Ten years ago, already a mother of six children – three boys and three girls – Jocelyn Williams decided to become a foster parent; the experiences have not all been good, but it is a decision she does not regret and she plans to continue fostering for as long as she is allowed.
Her introduction to the process is one she will remember forever as the first child she fostered was a five-day-old baby who was abandoned in the hospital at birth.
Over the years, she has fostered seven children and is among 118 parents who have fostered 174 since the Child Care and Protection Agency introduced this form of parenting in 2010.
“God has given me that gift,” an enthusiastic Williams told the Sunday Stabroek in an interview when she was asked about the motivation to becoming a foster parent to children of all ages and ethnicity.
She explained that at the time she worked with children in her church and it was a friend who encouraged her to sign up to become a foster parent because she was “so good with children.”
After a discussion with her husband and children, she was given the greenlight to take random children into their home and love and care for them as if they were her own. For a while, she thought the agency had forgotten her, then she got the call about the five-day-old baby boy.
It was not what she had signed up for as she never thought she would have gotten children she would have to sit up with in the night to feed and change their diapers, but she could not say no to the “innocent baby.” And so, John, whom she named, was welcomed and according to Williams, “everybody gravitated towards John, he was the centre of attraction.
“I did for him what I did for my children, everything a mother would do for her baby and when it was time for him to go I don’t think I was mentally prepared for him to go,” she said sadly, adding that even though she had “the waking up in the night as an experienced mom I was able to cope.”
The second child was more of a challenge, as the 12-year-old did not want to be in her home even though she tried to make her as comfortable as possible.
“She knew her mother and I don’t know if she was influenced by friends but there was a yearning for something more, even though I tried,” she acknowledged.
The child attended the same school with her youngest child and one day after she sent them both to the school’s athletics day, the child never returned. She was later found and through the intervention of the agency she was returned to her biological parents.
While she was happy the child was reunited with her parents, Williams admitted that for a while she felt as if she had failed.
“It was a lesson learnt and you know even with biological parents sometimes there are some needs of your children that you just cannot meet,” she reasoned.
‘Calls me’
She also fostered a young boy who was later reunited with his mother, but he still checks up on her.
“He even came back and spent a day with me, and it is like you never feel disconnected because he calls every now and then,” she said, smiling as she spoke.
She would ensure she finds out what he is doing and encourage him to do better.
She also spoke of a brother and a sister she fostered, who were always willing to assist in the home and at times she would have to tell them to rest up. For her those two children were the most connected and when they were eventually reunited with their parents, she recalled the boy cried.
“That was sad, and I am very sad that I have never heard from them again, but I know I impacted his life,” she said.
She now cares for a 17-month-old baby girl who has hydrocephalus, a condition in which excess cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) builds up within the ventricles (fluid-containing cavities) of the brain and may increase pressure within the head.
“With her I had to take all my compassion and patience out and use it. But she is not a crying child and she is like the pet of our house, everybody loves her,” she said of the little girl adding that she has no regrets working with a special needs child.
“I take her to therapy. I take her to church. I take her everywhere. I am not ashamed of her,” she shared.
It is her love for children that keeps her going, as Williams pointed out that while the agency does give her some money to help take care of the children, that is not her motivation. And especially in the case of the special needs baby the money is not sufficient, but she is not complaining.
“You know at times my house is so full because I have grandchildren too. I just find joy in taking care of children. And God has a major role in it that children will be my focus, he put some love in my heart so I can love those children,” she said.
She pledged to continue fostering and she shared when a foster child leaves, she feels the “emptiness but knowing they have gone back to their parents or found a permanent home I feel good.
“And I don’t do it alone, I do it with the support of my family,” she added.
Group homes
Meantime, Director of the Child Care and Protection Agency Ann Greene noted that fostering provides a vital service to children in need of families as it is better to have them in such settings than in an institution.
The agency plans to soon introduce a new dimension to this particular care service which became a reality in Guyana in the year 2010 and this is through group homes which will accommodate more than one child at a time.
As she explained, prospective foster parents will have to sign up and their accommodations will be examined and once selected they will be allowed to foster not more than four children at a time. She believes that this is a good option as the children will be able to interact with each other and their foster parents will be assisted to create a family setting for them.
“They would sit around the table and have meals with each other, and they would have conversations, parents would talk with, let them say what good they did for the day, what they would like to do,” Greene told this newspaper.
“It is going to be ideal, it had worked in the past,” she posited adding that children just need cheerleaders in their corner for things to work out.
Also on the agenda for the agency is the soon to be re-opened Drop-in Centre, which was destroyed by a fire that killed two siblings. This time around, not only there will be accommodation for children but there will also be eight apartments to accommodate families, mainly mothers and children.
The children at the home will not stay for extended periods as they will be reintegrated into their families or placed in foster care, the director revealed.
As for the families occupying the apartments Greene explained that the agency will work with the parents to help them to function on their own.
“We will have coaches for them, transition coaches,” Greene said adding that the agency will also, as much as possible, assist the families to find homes.
She said while the Ministry of Housing provides land, these families will have to have homes because they would be unable to afford the cost of building homes.
She explained that it will be like a training centre for the parents.
“In some cases, parents will have to be trained even how to clean a house… coaches will have to carry parents to markets, show them how to buy groceries and show them how to cook a low-cost meal that children could benefit…,” Greene said.
The apartments will not have facility for the parents to cook but they will do so in a common kitchen.
Further, Greene also revealed that the agency will be partnering with non-governmental organisations and religious organisations to help to execute the national policy on alternative care. The launching of this policy will be done simultaneously with a five-year action plan that will focus firstly on preventing children from going into institutions and secondly on lessening the need for alternative care.
This will entail in-home care where a child who comes to the attention of the agency remains in his/her home and the agency works with the parents to make the home environment more suitable.
“We will help the parents with some day-to-day issues and model some behaviours and build capacity. The ones with sexual abuse will be removed, but with neglect we will work with the mothers to give help and assistance,” Greene said.
The persons who will work with the families will come from the communities, but they will be screened and monitored.
“It is a lot of work, but people who like it don’t see it as work. Once we get the right type of person it is easy sailing,” Greene said positively.
For her it is like “saving the world one child at a time, one family at time” and this sentiment twins with Williams’s motivation for opening her home to foster children in need.
