higher level understanding that I had really sink in. Um so that's been great. So I need to yeah, I need to get that finished next year. Um and I'm also I'm building something called Trauma Space. Um, so you can sign up for updates at the moment. It's at traumaspace.com. Um, I'm not entirely sure what I'm gonna do with that, but I know that I would love to go to every school, every local authority, every fostering agency, adoption agency, kinship support service, everyone and everywhere. Um, but I just don't have the time to do it. I'm I'm one person and I can't travel that much. I've still got my children at home. Um, so I'm kind of trying to do something that allows some virtual stuff to happen and some things, maybe some like self-paced courses that people can, you know, if they know they need help with X, Y, or Z, that they can go online, do the course. You know, I could be here in the UK asleep in my bed, and you're still um getting access to some of the knowledge that I hold, um, and potentially bringing in other people to support with that as well. So, yeah, just just kind of chipping away at that in the background.

Colby 1:21:13

Yeah, yeah.

Gareth 1:21:14

Oh, and I should mention we've got our book as well because yes, we've got um so Sarah Nage um and and a few others over the years have have written lots of books on on therapeutic parenting, um, you know, absolutely bestsellers. I'm really lucky that I get to go out on the road um to different, you know, events and conferences and stuff and speak at different things. I quite often have um some of the books with me, and I get people constantly come up to the table and say, this is the book that changed our lives, this is the reason why we stay together as a family. You know, that that's kind of really powerful. So um I was asked um earlier this year if I would uh co-author um the A to Z of therapeutic parenting teens and tweens. So focusing specifically on teenagers and and you know, kind of around around that age. Um, so I mean it's like probably the fastest yes I've ever ever given to a project. Um so it's Sarah Nage, Sarah Dylan, Sarah Penner, and myself. We're all we're all writing uh this guide. I feel like I've really gone above and beyond with my research on this because I had currently have three teenagers living in the house. So that shows you my my commitment to the to the book. Um, but yeah, we're we're we're in the process of writing it. We're hoping it'll be uh available soon. Uh but you can find out more at a-z-book.com. Awesome.

Colby 1:22:34

Well, good luck. I wish you well in those endeavors. Um and especially the yeah, the trauma space uh one. I think I'd like to talk to you a bit more about that. I I I am newly dabbling in in some of these technologies around uh myself, around apps and things, and uh yeah, it's quite quite remarkable what we can achieve with technologies that exist these days.

Gareth 1:23:02

Yeah, definitely. And that that's I think that's my approach, is almost kind of well, let's see what we could build, let's see what we could, yeah, what we could do for people. Yeah.

Colby 1:23:10

Well, Gareth, thank you for coming on the Secure Start Podcast.

Gareth 1:23:15

Thank you for having me, brilliant. Yeah, thank you.