Marie

But how it had kind of unfolded was, first of all they went on holiday, my foster mum and her daughter, without me, which is quite common, so a lot of the time obviously, yeah, and so I went to go and stay with my boyfriend, and [boyfriend’s mum] was like: “It’s a bit weird,” you know, ’cause they had said to me: “Oh, we’d love for you to come, but we can’t... we also want some time to ourselves,” essentially without me. And yeah, it was just all a bit strange, and that weekend, I can’t remember what it was, I was just having these panic attacks and the thought of going home was like killing me, and then a few weekends later, I think from that experience, and from the way [foster mum] had been like: “No, you can’t have this gap year,” or whatever, I just totally lost respect and trust in her, which I had been for the two years prior to that, I think something happened, and it just like made me think like: ‘I just don’t... I’ve just lost total respect for you, the only reason why I’m here is ’cause I’ve got to survive and then I’m gonna go to university and I’m gonna try and escape.’ That was how I framed it in my mind. I found her very righteous and damning and not gentle at all. So yeah, and then I went to my boyfriend’s again, ’cause we had this argument, me and [foster mum], about the gap year again, and she was like: “Well, why don’t you just go and follow the boyfriend around then?” or something ridiculous like that, and I was like: “It’s not about that.”

It was sort of a checklist, as in like: “Can you put a load of washing on?” Like there was actually a literal checklist on the pathway plan I think: “Can [Marie] do this independently?” and most of them I could do. I imagine that a lot of young people probably can ’cause they were often parentified anyway, and if you can’t, it is a very unnatural feeling for someone to give you a form and go: “Can you do this, can you do this?” I think for me, learning some of those independent skills was a good excuse for me to do the cleaning; that’s sometimes honestly what it felt [like]. So, you’d have a meeting, right, with the pathway plan in the centre of the desk, or whatever,  you know, and you’d go through it in this kind of chronology, and then you’d hit the point where it’s like independent learning skills, and then if you couldn’t do things like that, they’d sort of pose it to you. Or at least this was my experience, like: “So how do you get on with that?” And I was like: “Yeah, I can do that,” or if I’m like: “Ooo, I’m not sure,” it would be like then they’d turn to [foster mum] maybe and be like: “Can you help [Marie] do this?” And then we’d arrange to sit down and practice it together, or something like that. So, like the laundry was one that I would do.

I remember being able to do it and finding it really overwhelming and trying to do my GCSEs and remembering things like the laundry, and in reality, that is actually how it works. Like now I am an adult and I do, do those things. But my housemate who didn’t have this, government-enforced independence actually can’t do a lot of those things.

I mean it’s probably the same for everyone, right? Like everybody needs people that will help them maintain equilibrium when everything gets too stressful for you, or you’ve signed up to too many things, or you have so many things on your plate that you’re thinking, ‘Jesus, how am I gonna go to work, put the washing on, do the drying, cook the dinner, how am I gonna do it all today? I don’t know, I’m not even feeling that well.’ Having those people who have taught me to know what parts of those things can just fall by the wayside when they need to, and what you need to prioritise. But I, like that’s only come from having those experiences, not explained to me, but seeing other people do them, and seeing other people prioritise their own self-care, and how they manage their time and their responsibilities, that’s been really, really important to me, especially the ‘seeing how other people manage their own responsibilities’ part, which I think probably again is fair for the general population of adolescents out there.

I mean I haven’t, actually. I know another question for a lot of young people leaving care is: ‘do you, or do you not look at your care... your file?’ And I just have such a... but like I just don’t... I just know that if I read it, it will feel so disconnected from the experiences, and potentially judgemental as well. I mean my experiences with social workers and people on that side of things, they were so overstretched that I can’t imagine they would... had the time or the emotional capacity to write kindly about everything.

Well, there was a couple of things: obviously, [ex-boyfriend’s mum] now has another child that she was not expecting, and nor did she give birth to, which was fine, but she basically... well, she did fund it herself. They would not offer... so what you can, obviously sometimes have, or at least in my council... and that’s another thing, it differs from... it’s like a postcode lottery, and people in care know that, you know, you... you can live over there and you can get £3,000 for your Supported Living Allowance, but if you live over there you only get £1,000, or things like that. They did give me 2,000 for the Supported Living Allowance. The difficulty with that was that like I think I bought it... I don’t know how I would have done that though, buy it first and then they pay me, or something? Or maybe they gave me that... I don’t know; it was all a bit weird. But basically, you had to justify every single thing, and it was against a list that had a recommended price.

I got a job quickly: yes, I had like a huge spreadsheet with hundreds of places and, you know, I was preparing my CV. I was... I had people around me who could also help me do that with the CV. I think... I quite like talking to people anyway, so it puts me in good stead. Like personally, I’ve always enjoyed interviews and things like that and… quite curious, so I think... I mean it... I think maybe like when I was much younger I was hugely... I still am very socially anxious, but if I was still struggling with that, in that way, I would have really struggled to go into an interview, and that would have been a real barrier for me. But luckily I’d kind of developed a way to cope with that by the time I was applying for jobs.

