Friday 5 February 2016

Blog entry #100 - well done us!

Ella and I started our blog in early November 2013 which means we have written 100 blog entries in 27 months which we think isn’t too bad as we both work and we both have husbands and youngsters to look after!

Our most memorable posts

Our first entry explains why we switched from a “by invitation only” newsletter, carefully targeted at former Care Kids, to an open access blog.


The remainder of 2013 was taken up by a whole series of guest posts.  Most of these contributors are still close friends and regular readers of our blog but they don’t currently post new material here for reasons you will discover if you read on.

Early 2014 saw the first mini-crisis in the history of our blog!  We both got new jobs (so we had less free time for blogging) and we seemed to be attracting readers who were hostile to our life-style choices. This small minority made many long-time supporters very uneasy. To cut a long story short a new Care Kids blog was started, under new management, with a very carefully monitored membership.   


The months went by and apart from one new entry in May 2014 our blog was on hold.

But then, quite suddenly, everything changed.

The on-line "Adoption and Fostering in the UK" forum closed down in very controversial circumstances, our dear friend Didi submitted a very sad guest post and another friend “Boy who shall not be named” died.



Late in 2014 we published our book “How I survived in and out of Care”.  When I wrote the book I did so in the sure and certain knowledge that it would upset some people and annoy others. If a reader falls into either category then my defence is that articulate and conscientious adoptive parents or foster carers – the type who would be sufficiently motivated to join an on-line forum or to read any book of mine on their vocation – are the exception rather than the rule. The on-going tragedy is that not all members of this elite group realise that their high standards are far from universal! Some of my friends had a long and happy relationship with their foster parents and a number of examples of entirely positive relationships are included in this book. Other foster parents I know from bitter first-hand experience just “went through the motions” and the degree of nurturing, especially when older teenagers were being fostered, that took place was fairly minimal. It is also my strong impression that the average quality of foster care gradually declines as the age of the child increases.



In 2015 Ella and I posted 54 entries in 52 weeks. I think that these three are probably the best of the crop.




I hope that my regular readers (150 to 500 per week) enjoy what Ella and I post.

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