It’s ok to say no…
People make the decision to be foster parents for many different reasons. Many of those reasons come back to one core reason, the desire to help a child. If you’ve made the decision to foster or are considering fostering, chances are good that you are compassionate. That compassion is what drives you to step in a fill the gap in a child’s life. It drives you to provide a loving, nurturing, and stable environment for the children in your care.
Despite the complexities of caring for children from tough backgrounds and the frustrations of dealing with the red tape of the foster care system, it is likely that you love what you do as a foster parent. I’ve heard it said that foster parenting is the toughest job you’ll ever love and in my own experience that is 100% true. It is a tough job (one of the toughest), but that compassion keeps driving you forward. But, without learning to set boundaries and say no, that compassion can drive you right to compassion fatigue.
Compassion fatigue refers to an identifiable set of negative psychological symptoms that caregivers experience as a result of providing care while being exposed to either primary trauma (experiencing the trauma firsthand) or secondary trauma (rendering care to those experiencing trauma). -Charles Figley
When we experience compassion fatigue we can’t care well for ourselves or the children in our care. As a foster parent, you can’t go home and leave the worries of your job at work. Your home is your place of work, caring for these children is your job. A study conducted by the University of Bristol's Hadley Centre for Adoption and Foster Care Studies found that with appropriate support and regular “time-outs” foster parents are less likely to experience compassion fatigue.
Simply stated, it’s ok to say no! Say no to the placement that you don’t think your family is equipped to care for. Say no to the placement when your family needs to grieve the loss of the child that recently left you. Say no to taking a placement when you feel you need a few days to regroup from your last placement. Say no when your kids need a few days with you all to themselves. It’s ok! Your Nightlight Foster Care Advocate understands. You need to be healthy and refreshed. Your cup has to be filled or you will have nothing to pour out to your foster kids. Just say no and give your family and your future foster kids the best you!