What do you do if you always imagined a house full of children, but don’t want to be a biological parent? This was the dilemma facing one of my schoolfriends, the standup comedian Kiri Pritchard-McLean, who lives on Ynys Môn (Anglesey) with her partner. Like many people in their 30s, they were surrounded by friends embroiled in the maelstrom of babies and young children. But the prevailing narratives around motherhood didn’t really speak to Kiri, nor did the hard, thankless work of it appeal to her (to quote one of her jokes, “I see what my friends have got, and it’s the fucking Manson family … chaos, violence, no one’s washing their hair, everyone’s talking about sacrifice. It is a cult.”)
Foster caring isn’t something that many millennials consider – the largest age group of carers are people in their 50s – but when Kiri and her partner heard an advert on the radio appealing for more carers, it felt right. In her new show, Peacock, she talks about the vetting process, which included many hours of training and more than 60 hours of interviews. Rather than being put off by how exhaustive the recruitment is, though, there was something reassuring about it. There are no qualifications for becoming a biological parent, no exam you have to sit, and no real way of knowing if you’ll be good at it before you embark. I, for example, naively thought that having been a young carer for my brother, and later an au pair, an aunt and a godmother, would mean I would be somewhat prepared for motherhood. Yet nothing truly prepares you, and you are humbled in profound, often mortifying, ways.
With foster care, social services are not just going to frivolously take a risk on someone who thinks they might just fancy it a bit. “You will never be approved for it if you’re not right for it. At various points in the process, the social worker checks in with you and asks, ‘how is it all going, do you need anything from us?’” Kiri says. She is, she says, “terrified” of being a terrible parental figure or parent, and is acutely aware of the damage that can do. “You’re locked in with biological children. You find out that you’re bad at it by doing it.” It’s not that she feels lackadaisical about foster care – the exact opposite – but more that the short-term respite care she gives to young people, mostly teenagers, is “exactly my capacity, while still supporting my community and the women and the children around me”. She and her partner are open to offering longer placements in the future.
More and more young adults are electing not to have children, or deciding that the nuclear family is not for them. Women, especially, are understandably wary of the impact of motherhood on their careers, bodies, finances – everything, basically, and are realising that you can still have a strong desire to care for children, and to make their lives better, without having your own biologically. As Rebecca Solnit writes: “There are so many things to love besides one’s own offspring, so many things that need love, so much other work love has to do in the world.”
There is a recruitment crisis in foster care. Kiri initially didn’t talk about her plans to foster on stage, but many of the social care professionals she worked with started coming to see her perform, and saw it as an opportunity to set up fostering information booths outside. Foster carers are an ageing demographic, which is why it’s important for younger adults to realise that they have something to offer, even if they don’t own their own house, or worry about not having enough time (respite care can be a solution to this, but full-time foster care is also a viable career choice). Their energy levels are a selling point. Another friend of mine, whom I’ll call Amy, and her partner had a young man stay with them for a year. They went mountain biking and cold water swimming, they went to the beach, and on holiday. “An older foster parent might not have the energy to do that,” Amy says.
Being a foster carer means, essentially, being a professional parent. There’s a skillset and a salary, and responsibilities. No one is saying that it’s easy, or something that you would go into lightly. For instance, many young people will have suffered trauma that can manifest in challenging behaviour. Both Amy and her partner have jobs that involve working with vulnerable people, including children, so were confident they were the right ones to advocate for those in their care, and to make sure they had access to all the help and support to which they were entitled. Her mum also grew up in foster care and did not have a positive experience. “I felt like I wanted to give something back, and put things right in certain respects,” Amy tells me. They now have two children under three, so are taking a break, but they fully intend to continue fostering in the future.
Fostering is, of course, primarily about helping the children involved. “If you can give stability and love, and can nurture, while also acknowledging that kids need boundaries, then it could be right for you,” says Amy. It has much to offer in terms of personal fulfilment. As someone whose family has benefited from foster care – my brother stayed with a lovely couple for respite weekends thanks to the charity Barnardo’s – I hope that Kiri’s show encourages more young adults to consider it. As she so brilliantly captures, there are so many ways to care and so many children who need that care.
What’s working
The NHS. Last week saw another trip to paediatric A&E with our son, after a long winter of viruses. Staff were incredible, treatment was rapid and effective, and within 24 hours of discharge we had seen a GP for a follow-up and referral. It feels important to highlight experiences such as these, while also recognising that it’s what every family deserves.
What’s not
I find myself despairing at some of the “child-free” discourse online. No one has a human right to go through life without encountering children in their vicinity, and as the article above shows, you don’t have to be a parent to care about the welfare of children. But some of the chatter on social media about our smallest, most vulnerable people has become quite unpleasant. Could it be becoming another form of internet radicalisation? I’m watching with interest, and trepidation.
Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett is a Guardian columnist
