Introducing foster children to the Outdoor City of Sheffield

The bluebells of Woolley Woods are for child number two, who loved to carefully examine the detail of twigs and fallen flowers.

Child three is the decaying tree stump in Ecclesall Woods, where she’d shriek crazily as she climbed to the top.Child one is in Norfolk Park, where he was dazzled by the spring trees above his pram, while child four is everywhere, because we went everywhere with him under lockdown when there were no playgroups.

He’s in the forests of Wyming Brook, on the hidden pathways of Ecclesall Woods, on Stanage Edge, and especially the Ox Stones near Ringinglow, where the little boy who lived out his first year in a cramped city apartment spent an incredible winter’s morning marvelling at the moorland snow.When you’re a foster carer, the question that everyone asks is: “How can you let them go?”“It must be so difficult when they move on,” people say. “How do you cope? I don’t think I could do it.”At first, it’s hard not to imagine your questioner thinks you must be some kind of heartless barbarian.

But after four years of fostering, we’ve reflected and realise it’s a genuine question, and a real deterrent to prospective foster carers.If you’re a short term or ‘Task’ carer, like us, your job is the temporary task (in our case, for usually between 6 and 18 months) of taking in a child at very short notice, who has been found living in a dangerous or chaotic situation.

The child will usually be traumatised and struggling, and your job from the first minute you meet them is to care for them, make them feel secure, and then put your heart and soul into helping them make their way back to a happy childhood.Meanwhile, now the child is safe, the authorities can get on with the task of working out the best future for them.

This might mean scouting out grandparents, aunties and uncles or other wider family members who can welcome them into their own family, or helping parents put their own lives back together again. Or if none of that works out, it might mean adoption.And while all that’s going on, we go out and introduce our new baby or toddler to the exciting world of the Outdoor City. (You can take on other ages too: we just choose to look after kids aged up to two).We can’t use their real names in print, so excuse me calling them numbers here, but our five children have never seen so many trees before we get hold of them. It’s fun for us to watch what they make of all the city’s parks and muddy paths, but it’s good for them too, as being outside helps them sleep, helps their brains and cognitive development, their eyesight and feelings of independence and curiosity.So the outdoors helps them start to put their early trauma behind them, and it gives us lots of fun and lots of memories.We now have a five month old baby, who’ll probably be leaving us soon.

We’re pretty much all she’s known, since she came to us at five days old.

As she got older, we introduced her to Ecclesall Woods, the Hope Valley and Endcliffe parkrun, and she‘ll be there in our minds, with bright eyes and rain on her cheeks, when we pass the duck pond, and walk through the woods again next year.The point is, we knew right from the start that our role in her life will be temporary.

Our job, over the fabulous few months we have her, is to get her life back on track and then pass her on to her forever family, who we’ll all have got to know very well by the time she moves on.

We know she’ll be safe, and will now have every chance to enjoy the rest of her life. We know we’ll always be part of her story, and she’ll always be part of ours.

Sheffield Council needs foster carers to look after children aged from 0 to 18.

To find out more, visit https://www.sheffield.gov.uk/fostering