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James Grandma Blog

James (name changed) went back to training on Tuesday night as his ankle seemed fine. He strapped it up and ran around and felt good. On Tuesday when James was at school I had a long chat with his Social Worker and my Link Worker, via Zoom.

We talked about the placement and how it was going. Obviously from James point of view the placement has been a success. He is thriving at school and socially. He is healthy and, most importantly, he is happy.

There are no complaints about his care and everything seems positive. We talked about Mum, who has not been in contact at all, and the rest of his family. There have been various people who have come forward to say that they will care for James and claiming to be family members.

The ones that James and I knew about were soon ascertained not to have any family connection and were friends of Mum. James’ Grandma had come forward but she was in her 80s and lived a long way away. Apparently Mum’s brother had also expressed an interest but hadn’t followed through.

I remember a placement many years ago who went to live with an Aunt. It broke down very quickly and the child returned. The level of care, the child had received, was awful and she had loads of belongings missing.

The child was eventually returned to Mum who had not completed her drugs rehab, and the family immediately moved away from the area. I often wonder what happened to her and how she had got on back in Mums environment.

So the meeting covered the fact that things would remain the same, for now, and that we would reconvene in 3 months for an update. The Social Worker logged off and I carried on the chat with my Link Worker.

The general consensus was that they were happy with everything and that the placement was a success so far. We ended our conversation and I sat and reflected with a cup of coffee. Yes I was doing a good job and James was thriving. There was no point worrying about the future and, as I had learnt from Fostering, always expect the unexpected.

James got home and I made him aware, briefly, about the conversation. He was happy and said he felt relaxed and positive about the future, which was nice to hear. He asked about half term and if we had any plans. I said that nothing had been organised.

He wanted to do some things with Paige and her family but also wanted us to have a couple of days out. I said great and that he should come up with some ideas on what he wanted to do. So off he went to think about some ideas.

We had dinner and James asked if I had heard anything about Mum during my earlier conversation. I said no.

He said that he still loved her very much but couldn’t understand why she had put her lifestyle before him.

I tried to explain that drugs were horribly addictive and it wasn’t a reflection on him. But he still couldn’t understand it, regardless of what I said.

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