It’s no secret that everyone has different experiences, both positive and negative, when it comes down to their time spent in the care system. For me, I went into the care system when I was 14, It was a daunting time and my experience has been a mixture of positive and negative overall. I felt angry at where I’d ended up, but also happy that I was no longer in a negative environment, but that feeling came with a lot of guilt.
Before coming into care, I was repeatedly told that I was mature for my age, and at first I always thought of that as a compliment, until I reflected on it. Yes, in part it was still a compliment, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had grown up too quickly, that from the age of about 8, I started to miss out on doing things a child of that age should do. I wanted to stress out about homework, or who got to take home the class pet or what I was going to take in for show and tell, not what will happen if I’m home slightly later than normal, or what am I going to cook for my sibling and myself for dinner tonight. These things seem insignificant now, but they played a massive part in my struggles with mental health. The things that were plaguing my mind were things my parent should have been worried about. My friends at school would tell me the next day how they got to watch ‘The Sparticle Mystery’ and ‘4 o’clock club’ before their parents helped with math homework and went to the park. I had an overwhelming feeling of failure. I’d failed at being a child. I’d failed at doing what other kids did, and I was left feeling like the odd one out.
These things may seem quite trivial, something just to shrug off, I was taking on the responsibilities of my parent, making adult decisions as a child and it felt as though I was doing so blindfolded and with my hands behind my back.
Once I went into care, things kind of slowed down, it was a bit of a shock at first. I lived away from my parent and sibling before going into the care system, so it wasn’t a shock like that. I’d gone from fighting for my mental health, for someone to listen to me and for help to see my sibling to being able to go to school and actually concentrate on school, and being able to just take a minute to think, and for my mind to actually be at rest. For a short while, it felt like my all worries were lifted, or pushed to the back of my mind and I could finally start trying to find myself.
Ultimately, my experiences have led me to where I have been, the hard work I have been doing to overcome challenges, to try to improve and understand my mental health, and being able to be who I am, not who I have to be, has led me to where I am today.
Emily x
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