Sally, the guardian ad litum, came to visit and asked to spend some time alone with Jodie. I left the two of them in the lounge, and took the opportunity to spend some time with Lucy and Paula, while Adrian was out with his friends. Jodie had been disruptive and aggressive all morning, and I found Paula sitting despondently on her bed. ‘I wish I was back at school,’ she admitted. ‘I’m dreading Christmas. She’ll ruin it.’
‘No she won’t. We won’t let her. And we may find it’s just what she needs to open her heart. I know it’s difficult, but she can’t keep this up for ever.’
‘Can’t she? She’s done a good job so far. I daren’t even bring my friends home because of how she is.’
I was taken aback. My usually sociable daughter was now too embarrassed to bring friends home. I went over and hugged her. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t realize. How about you arrange a sleepover when she’s away on respite? Videos, midnight feast, the lot?’
She brightened a little. ‘OK, Mum. I’m sorry.’
‘No need to apologize. I understand.’
I went into Lucy’s room, but the second I mentioned Jodie’s name she turned on me.
‘It’s all we ever talk about. Jodie, bloody Jodie. I’m sick to death of her. I wish she’d never come. You won’t change her, Cathy, whatever you do. Surely you can see that by now? She’s evil. She’s needs a bloody priest, not a carer.’
I wondered if Sally had noticed the tension in the house, for as she was about to leave she paused in the hall and placed her hand on my arm. ‘Cathy, you’re doing a really good job, but make sure you and your family don’t suffer. These children can play havoc with your emotions. Remember, her damage isn’t your responsibility. You can only do so much.’
I found Sally’s words comforting. It was nice to hear someone say something positive and to recognize what was going on. I respected Sally – she managed to combine professionalism with an ability to empathize that made me feel she understood.
Later that afternoon, Eileen phoned. ‘Hello, Cathy,’ she said, in her flat, plodding way. ‘We’ve got a bit of a problem.’
‘Oh yes?’ I replied, unperturbed. I was used to social workers telling me ‘we’ had problems. It usually meant that something unpleasant was coming my way.
‘When we sent a copy of the doctor’s letter to Jodie’s parents, someone forgot to blank out your details, so I’m afraid they sent them your name and address.’ As usual, she didn’t sound very sorry at all. I was furious. I’d been worrying about the Ear, Nose and Throat department being indiscreet, but meanwhile the Social Services had been handing out my details. I thought back to the silent phone call I’d received when Nicola had been with us; could that have been Jodie’s parents?
‘I see,’ I said. ‘That’s really going to make Jodie feel safe! I can’t say I’m surprised, though. When did it happen?’
‘I’m not sure exactly. We only found out when Jodie’s mother phoned today, demanding contact. She threatened to come to your house if we didn’t arrange it. Obviously, we told her that was unacceptable, but I thought you should know.’
‘Thanks,’ I said tersely. ‘And what did she say? Is she still planning on coming round?’
‘I don’t think so. She only mentioned it once. But don’t worry, if she does come round we’ll apply for an injunction straight away.’
Yes, I thought, but an injunction’s only a piece of paper. I’d had angry parents turning up on my doorstep before, and I knew waving a scrap of paper at them wouldn’t have had much of an effect. If a child is on a Voluntary Care Order, or we’re working towards rehabilitating the child so that he or she can go back home and the parents are cooperating, then there’s no problem in them knowing where the child and I live. Indeed, sometimes contact takes place in my house. But that clearly wasn’t the case here, far from it. It was blindingly obvious that the highest level of care should have been taken to protect my details and that hadn’t happened.
Eileen was impervious to my frustration, and there wasn’t much I could do about the situation now. An injunction was as useful as locking the stable door after the horse had bolted.
‘Right,’ I said stiffly. ‘Thanks for letting me know.’ And ended the call.
