A, B and C
I've been preoccupied with my relationship with my godson and thinking with hindsight that it was never going to work out the way I hoped when I agreed to foster him three years ago. I thought I would be able to give him security, guidance, support and to build up an affectionate relationship with him that would help him make his own way in the world. I hadn't accounted for how self-reliant this tri-lingual 13 year old had become- had needed to be to survive his childhood. Self-reliance seems to be an increasingly important quality or skill-set, but it can be a problem if it is based on insufficient knowledge, experience or both. He endures my nagging with stoicism but, despite his intellect, fails to make the connection that if he struggles to exist in a home where his meals etc are provided and he has most of the things he wants, how is he going to survive when he doesn't have access to those things? Like most teenagers; my godson believes he knows what he needs to know about everything he thinks is important, additional data is irrelevant... But he is not an average teenager.
Teachers are convinced he is of above average intelligence, yet he has been achieving below average grades. He declared himself to be "-demotivated by school because the best it would be able to offer would be 40 years of a job I'm going to hate!" He is determined to survive school allowing it to have as limited an impact on him as possible. As someone who has engaged hundreds of young people in learning and enterprise I found this increasingly difficult to the point where I stepped back as my frustration conjured images in me of my (alcoholic) father. My friends, social workers, teachers, his father; everyone tried, in a variety of ways, to impress on him that this might not be the best course, he listens politely... or rather; he waits until the talking stops and usually retreats with minimum commitment let alone acknowledgement that he'd be actively listening. The only person that wasn't bothered was him! Eventually I gave up, I don't know how to force him to want to learn and I am sure I don't want to. Of course it is stupid that 16 year olds have to make decisions that can affect the rest of their lives, but it is the system in which we live in this country, railing against its injustices and illogicality is irrelevant while it continues to be the way things are done.
One reason I agreed to foster my godson was that I had already decided that I would apply to be a foster parent that year anyway. I had noticed pleas for black foster parents in this English region with the smallest 'minority ethnic' population. I enjoy children and young people and have always harboured a desire to bring up a child with a partner. It was a big step to acknowledge that there was a need AND I could do it alone- even if it limited my already meagre partner options even further. At 50, I knew I was fading into the final obscurity of the Gay Man anyway, so why not offer some support and care to a child in need. "Charity begins at home" so it would have been the height of hypocrisy not to have taken in my own godson. When he approached me to ask me to become godfather to his new-born son, his father had said that I was the only one of his friends he would trust with the care of him if he was unable to for any reason. The down-side of the "Private Fostering" was that I received no state support except Child Benefit, but financial gain was not my aim. Part of me, I am sad to admit it, feels like I missed out on something... In many ways I have felt that I have merely been a sort of house-keeper to a child who prefers playing computer games with friends on-line to any sort of real human interaction, it is how he has learned to function.
So, my 'Little Man' thinks he's where he needs to be. He tells me he can make money playing on-line games, but I am not aware that he is of any notable standard... All I can do is wish him luck and hope he dashes my fears that his current strategy will ultimately deliver him up to the 40 years of scrabbling about trying to keep it together and perhaps regretting not making the best of the opportunities he has now.
I should add that in most ways, my godson is not a "problem child": he is polite and articulate, he displays little of the teenage sullenness and anti social behaviours I witness from his peers. In some ways it makes the things that he does do that exasperate me all the more vivid.
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