... the tide is turning
MY EXPERIENCE, MY STORY, MY LIFE
My experience in foster care.
Not every day was good and if it was it was because I was going to school.
But not seeing my mum and dad was the worst. I was so upset, I loved them and
the department took that away from me and I will never forgive them.
I didn't like being in care. Not very many kids do. For the first couple of
weeks I had this one career named Agnes. My brother and I thought she was a
really good carer because she would let us get away with mostly anything
letting, our friends stay over without the department knowing, letting us each
junk food and giving us what we wanted. Even though I was the oldest out of my
brother and I, I still tried to set an example often, telling her we weren't
aloud to have those sorts of things but she just said "Your not at home
sweetie". After about a week she started to do things that I thought she wasn't
supposed to do like take us to her daughter's house and her families house and
she would sit and talk to them for hours. One time she even left my friend and I
in her car for 2 and a half hours without asking us to come in but my brother
was allowed to go in and when we asked to go to the toilet she just replied "Go
around the back of the house" because her little house was there and she said as
soon as you finish lock up and stay seated in the car.
When we left her friend's house, Agnes drove up the road with a child on her lap.
Agnes and I also had big fights and her daughter Donna used to come and stay with us too. I was fighting with her as well. One time, Agnes said to me "You need a kick in the pants" then she changed it to "No, your parents need a kick in the pants". She even called me a slapper.
Agnes used to also shut us in our room and not let us come out. We used to spend all day in our room. It was like being in prison.
After a couple more days she started to hit my brother for little things, like
when he dropped a piece of ice on the clean floor he got a smack
and she yelled at me for eating, and I didn't get dinner. All we were given to
eat was icecream from a shop that was near the apartment building we were living
in, baked beans on toast or spaghetti on toast. I got so hungry that I started
making food for myself. When I did this, Agnes yelled at me and said "Are you
making your dinner?". When I said "No, I'm hungry" she didn't give me dinner
that night and let my brother have Hungry Jack's.
The next morning I had to go to school and I
hadn't eaten since I cooked myself something for lunch the previous day. I
hadn't even had any breakfast. I went to the office and told the principal what
had been happening. The school rang the department about how scared I was of
Agnes. The department changed my carer to another person and when I left school
that day, it was Donna who was picking me up. So I ran straight back to the
office and I didn't move until they sent out Georgie. I was not going to go back
and live with Agnes or Donna!
GEORGIE
Georgie was not what she seemed, a vegetarian with 2 dogs and 2 twin sons almost
adult. She seemed really cool and friendly but she wasn't.
The first time I met her I was very scared and soon after she moved in to the
hotel she changed and she was very controlling. I had to sleep, get dressed and
live in the same room as my brother. He was 10 and I was 13 at the time and over
the period of her being in the same hotel space as me I became very angry and
always tired and upset and mostly I wanted to hurt the carers but I never let
anyone know about that. I had so many carers and she couldn't work more then 4
days because of her pets and she had a disabled boy she was looking after as
well when it was time for us to move we moved into this place called Diamond
Cove with this lady named Ange.
Every week or 2 we would move around hotels and apartment buildings and our carers kept changing. I became very upset and I would turn to my friends to help but they didn't understand and I was getting into trouble at school all the time. I got suspended 3 times during a period of 3 weeks.
I never ever saw my sisters enough and my baby sister Rebecca, I missed her so
much. I missed all of them and the department has no heart or they would of put
us together instead of splitting us up. I felt horrible that I couldn't look
after them or myself for that matter I hated Georgie and I asked and asked the
department to give me someone I liked and they kept saying no and no over and
over again I was very very lonely and I became mad all the time spending ever
second with my brother, sleeping next to him, swimming with him, eating with him
cleaning his mess. I couldn't handle it so I started to cut myself. Georgie soon
found out and I only did it once and she told everyone that I was suicidal and
it wasn't true she told her friends and my carers I tried to drown myself and
she even had to take my razors away.
