Fostering case study – Mary Moore
Mary Moore, 53, has been a foster carer for eight years. She always fosters unaccompanied asylum seeking children.
Mary had become friendly with a number of asylum seekers through the work she used to do. She had heard their stories of the hardships they had endured in their own countries and in getting to Britain and wanted to do something to help. Fostering was something she had considered over the years, but wasn’t sure she would be able to do it.
Mary split up with her husband and didn’t know single people could foster. Once she realised they could, she applied to become a foster carer.
Mary said: “My own children had grown up and left home and I was left thinking ‘what am I going to do now?’ I love being around young people so fostering seemed the right thing to do.”
Mary from Gloucester has fostered around 18 boys from all over the world over the last eight years. Currently she has one young man in foster care and three in supported lodgings, including two who have been with her for the full eight years. Supported lodging is like fostering for young adults, supporting them until they are ready to live independently.
The eldest young man is 22 and from Kosovo. She is also supporting an 18 year old from Macedonia and two young men from Afghanistan, aged 18, and 16. Two of the young men now have permission to stay in Britain.
The youngest boy has been with Mary a year and is doing very well at school. All the boys are doing well in their studies and are hard working young men. One of them hopes to go onto university.
All the boys who have lived with Mary previously have done well at school and gone on to college. One who left earlier this year is hoping to become a doctor.
Mary loves caring for the boys. She said: “I love having young people around. I always have this feeling it could be my children alone in another country and I hope there would be someone there to look after them. These kids need somebody and there aren’t many carers who want to foster asylum seekers. I fostered an English boy and young woman briefly, but I find it easier to look after asylum seekers”
The young people stay with Mary until they are ready to live independently and she sees a real change in them. At first they face a lot of problems adapting to a totally different way of life.
Mary said: “There’s problems with bullying, the language barrier and food. It does take them a while to adapt.
“You see a real change. They gain so much confidence. It is getting easier for me too as I get more experienced in caring for them.”
Fostering asylum seekers has been a real experience for Mary and she wants to carry on with it for as long as she can.
She said: “It certainly opens your eyes to other cultures. Some of the things they have been through are horrendous, other kids just don’t realise.”
Mary and the young people she cares for have had a lot of support from GARAS in Barton Street, a centre for asylum seekers.