I was angry, of course, but, as I’d said to Eileen, I wasn’t terribly surprised. While the care proceedings are in progress, there are a huge number of documents flying around, between the parents, solicitors, social workers, the guardian ad litum and others. The present system relies on someone in the office at Social Services remembering to blank out the confidential details from every document, so it’s inevitable that there will be mistakes. In my experience, about 50 per cent of parents are given my address at some point, which in my view is unacceptable.
As a result, when there is a breach of confidentiality, we as a family have to take special precautions. My children always look through the spyhole before answering the door, and if it’s someone they don’t recognize, they don’t open it; instead, they fetch me. Foster children don’t answer the door at all. On top of this, we have an expensive alarm system, a Chubb lock, and I always look up and down the road before leaving the house. After a while it becomes second nature, and we have all learned that we simply have to accept the risks. Thank goodness that, apart from some nasty verbal confrontations, none of us has been placed in real danger.
My patience with Eileen, however, was stretched to the limit a few days later. For reasons known only to themselves, Social Services decided to call a meeting to discuss Jodie’s mother’s threat to come round, and they wanted Jill and me to attend. We marvelled that they had the time, so close to Christmas. And what were we going to discuss in any case? No one could take back the information now that it had been released; taking out an injunction forbidding Jodie’s parents to come near my property would have been pointless; the only other option was to move Jodie to new carers, which was clearly in no one’s interests – especially not Jodie’s. And who would take her anyway, with her complex needs, and at such short notice?
The meeting went as I had expected. We discussed all the possible options, before deciding on the sensible course: namely, to do nothing. I was relieved to get out of there and was just shaking my head at the monumental waste of time we had all been through when Eileen caught up with me in the corridor.
‘Cathy, just before you go, can I give you this? It’s a Christmas present for Jodie. Her father asked me to pass it on to her.’
I stared at her, astonished, as she held out a well-used Tesco carrier bag.
‘I’m not sure it’s really appropriate, Eileen,’ I said, with forced diplomacy and reminding myself of my professionalism. ‘Contact has been suspended, and present-giving is usually classified as contact, particularly in a case like this. Jodie feels very hostile towards her parents at the moment, understandably.’
‘Oh, right,’ she replied, mulling this over. ‘Do you want me to give it back then?’ As she said this, she pulled the unwrapped present out of the bag, presumably to show me how harmless it was, and that I was being over-cautious. It was a bright pink, long-sleeved T-shirt, with ‘Daddy’s Little Girl’ printed on the front in big sparkly letters. Eileen looked at it, then held it up. ‘So you don’t think Jodie would like it?’ she said.
I was almost lost for words as I looked at her holding up a T-shirt that was just about the most bitterly ironic thing I’d ever seen.
‘Eileen,’ I said, slowly and deliberately, ‘Jodie has been sexually abused by her father, probably for most of her life. I don’t think a T-shirt calling her daddy’s little girl is very appropriate, do you? If I gave her this, Jodie would be terrified by the sight of it.’
The penny dropped. ‘Oh, yes. Right, I take your point. We’ll give it back then. Have a lovely Christmas!’
By the time I reached my car, I was still shaking my head in astonishment.
Chapter Twenty
Christmas
I was determined to make sure Jodie enjoyed Christmas, and
started to feel part of the family. I knew from sad experience that foster children have often missed out on Christmas in the past. In fact, because they’re at home for at least two whole days, and their parents tend to drink more, it can be the worst time of year for many children.
I remembered my previous placement, Callum, a sweet-natured ten-year-old. Callum had lived with his mother, who was a non-functioning alcoholic. That meant that she was incapable of leading a normal life, she was too locked into the prison of her alcohol dependency. The Christmas before Callum came to me, his father had sent him a cheque, which his mother had subsequently taken and spent on drink. On Christmas Day, she’d woken up after midday with a hangover, and then tried to make Christmas dinner. She hadn’t done any shopping, so she’d peeled the breadcrumbs off some chicken nuggets, and tried to pass it off to Callum as roast turkey.
