The Case Never Closes

Watching Neil Morrissey's personal journey in the excellent Care Home Kid documentary last week provoked so many emotions. Not least was a deep sadness about the lasting impact of being separated from your birth family (even when it might be in your best interests) and the resulting feelings of rejection and loneliness that this ‘lucky' and successful graduate of the care system still carried with him.

As he said, his ‘case' had been closed when he was still a teenager, but the impact of his experiences will always be with him. I'm sure other people with similar life histories would agree with that statement, and over the years I've met many adults who in middle age or older are still dealing with what happened to them during their childhood in care. But the system fails to recognise this.

Yes, there are individual carers like Andi, who featured in the programme. I've met her as well as some of the men and women she fostered as teenagers who still keep in touch, and often visit - bringing their own children with them. Because Andi has made relationships which are not based on blood or legal ties but which are life-long - and her home has become their home too; in the good times and in the bad.

But for far too many, closing the ‘case' means that they simply have to move on - physically as well as emotionally - with few resources and often very little support. I remember a man telling me, ‘It wasn't until I was in my thirties, married and had my kids that I started to think about what had happened to me. By then though, I'd got so used to blocking out the past, and covering up my feelings, that I really didn't know where to begin. I'm sure that if I'd known how to get help, then we'd still be together.'            

I've met others who were not able to focus on their studies, and had too much to cope with to even think about going to university. Yet, years later when they were more settled and ready, they found that they had missed out on the opportunities and the grants that would have been available to them as teenagers.

I know that many people watched, and like me, were moved by Care Home Kid. Including some who had previously known very little about what it means to have been in care. So I'm hoping that it challenged some of the myths and the stigma. That it made the politicians think about the lost potential of those who weren't as ‘lucky' as Neil.  And about the long-term impact of some of the wrong decisions they are making now.