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What do we mean by “Therapeutic Care?” Our understanding starts with this post and continues for twelve additional posts to cover the complexity of Therapeutic Foster Care. I am glad you have chosen to take this journey with me and hope that you finish with a better and more caring understanding of what is therapeutic about Therapeutic Foster Care. — Please press play and let’s get started.

As we continue our journey into therapeutic foster care, it will help to pause to consider your personal vision for children in your care. — Please press play to listen.

Later, we focus on maladjusted children. Here though, it is important to understand what it means to be a well adjusted child. — Please press play to listen.

The goal for each abused and neglected child coming into the agency’s care is safety, permanence and well being. Understanding what “well being” means for the child and for foster parents is critical. — Please press play to listen.

Children learn many things from many sources. Unfortunately, the lessons learned by abused and neglected children are most often both very sad and frequently developmentally devastating. — Please press play to listen.

Over the past several years, the expectations for foster care and foster parents have changed. The level of commitment and expertise required for a successful foster placement have become more complex and increasingly challenging. — Please press play to listen.

In years past, safety was the primary and usually only goal for abused and/or neglected children. Now we know that safety is not enough. Children need a stable, permanent home where they can grow and develop, without being moved, sometimes again and again. — Please press play to listen.

For abused and/or neglected children in the custody of Child Protection agencies, concurrent planning is essential to avoid unnecessary time in the system for the child. This means that while every effort is being made to place the child back with parents or other relatives, plans are concurrently being made for other permanence arrangements for the child, should the return to family not be possible. — Please press play to listen.

Many if not most children who are placed in foster care are unlikely to ever return to their parents. This means that foster parents frequently give permanence to their foster children through adoption. — Please press play to listen.