Again, like I had the skills. I knew roughly that I wanted to work in the sector that I work in, I knew what I had as my long-term goal, and I knew that I’d have to sort of climb up these little ladders, and I had the patience. And I mean some days you think, ‘oh god, it’s not working,’ you know? But I knew that... what it was gonna take if I’ve got this longer-term vision and I want to own a home one day and have a family one day, I’m gonna have to look after myself and figure out my own stuff and I’m gonna have to put in the work and sometimes do jobs that I don’t wanna do. Sometimes you end up having to work for free and it’s the most painful thing when all you’ve ever done is give yourself to other people and now you have to do it more because that’s the nature of like forging a career, unfortunately, although it is getting better; a lot of internships and things are now paid.

We still do have that like in amongst our generation, like a belief that, you know, stiff upper lip when you’ve got to go to work, and all of this stuff, but I think it’s getting better, and I think we’re starting to realise that the private and the public is actually relatively... you know, you can’t really always separate who you are from the thing that you do to pay bills. And that’s gonna be especially the case when you’re a care leaver because, I don’t know, like, I could be working or something and I’ll get a text from my mum, and then, you know, I might be worried about her, or something – obviously we all do that – but I guess it’s maybe a bit more complicated, I don’t know. But yeah, I think I’m still new to it, I’m still learning how to be in the workplace and how to even know what my needs are, you know, in a workplace setting, let alone how to ask for them.

Yeah, there are always gonna be hurdles that you face, or times when you don’t really know how to explain yourself, or when you’re not really sure if you should offer context, or if you’re oversharing, but you also need to offer context because, I don’t know, you need like... you need some time to... Like, so I have fibromyalgia, so I get like chronic pain, all of that, and it’s really hard to say, “I think I need to work from home today,” or, “I think I need to look after myself today,” because you just think... But, you know, and that’s on me as well for thinking that I can’t say it, but it also comes from my experiences of not always being able to have my needs met first, and that’s quite a deep-rooted thing that comes with the territory of being a care leaver.

I was reading something, it was actually about ADHD and autism and people who have those, but it was saying you’ve got all these things about work that you often have to overcome, which at home you don’t have to overcome, but they’re relatively invisible. So, for example you might like it the temperature you like, or the lighting that you like, or... or you feel like you’re having to mask a lot of the time, and to some extent, yes, your workplace could offer you a lot of concessions for all those things, but in another sense you also, you know, are having to deal with them yourself, or it can just be resolved by being in a different space to work.

Yeah, I think there’s something really important in having a trusted adult, even though you’re an adult yourself, like you just want someone who’s almost like that parental authority figure to be like: “Don’t worry, you’ve written this application correctly,” or, “don’t worry, we’ve all said and done things like that before.” And I mean that’s what parents are, really, someone who can just... someone who you see a bit of their vulnerability too; it has to be an exchange of that kind. So, someone who’s willing to be that, because not... obviously not everyone is, and not everybody has to, but... yeah.

So, obviously my unofficial adoptive mum and family. I guess my boyfriend, although I think for friends, and my boyfriend, is probably... it is quite hard to sometimes understand for them how something very small could trigger you, and to them it would seem so silly, but to the other person, you know, who’s had experiences maybe with abandonment or things like that, or rejection. So, I think communication, like, I’m quite naturally communicative, but if I wasn’t, it would probably make it even harder to kind of communicate, especially if the other person isn’t understanding.

I mean, in terms of my birth family, I find that like… it’s more of a kind of... I check in on them and it feels like varying degrees of being responsible for my mum at different points. So there’s also an element of like un... not that it’s recognised in any sort of formal way, but unofficial kind of caring responsibilities for other people that are pretty invisible, say to my workplace, or whatever, and it can be really hard to put that into words and explain: ‘well actually, I... it’s not on paper, but I do have caring responsibilities,’ even if that is a choice. I mean my therapist, I think the whole... I think everyone should have a therapist really, but you just need that one person who’s not in it. Obviously, I did have my PA. I think... I mean I’m not sure what other young peoples’ experiences would be... But mine’s quite rickety, like they were always changing, but when I did have a good one, it was very noticeable that they were good, but unfortunately, they just weren’t ever that permanent.

Mm, yeah, having safe people. And you’ll know when they’re safe, because you’ll just know, like it’s hard to explain why, but... I know there are some people who you think are safe and then they don’t end up being safe because we have sort of different wiring when you’ve had certain experiences.  

But peer support and, well, you know, not just from like, I don’t know, school, college, uni, whatever, but peer support as in adults, trusted adults, is like just absolutely vital, as well as when you’re in the workplace. 90... 99 percent of the time, someone’s probably had a similar thought of like: ‘oh, this is really frustrating,’ and you’re keeping it to yourself, so you don’t know that other people think that, but if you find the person who, you know, isn’t your parent, or isn’t your teacher, isn’t your boss, but someone who is also a remote association to sort of speak to and work out, then that’s gonna be really cathartic. Because we all have frustrations with the people we sort of have quite direct relationships to, it’s just about knowing who to say, and how to work them out so that you don’t get involved in any collateral, basically.