The department gave the carers $150 every week to get groceries for my brother and I. The carers weren't allowed to eat our food, but they did. All the money was spent on stuff that wasn't even real food. The cupboards were always filled with custard, 2 Minute Noodles, toppings, yoghurt, cake, biscuits, baked beans, spaghetti and that kind of thing. I was so sick and tired of eating these things that when I got to see my mum I yelled at her about wanting REAL food and ran to my bedroom. I know that it wasn't her fault.
This new lady named Natasha came along and she
was really awesome. I liked her so much even though I didn't show her and I
always had fights with her because I wasn't scared of her. I was frightened of
Georgie only because she has 2 sons and has discipline. anyway when Natasha
found out she took everything sharp I was so confused because Georgie had taken
over my life. So one day I couldn't handle having hairy legs, always itchy, so I
took what was left of a shaving razor I had hidden and I shaved my legs but I
ended up with these big scraps over my legs and everyone believed
that I tried to cut my legs. I got really scared and angry and sad that no one
believed me because of Georgie. After that no one would leave me alone. I was so
sick of it. They were always locking the doors never letting me out by myself,
not letting me open windows I was 13 for God's sake and I didn't have any
friends.
After an incident when a carer left me by myself they didn't let me have any friends over so I was alone. No one seeing me and I couldn't even talk to them. The months passed and it got worse.
Mum complained for ages to the department about what we were being given to eat. The department didn't do anything about it until the school started to complain that my brother wasn't taking proper food to school for his lunches. When the school complained, the department started asking for receipts from the supermarket.
Georgie told all the other carers that we weren't allowed anything that had sugar in it. Because of this they didn't just stop buying the junk food, they started buying brown bread and other health freak stuff and we weren't even allowed to have normal sugar, we weren't allowed sugar at all for our breakfast cereal or anything. It went from one extreme to the other.
I was always upset I even pulled away on making friends. I tried to be that person everyone knew, but I couldn't find her anymore she was lost and so was I.
My mum also took ages to get the department to buy me new bras. I had to wear these bras that were really small. None of the carers would buy me any and I asked all the time. It took about 3 months to get new ones and I only got 2. My mum used to buy me 4 every month.
Nobody would fix my school blouse. I had to wear
a blouse that had nearly all the buttons missing and it had tears in it. I had
to keep the buttons closed with safety pins and I had to wear a shirt underneath
it. I kept getting in trouble at school for being out of uniform, but my blouse
wouldn't do up properly. I asked the carers to fix it, but nobody did and I got
sick of asking. My mum didn't know what my blouse was like until I went home to
live. She put it straight into the bin when she saw it and bought me a new one.
Christmas/Birthday
For Christmas we weren't allowed to see mum and I missed seeing her. I had to be
strong. We had Christmas on Christmas Eve at my mum's. I got things and
everyone was happy, but it wasn't Christmas. There was no tree, no big family,
no real celebration. The department wouldn't even let me see my uncles or my
Granny.
I have a really big bond with one of my uncles and my Granny, but the department wouldn't let them see me or my brother. My uncle kept ringing the department to try and see me and so did my Granny, but the department never called them back.
My brother and I have nearly the same birthday. His birthday is the day before
mine. Georgie got my brother something for his birthday and she gave me a
necklace for mine. I hated her so much that I gave the necklace to one of my
friends.
My brother didn't get to see mum on his birthday,
but we got to see mum on mine because it was one of our visit days with mum. We
had a bit of a get together and one of my cousins came. I don't think the
department knew that my cousin would be there, but it was so nice to have
somebody my age to spend some time with.
Mum had something really important to tell us on my birthday. She told us that we would be going home! I was SO excited! It was like being told I won a prize. All the sadness, hatred and mean thoughts went because I knew that I would never have to see them ever again.
I never knew why I was in foster care. Nobody ever told me or my brother why. I tried to ask the department, but the carers didn't let me speak to the department very often and the only real times I got to speak to them was when they had to speak with me because it was the law or something. If I asked the department during these times why we were in foster care, they would just give me an answer that never answered my question. It was just like saying "Because".
We had about 7 carers and we moved about 11 times over 4 months.
- Danielle A. Queensland
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