Despite her drink problem, Callum’s mother hadn’t been violent or abusive towards him, but her alcoholism had been such that Callum had had to look after her, rather than vice versa. For the previous three years, he hadn’t had a single Christmas or birthday present. The Christmas he spent with us, I bought him a skateboard, helmet and kneepads, and when he opened them he ran out of the room, because he didn’t want us to see him cry.
On Christmas morning, Jodie was up before six as usual, but she seemed to regard it as just another day. The previous night, we had all hung pillowcases on our doors, and these were now full of presents. I led Jodie downstairs and showed her that the glass of sherry, mince pie and carrots had all disappeared, which meant that Father Christmas had come to visit in the night.
‘That’s nice, Cathy,’ she replied, as if humouring me. Throughout the morning, even as we opened up the presents under the tree, Jodie remained fairly flat, but she did seem to have some understanding of the importance of the day. She behaved well and generally joined in with the family. As I watched her, I hoped that, even though she wasn’t showing much enthusiasm, the goodwill of the day was having some impact, and that she would remember it fondly in the future.
In the afternoon my parents arrived, along with my brother Tom, his wife Chloe and their six-year-old, Ewan. Suddenly the house was full of noise and excitement, and I realized how cut off we had all become from our normal lives. For one thing, I hadn’t had any adult company for more than a week. Jodie had met all of my family before when they had come round to visit me in the usual run of things, and they always included the children I fostered, treating them like members of the family. Nonetheless she seemed a little startled when they all arrived at once, and she remained inhibited for most of the day.
After I’d made a round of drinks, we all gathered together in the lounge, ready to exchange presents. My family had brought some for us, and we had kept theirs under the tree, ready and waiting. We were all excited, but I could see that this was another ritual which was new to Jodie. As the presents were handed out, she stared at the others, taking cues on how to behave. She watched Ewan as he opened a present, and then she followed suit. She looked at it blankly, and I had to coax her to show excitement.
‘That’s lovely, Jodie, isn’t it? You can play with that this afternoon. Will you say thank you?’
She did as she was told, but without any of the excitement and shining eyes that Christmas usually brought to children. Throughout the day, she didn’t seem ungrateful for what she was given, and she did seem to like some of her gifts, but it was sad to see her having to mimic the enthusiasm and happiness that came naturally to the others.
After dinner we sat around and played games, as we slowly recovered from the meal. The girls worked hard to include Jodie, but she grew irritable, perhaps worn out by the excitement of the day. She went through the motions of playing the various games, but didn’t seem to derive any pleasure from them. When she didn’t win she became angry, and slammed her fist on the arm of the sofa. When she did win she was flat; she couldn’t take any pleasure from it, and couldn’t celebrate gregariously with the others. When we cheered for her, she joined in, but it seemed hollow.
Some time later she seemed to become frustrated and started holding her nose. I ignored it at first, suspecting that she was simply seeking attention, but when she persisted I eventually asked what was wrong.
‘My nose hurts,’ she said, her voice muffled by her hand.
‘Oh dear,’ I replied. ‘Can I take a look?’ She removed her hand, but squirmed away when I tried to touch her face. ‘I can’t see anything wrong. Is there anything I can do?’
‘It hurts!’ she moaned.
‘Why does it hurt, Jodie? Have you done something to it?’
‘It hurts.’ She was getting louder, and did seem to be in pain.
‘OK, well, come with me, and we’ll put a cold flannel on it.’ I took her into the bathroom and put the wet flannel to her face. ‘Can you tell me what you did, Jodie, to make it hurt?’
‘It was him. He whacked me in the face.’
‘Who, Jodie?’
‘Daddy! He thumped me,’ she wailed, sounding like she was about to cry.
I had been sitting next to her in the living room, so I knew that nothing had actually happened. However, even though the pain seemed to be imagined, in the sense that she obviously hadn’t been injured today, it was totally real to her. It sounded like she was remembering being hurt in the past, and was transposing the memory on to the present. We stood in the bathroom for a while, until she’d calmed down, then we went back to the lounge to rejoin the others.
