Fostering Alice Foster Care Bog
Tuesday.
There are lots of days when I feel like I am juggling too many things. I am pretty sure most people feel like this from time to time – but from my perspective they are definitely hiding it better than I do. Maybe they are just ok on the surface and underneath they feel like me. Today, I feel like I have gone from one thing to the next, without a breath. It started after the older two girls had gone to school, I had to get across town for Alice’s community dental appointment. I don’t know what I was thinking getting a 9 o’clock appointment. I usually get something after school, so not sure what I was doing. Getting across town during the rush hour is not my idea of fun. It is not helped by the commentary coming from the back of the car. Alice has no inner monologue, it makes sitting in traffic jams less than ideal.
I never know from one appointment to the next how Alice will behave. On occasion she can be angelic and we can be in and out in a few minutes. It was wishful thinking hoping we would get an appointment like that today, particularly as I had a meeting to be at afterwards. Alice started the session by asking the dentist and her assistant lots of questions. They always think its cute that she wants to know so many things and they indulge her by answering everything and showing her all the equipment. I know that it is simply a delay tactic and she has a string of questions up her sleeve to delay the dentist and stop her actually going anywhere near her mouth. I know she picks up from me that I am getting annoyed. I must have looked at my watch a number of times. More than ten minutes has gone by and she is now flicking through a ream of good child stickers – she’s choosing the ones she might like to have after the dentist has looked in her mouth.
It is no use, I have to say something. I remind her that the dentist needs to look in her mouth and we need to get back to school. Of course I am really hoping the dentist picks up from my cues – that Alice is wasting time and we need to get on with what we are here for. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work as the community dentists have much longer slots for their appointments, so they don’t feel the urgency to get her to open her mouth. After thirty minutes she has had a good look at Alice’s teeth and says she needs a follow up to have some fluoride coating put on her teeth. I couldn’t help but think, if she had got on with the inspection a little quicker then she could have done the coating there are then. I quickly get Alice back in her wheelchair, we make a follow up appointment (for a time after school!!) and we are back in the car and on our way to school.
As soon as Alice goes in to class, I head off to my foster carer training at the independent agency – back across the other side of town! I arrive a little late and quite a lot flustered. Fortunately everyone understands – they are all in the same boat. It is always good to have a catch up with fellow foster carers, you realise that you are not on your own!! Today’s training is about dealing with stress!! How apt!!!
A Less Ordinary Fostering Family Blog.
