Welcome everyone to our Fairness for Children Raised by Relatives website. We welcome you to this website and want you to know we are only getting started so this space will forever be changing and expanding to allow us to provide the best supports possible to our B.C. kinship caregivers.
We want you to all know that what you are doing matters, you, and your families matter, and you are not alone. We are over 13,000 strong in this province and we need to come together and raise our voices in unison so that we can be heard, be seen, be respected, and be supported. Our children should be entitled to the same benefits as those in the foster care system.
I just wanted to share a little bit of my story with you, I am a single grandparent raising my 2nd grandson, my 1st grandson came to me when he was 11 and my 2nd when he was 2. Did I think at 52 that I would be raising two more children, no, like many of you I was thinking ahead to retirement. My 1st grandson is now in a healthy relationship and has two children of his own and a career in the trades. My 2nd is turning 16 very soon. So here I am 15 years later, I did retire two years ago and am now 67. One thing I promised myself was that when I did retire, I would become more involved in advocating for all of us kinship care providers and that is why I am here.
When you get the call, you answer it and you do everything in your power to keep these children, OUR children safe, healthy, and happy. It is what we all do, but we do not have to do it alone.
We want you to all know that what you are doing matters, you, and your family’s matter, and you are not alone. We are over 13,000 strong in this province and we need to come together and raise our voices in unison so that we can be heard, be seen, be respected, and be supported. Our children should be entitled to the same benefits as those in the foster care system.
We need to educate the public on who we are, we need to share our stories, and we would love to invite you all to do just that. We want to post your stories, your challenges and/or successes. Or maybe just a funny story about something one of your children have done. This can be done anonymously with no names, or first names, or you can invent a name, it is totally up to you. If you are more comfortable with doing an audio recording or video that would be fine too.
Another hope of ours is to have a photo gallery, again no names, just beautiful pictures of our children. It could be current, or from 15 years ago, it doesn’t matter. We need for people to see us, see that we come in all shapes and sizes, but are all sharing the same goal to raise OUR children to the best of our abilities.
Please join our society and I know together we can and will affect change to make life better for OUR children.
Thanks for visiting our website.
Shari
President, Fairness for Children Raised by Relatives