Safer Fostering

15/04/2026

🌟 save the date 🌟

Save the date!
3rd June I’m in Exeter ‘Survival Strategies for Therapeutic Foster Parents’
More details to follow. 😀

09/04/2026

💙 April is World Autism Awareness Month 💙

This month is a reminder of the incredible difference you make every single day. Many children in care may be autistic or show traits of autism — often navigating big emotions, uncertainty, and a world that doesn’t always understand them.

Your patience, consistency, and compassion can be life-changing. 💙

Autistic children may communicate differently, process the world in unique ways, or need extra support with routines and transitions — but they also bring amazing strengths, honesty, creativity, and perspective.

This month, let’s focus on:
💙 Learning about autism and trauma-informed care
💙 Creating calm, predictable environments
💙 Listening to each child’s individual needs
💙 Celebrating progress — no matter how small
💙 Advocating for understanding in schools and communities

You don’t have to have all the answers — showing up, being steady, and offering a safe, accepting space is what matters most.

Thank you for the love and stability you give. It truly changes lives. 💙

08/04/2026

💛 Every child deserves to feel safe.

At Safer Fostering, children always come first — not profit. 🏠

✨ With the right support, you could help a child feel seen, valued, and safe again.

💙 Why foster with Safer?
• Trauma-informed care helping kids heal 🌱
• Full support & training for you 🤝
• Paid breaks, family healthcare & holidays 🎉

💫 One home. One connection. One life changed.

📢 Start your journey today: https://saferfostering.org.uk

12/03/2026

What a brilliant evening! ⭐️

12/03/2026

12/03/2026

Our conference is officially underway! 🎉

We’re excited to welcome so many therapeutic parents, and professionals to the COECT National Conference: “The Truth About Tech.” Today we’re coming together to explore the impact of technology on children and young people through a trauma-informed lens — sharing knowledge, experiences, and practical strategies that can make a real difference.

A fantastic start to what promises to be a powerful day of learning, discussion, and connection. Thank you to everyone who has joined us!

05/03/2026

Happy World Book Day! 📚💙

For foster parents and the incredible children in their care, books can be more than just stories — they can be a safe place, a way to understand big feelings, and a reminder that we are not alone.

On this World Book Day, we’re celebrating stories that help children explore emotions and experiences in a gentle, supportive way. The wonderful books by Sarah Naish, such as William Wobbly, Sophie Spikey, and the other characters in the series, help children recognise feelings like anger, worry, and sadness while showing them that those feelings can be understood and managed.

These stories can open up important conversations between foster parents and children, helping build trust, empathy, and emotional understanding. Sometimes a character in a book can say the things that are hardest for a child to explain.

So today, take a moment to sit down together, share a story, and celebrate the power of books to comfort, teach, and connect us. 📖✨

https://tinyurl.com/3tpf43c2

05/03/2026

Wow! Thank you to everyone so far who has booked on to 'The Truth About Tech' Conference!

If you are a Foster Parent or Supporting Professional, please get in touch with us via our email [email protected] about booking your FREE place.

Thursday 12 March 2026 at the Village Hotel Cardiff.

Further details can be found on our website https://www.coect.co.uk/event-details/coect-national-conference-the-truth-about-tech

03/03/2026

🌟 Discover One of the Many Benefits of Fostering with Safer 🌟

At Safer Fostering, we’re proud to offer extra perks that help create special memories for our foster families — including access to our Safer caravan! 🏖️

Our caravan gives foster families the opportunity to enjoy affordable breaks away, spend quality time together, and create lasting memories in a relaxed, home-from-home setting. Whether it’s a seaside adventure, a peaceful escape, or simply time to reconnect, it’s just one of the ways we support and value our incredible foster parents. 💙

✨ Time away together can:
• Strengthen family bonds
• Provide children with new experiences
• Offer a well-deserved break
• Create positive, lasting memories

📅 Reminder: The Safer caravan is now OPEN for bookings from 01/03/2026 – 30/11/2026!

If you’re part of our Safer family and would like to book, please get in touch for availability and details.

Not yet fostering with us? Get in touch to find out more about the support and benefits we offer our foster families. 💬

18/02/2026

Screens. Trauma. Children.
Are screens affecting children more than we realise?
We need to talk about it.
📱 The Truth About Tech
🎟️ LIMITED FREE places available for our national conference
🔗 https://tinyurl.com/5x2vcsuu
📅 12 March 2026 | Cardiff
📩 Email us at [email protected] to book your place
✨Remember if you already foster you can get a FREE ticket, just email [email protected] ✨

Join us for an inspiring and engaging day of learning and connection7 Guest Speakers: Sarah Naish Sarah Dillon Gareth Thomas Sair Penna

14/02/2026

Our Foster Parents are highly valued co-professionals

More Than “Just Carers”

Sarah Dillon (c)

Something quiet is happening.
Foster parents are leaving.

Not in anger.
Not in headlines.
Just… slipping away.

Because it’s hard to stay
when you feel unseen.

They say there’s no reward.
No job satisfaction.
But what they really mean is
there’s no recognition
for the weight they carry.

Blamed.
Shamed.
Judged.
Made to feel small
in a role that is anything but small.