At eight o’clock we stood on the doorstep and waved as my parents and my brother’s family drove off home. I closed the front door. I was relieved that Christmas was over, even though it had gone as well as I could have hoped. Jodie had been somewhat overawed by the occasion and the large gathering, but she had behaved reasonably, and I hoped that some of the warmth of the season had got through to her. While it hadn’t proved a breakthrough, and hadn’t touched Jodie emotionally in the way that Callum had been touched, I hoped that Christmas would now mean something good to Jodie, and that she’d had a small taste of what other children enjoyed every year.
Chapter Twenty-One
A New Year
As the New Year approached, my spirits rose. A new year offers a new start, and anything seems possible on the first of January. Giving up smoking, however, was not on my list of resolutions, and I was now sneaking outside upwards of seven times a day, deluding myself that I would quit again when things were calmer. But when on earth would that be?
Despite my hopes, Jodie showed no improvement as the New Year passed. Her behaviour continued to be difficult and hostile, and her nights were increasingly disturbed by nightmares and hallucinations. She was having more incidences of remembered pain now, and these became linked to disclosures; Jodie would complain that her arm hurt, and this would lead to the memory of her mother hitting her with an ashtray, or her father scalding her with hot water. In all of these cases Jodie’s pain seemed to be completely genuine, despite my attempts to explain to her that the injuries she was describing had happened months, sometimes years, ago.
Although I didn’t think she was fabricating the remembered pain, I was becoming increasingly aware that she was lying in other situations. Often, she was so convincing that I found myself questioning what I’d seen, and doubting the evidence of my own eyes. If I caught her red-handed in the middle of some misdemeanour, she would so emphatically deny that it was happening that I had to stop and reassess what I was looking at. She had sometimes told lies when she first arrived, but I had assumed that she had been reverting to past experience, telling lies to avoid punishment, so it had been somewhat understandable. Now, however, she must have known that she didn’t have to worry, that there was never any risk of her being physically or emotionally punished. Why, then, did she feel it necessary to deny her actions so vehemently?
She also started making false accusations, making up stories about the other children, even when I was in the room and had obviously seen
that nothing had happened. She would claim Lucy or Paula had kicked, pinched or bitten her, which was clearly ludicrous. If anything, they were scared of her, quite understandably. When I pointed out to her that I had been in the room the whole time, and had seen that no one had gone near her, she flared up.
‘She did. She did! Why don’t you ever believe me?’
She was so passionate and convincing, I was often tempted to reconsider, and had to remind myself of what I’d seen.
At other times I caught her deliberately hurting herself. It wasn’t like the time she had cut herself so chillingly. Now it seemed more as though it was done in anger, in a fit of fury or passion, when she would thump herself, pinch herself, thud her head against something or pull her hair. Then she blamed it on one of her imaginary friends. Some friend, I thought. I would have to patiently tell her that actually she was the one who was doing it, as no one else had touched her. This self-harming was one of the most disturbing aspects of Jodie’s behaviour, and the pinches, scratches and thumps she inflicted sometimes produced marks, which she then used to convince herself even further that someone had been attacking her.
Even more worryingly, a week into the New Year the different voices she sometimes used began to suddenly take on identities of their own. Adrian’s mobile phone went missing, and after a lengthy search I eventually found it in Jodie’s toy box, which was on a shelf in the conservatory. Jodie hadn’t stolen anything before, but she did have problems respecting other people’s property, and I had been trying to teach her that we couldn’t just help ourselves to what we wanted, that we had to ask the owner first.
‘It wasn’t me, honestly,’ she repeated, looking me straight in the eyes and speaking in a babyish voice. ‘It really wasn’t. I’m not big enough to reach.’
Adrian and I both looked at the shelf, on which Jodie had just placed the toy box with ease.