Emotional Toll
It is very difficult to support another person when you are overwhelmed, stressed, exhausted or just generally not in a good place.
The Casey Foundation and the Justice Resource Institute developed ARC Reflections, a training curriculum to develop foster parents and caregivers’ understanding of traumatic stress, increase their own emotional regulation and provide tools to support their parenting skills. The session three guide emphasizes the important role foster parents and caregivers play in the lives of children and teens who have experienced trauma; validates foster parents and caregivers’ emotions, reactions and missteps; and highlights the link between self-care and effective foster parenting.
Every session includes a check-in to increase awareness and engagement of participants; a facilitator checklist of session materials; practice activities and take home log for participants; a representative case study to follow throughout the sessions; and reflective questions for participant growth and understanding.
Children and teens in foster care enter into the relationship with a family looking through a lens colored by abuse, maltreatment, neglect, loss and separation. Often, they have developed self-protective strategies and may distance, disconnect and withdraw from the adult who is attempting to help. For foster parents, this can feel very personal and is often emotionally draining. Building a toolkit of preemptive skills and self-care aids through this curriculum can help ease the situation.