Being a foster parent
is not babysitting.
It is not shift work.
It is not a rota you clock off from.

Carers do shifts.
Foster parents live it.

Twenty-four hours.
Seven days.
No handover.
No “I’m off now.”

They open their doors
and something much braver
their hearts.

To children who arrive
carrying more than a suitcase.
Carrying fear.
Grief.
Rage.
Loss stitched into their nervous systems.

They learn the language of trauma.
They bend their routines.
They fight for assessments,
for school support,
for therapy,
for someone to listen.

They document everything.
Every bruise.
Every incident.
Every phone call.

Robust recordings.
Safer caring plans.
Risk assessments stacked on risk assessments.

And still,
an invisible magnifying glass hovers above them.

A system so risk-averse
it forgets
that courage lives in these homes.

Waiting for them to slip.
To miss something.
To make the smallest mistake.

Some are asked
to drive children
to visit the very people
who harmed them.

To sit in waiting rooms
holding shaking hands
while swallowing their own anger.

Many feel voiceless.
Decisions made in rooms
they’re not invited into.
Meetings about the children
they tuck in at night.

When they say,
“I need support,”
they are given a gentle pat
and the words,
“You’re doing a great job.”

Even when they are on their knees.

Finance blocks the door
to the resources that could make a difference.
Therapy delayed.
Support reduced.
Budgets louder than children’s needs.

And then there is the hardest truth
they are often on the receiving end
of the child’s trauma.

The slammed doors.
The accusations.
The fear-fuelled words.

All while living with the knowledge
that an allegation,
mismanaged,
misunderstood,
can shatter everything.

And still they stay.

Because they know
these are the most vulnerable children
in our society.

They are not “just carers.”

They are trauma interpreters.
Advocates.
Regulators of nervous systems.
Midwives of trust.
Builders of safety from scratch.

They are professionals
whether the system names them so or not.

And if we keep losing them,
we are not just losing homes.
We are losing skill.
Experience.
Wisdom.
Love that has been tested and stayed.

At True and Safer Fostering,
there is a different story.

Foster parents are treated
as co-professionals.
Not an afterthought.
Not an accessory to the system.

Real support.
Not platitudes.
Not head pats.

Because if we want children to heal,
the adults holding them
must be held too.

This work is specialist.
It takes a certain kind of person.

And they deserve
to be treated with the utmost respect.
To be recognised for the expertise they carry.
To be trusted for the insight they hold.

And when decisions are made
about the children they live with,
love,
protect,
and advocate for

their voice
should be the loudest in the room.

Safer Fostering
True Fostering

13/02/2026

It Really Is Safer in SAfER

When we first said yes,
we had a spare room and lots of love
and thought that would be enough.

We had raised our own children
knew the rhythm of homework and bedtime,
the language of scraped knees,
the hush of night-lights glowing softly in the dark.
We believed our love would travel the same road
it always had.

But the children who came
carried storms inside them.

Their eyes held rooms we had never entered,
their anger rose like sudden weather,
their silence weighed more than words.
We found ourselves wading through days
thick as treacle
every step slow,
every effort heavy.

Behaviours we couldn’t make sense of
The smell of fear permeating the air
Chaos stealing our joy
Defiance, refusal, rage.

We questioned everything.
Ourselves most of all.

When things went wrong,
the fingers did not point at trauma
or history
or wounds stitched too tight to heal
they pointed at us.

We tried to explain
that pain can shout in borrowed voices,
that fear can twist memory into something unrecognisable.
But our words fell between meetings
we were not invited to,
notes we were not shown,
histories folded away
like secrets we were expected to solve.

And when allegations came
sharp and sudden
we stood steady,
knowing confusion can grow
from unprocessed memories.
We explained our experiences,
What we believed was happening
We waited to be heard.
Our voices fell on deaf ears.

We felt small.
Just “carers,” they said
as though our nights were not sleepless,
as though our hearts were not breaking open
again and again.

We were blamed, judged, vilified
Shamed…….

Then we found a different door.

At SAfER Fostering Wales,
something shifted.

We were seen.
Not as bystanders.
Not as problems.
But as partners.

Co-professionals.
Voices at the table.
Hands trusted with the role.

Training that did not skim the surface
but dived deep
into attachment, trauma,
into why a slammed door
might really be a plea to stay.

Support that felt solid
Someone to call,
Experienced people who answered.

The therapeutic assessment,
the transfer
smooth, thoughtful, human.
No hurdles thrown in our path.
Just a bridge.

Social workers who are truly trauma informed
Support workers who know how to connect with the children
Excellent support groups
Empathic listeners
management who care!

And here is the truth:
when an agency is not for profit,
care is not counted in coins.
It is invested
back into families,
into wellbeing,
into rest.

Private healthcare
when the strain shows on our own bodies.
Caravans in England and Wales
where tired hearts can breathe by the sea
or under wide skies.

For the first time,
we did not feel alone in the work.
We felt held.

Fostering is not soft.
It is fierce.
It asks you to love children
who do not yet know how to trust love.
It asks you to stay
when staying is hard.

But in the right hands,
with the right people beside you,
the weight is shared.

And we have learned this
safety is not just for the children.

It is for us, too.

It truly is
safer
in Safer.