Looking into this, has anyone else had experience of the system in Sheffield? Is my age (38) going to count against me? I am now single too, as my husband gave up after years of failed IVF etc, is this a minus point too?:|

Dont know the answer but good luck as if you are in a position to provide a loving foster home you will be doing a great thing x

I don't think your age or the fact that you are single will go against you. I think the fact that you are willing to provide a loving, caring and stable home to a child will count for a lot more. I know a couple of foster carers in Sheffield one being my cousin (in her 40's) and a friend ( who's in he 30's and single with 1 child of her own). Have you applied to be a carer yet? How far have you got?

Dont know the answer but good luck as if you are in a position to provide a loving foster home you will be doing a great thing x

good luck to you i always wanted to do this but circumstances etc:)

Thank you for support, everyone. I am waiting for agencies and council to get back to me, so just at the beginning of my journey!

HI, We're at the beginning of things with fostering and my understanding is that you would be absolutely fine regardless of age or especially because of your age possibly.
We're waiting for our first meeting with SCC and it's driving me mad, it was cancelled because of the flood so we can't progress yet.
Get in touch if you like, there's another lady on SF also starting out and could end up at the same intro meeting, perhaps you would too, could be useful to know others in the same situation :)

Thanks, I am feeling more cheerful about that, it is good to know others are in the same situation. Not everyone is lucky enough to be able to have a family the conventional way, and there are plenty of children out there who need support and love that we have to offer.

good luck everyone with fostering ect, my mum used to do it years ago and loved it!

Thanks, I am feeling more cheerful about that, it is good to know others are in the same situation. Not everyone is lucky enough to be able to have a family the conventional way, and there are plenty of children out there who need support and love that we have to offer.

Good for you and Good Luck :)

Thank you for support, everyone. I am waiting for agencies and council to get back to me, so just at the beginning of my journey!

As I posted elsewhere - fostering is great - although hard work and nothing like the introduction days you will go on!! However, if you are in it to help the children, you will be rewarded!!

We have just started the journey to possibly becoming foster parents.

Its very exciting although a little scary

Good for you Ollie. We've just got our first Social Worker appointment and the days are ticking down. Looking forward to it!

my advice to you would be please don't think that this is going to be easy or quick, me and my husband spent a year and a half "going through" the adoption process with SCC only to be told that because we where not able to adopt in any of the three catagories listed below we would not b e recieving a social worker to begin the assessment process.

1)a sibling group because we have a child of our own.
2)A child over five, because our child was only five and there needs to be a 2 year gap with your own child being the oldest.
3)a child from an Ethnic Minority group, because we are not of that ethnicity ourselves.

why oh why did they tak us through the initial training days as they had visited us at home and where aware of our circumstances.

When I spoke to them to withdraw, i was asked if we would like to become foster carers instead, as the time scale was less. at that time fostering was not an option.

We have however been successful and been approved to adopt with another country wide agency and it took 13mths.

good luck, gets loads of advice from people who already do this as a job and make sure that you get all the support you need from SCC.