LGBTQ+ Adoption & Fostering Week 2024
LGBTQ+ Adoption and Fostering Week 2024 returns on Monday 4 March. Running until to Sunday 10 March, it remains the only campaign in these industries to focus on the LGBTQ+ community.
We celebrate our adopters and foster carers every week of the year, and this week we are giving particular attention to celebrating those in the LGBTQ+ community who are already fostering, adopting or thinking about doing so.
We’re Dan & Lee, and have been fostering for Fostering Devon for nearly six years. After an initial phone call to the enquiry line, we had a home visit by an amazing Assessing Social Worker a couple of weeks later. The home visit gave us a great insight into what the process would involve, and some information on what fostering looks like. It was a very honest conversation, covering the good, the bad, and the ugly!
“As we went through the assessment process, the more we learnt, in particular topics such as Therapeutic Parenting – something we’d never heard of. The more we heard, the more we read, the more we learnt, and the more we wanted a bit of the action. It really sounded like a challenge that would be rewarding for us as well as doing something truly amazing for young people who need a family home environment where they can feel safe, understood and accepted.
“We have offered long term homes for some of our children, and have also offered short breaks for several children. Dan has gone on to become a member of some national fostering panels, being lucky enough to meet more amazing prospective foster parents as part of their assessment and approval process.
“If you have a spare room, flexibility in your schedule to accommodate professional meetings, and a strong drive to do something incredible – then make that first step and call the enquiry line. Children need Foster Parents from many walks of life and you could be that next person/family to have a positive impact on a young person currently in crisis. For us, fostering is fun, tough, chaotic, challenging, rewarding, intense, emotive, crazy, busy, to mention a few. Most importantly, it’s life changing!”
Dan & Lee – Two of our inspirational Foster Carers
For LGBTQ+ people thinking about fostering or adoption the question absolutely shouldn’t be “will my sexual orientation or gender identity count against me?”
We encourage people of the LGBTQ+ community to think about giving a nurturing, safe home to a child and foster with Fostering Devon.
“This week, as every week we welcome enquiries from Devon’s LGBTQ+ community, the most important thing to us is that you can provide a loving, safe and stable foster home for a child or young person for as long as they may need. “
Every child in our care is unique, and all have very different needs. Here at Fostering Devon we are interested in what you have to offer a child or young person, we need people with different skills, abilities and experiences – who you are really does matter to us. Please get in touch.”
Emma Nobes – Fostering Devon Service Manager
Across Devon, we currently have 383 Foster Carers, of which 8 currently live in the Torridge area. This is far less than the amount of carers we need across Devon and in the Torridge area. It is of paramount importance to our service to keep the child in their local area, where appropriate. By keeping the child in their local area, they are able to continue at their school where they are known and cared about by their teachers, and their friends. Having to move them out of their known area means not only do they lose their familiar home environment with pets, toys and siblings, but also lose the connections they have with education, health and friendships.
We need more foster carers from all backgrounds regardless of their sexuality, gender, relationship status, race, ethnicity or religion.
Foster Carers for Devon County Council receive excellent training opportunities, support from our community and generous allowances. Click the button below for more information.