“Scooping up the tiny baby, I felt my mother's instinct kick in. ‘It’s okay, you're safe,’ I soothed. At 75, I’d become a foster mum for the first time,” Patricia Swan tells us.
“My husband, Phillip, and I had decided to become foster parents after retiring. Our first kids were siblings, a six-month-old girl and her big brother who was 17 months old.
“'You look after the baby and I’ll take care of the boy',” Phillip suggested.
Patricia Swan, who started fostering children after retirement
“That first day was daunting, I felt overwhelmed. But then I thought back to when my own three kids were little. All we needed to do was feed, love, help and teach them.
“We soon found our groove and it was magical as we helped them meet milestones – getting the baby on solids and the toddler to a point where he could feed himself. I loved reading them bedtime stories and giving them a cuddle.
"And there was no better sound than hearing the gorgeous belly giggles they made when they found something funny.”
A long and thorough process
“The idea of fostering had first popped into my head in 2022, aged 73. Making banana bread in the kitchen, an appeal for foster carers played on the radio. ‘Gosh, are they really that desperate?’ I wondered.
“I phoned my daughter, Tracy, who’d been fostering herself for the past eight years. ‘Mother, you’re too old,’ she said. ‘I can only try,’ I replied, feeling determined.
“I realised that I was feeling very bored since retiring from my housekeeping career five years earlier. I often helped out my youngest, Samantha, with caring for the horses that she owned, but once I was back at home, I felt restless.
“With Philip on board too, I got the ball rolling and registered with an agency called Fostering Solutions. The process was very long and thorough – a social worker came over to assess our home and we needed to provide references and a list of everywhere we’d worked and lived, along with a police record check.
“Sadly, several months in, we had to put a pause on the process when Phillip was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Once his treatment finished and he got the all-clear, we picked things up again.
“In September 2023, our application was put forward to the panel and I was devastated to hear that we’d been rejected as we lacked experience with traumatised children.
“Speaking on the phone to a member of the board, I said, ‘99 per cent of people in this world don’t have experience with traumatised children.’
“Our case was re-assessed by an independent body and a week later, I received a phone call confirming we’d been accepted. I felt excitement and fear – it was really happening!"
Moving on to new homes
“We had the baby girl and her brother for seven months before they left to be adopted by friends of their family. The thought of them going really affected me, especially the baby whom I’d seen grow and develop so much. ‘She’s so dependent on me,’ I thought.
“‘Babies can adapt easily,’ the social worker assured me.”
“It broke my heart when they left, but when I went to visit them in their new home, it was lovely. They were being showered with love and affection. What more could a child want?
“Since then, we’ve fostered three sisters for several months and a little two-year-old boy who is still with us right now.
“He was very quiet when he first arrived, but over the months he’s come out of his shell and he adores pottering around in the garden with Phillip. I’ve potty-trained him, as well as helped him with his speech. We also pay for him to go to nursery three days a week so he can interact with other kids."
Pure joy
“Fostering has genuinely brought me so much joy and I’m so glad that it’s something I decided to try at this stage of my life. I think it’s a good thing to be doing at my age – it keeps life busy and makes a big difference to your own world as well as the kids’.
“I love seeing how well the little ones progress in our care and I see myself as the first stepping stone before wherever they go next in life.
“All these children need is some love, guidance and a feeling of safety. For as long as I continue being fit and healthy, I’ll keep on fostering. It’s worth it – especially when you see their little faces light up with a smile.”
Fostering facts
The latest National Fostering Group figures reveal that 12,500 foster carers are urgently needed across the UK, where there’s also an estimated 26 million spare bedrooms. Types of fostering include:
Short-term: Providing a child or young person with a place to stay until they can return to their own family.
Respite: A type of short-term foster placement where the child or children are placed with a foster family to provide a break to their current foster family.
Long-term fostering: A child or young person lives with a committed foster parent until they reach adulthood.
Emergency: A short-term placement that provides immediate care for a child who is at immediate risk.
For more information on fostering, head to the National Fostering Group website.
