Penny and Tim, Wadhurst

‘What interested us in fostering? Tim and I both wanted to have more children. We had our first child then I had an ectopic pregnancy and we weren’t sure we would have any more. That’s when we first thought about fostering, we wanted to do something positive for other people’s children, to give them a good start in life. In fact we went on to have two more daughters but we still wanted to foster as well!

We wanted to do something positive for other people’s children, to give them a good start in life.

We are also Christians and we felt an opportunity was being given to us to do some good in the world. How did our own children feel? I used to be a child minder so they were used to sharing me with other children. Fostering was just an extension of that, it made it easy to explain to them – fostering was like child minding but the children stay.

What do we love about fostering? It’s about the changes we see in the children as they get more settled, make friends of their own, seeing them grow and develop so they are in a better position when they leave to choose the right path. Even very young children can learn the difference between ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.

A challenge for me in fostering would be to stay patient when there are 5 children in the house all wanting different things! Our own daughters are now 14, 12 and 9 years. Fostering is definitely a family affair and they have given a huge amount of support that has made it possible for us.’