Imaginif

Article by: Sunshine Girl On A Rainy Day

Today, I led a workshop for a group of twelve teenagers in foster care.

The majority of attendees were 16 years old.

As a former foster child myself, I wanted to share with them how to create a personal mission statement and life management plan for their lives. 

When I aged out of care, I had to figure those things out for myself, and it’s important to make that task easier for others.

I also shared this circle of intimacy diagram, which I created to demonstrate appropriate levels of self-disclosure:

One of the challenges for young people preparing to age out of foster care is developing healthy personal boundaries.

- How much can I share?
- Who should I share it with?
- Will they be too overwhelmed?
- Who can I tell?

For current/former foster children, the journey toward wholeness often involves bouncing between one extreme or another. They might share too much about themselves and make themselves vulnerable. Or, they might strive for total independence and reveal their true selves to no one.

What often happens after aging out of care is that a person might try to be a rock, an island, an individual existing in isolation. But then, when deep need strikes, when the young person is struggling with core needs such as food, shelter, safety or even clothing, they might be so desperate for assistance that they reach out to anyone who might listen and offer a helping hand. Rather than protecting them, their isolation has made them even more vulnerable.They need to make connections. They need people in all categories of circles. It takes time and effort to build and maintain relationships with people in the innermost circle, and to establish the trust necessary for deeper vulnerability. Ideally, those would be the people to whom you entrust the secrets of your life.However, for young people in foster care, it’s difficult to build these skills, because the system isn’t set up to reinforce healthy boundaries.One young lady in my workshop raised her hand and asked, “How would you feel if someone came to the placement where you were staying and asked her to tell you all about yourself when you had just met her?”