The Kinship Circle is changing the landscape for carers across the ACT
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Sometimes when you can’t see the change you want in the world, you have to become it.
This is a sentiment that resonates strongly with Sara, whose website Kinship Circle is giving support to those who are faced with the complicated (and at times unexpected) journey of caring for relatives who are too young to care for themselves —support that Sara did not receive herself.
Drawing on the many shades between triumph and trauma, Sara’s journey into kinship care has forced her to cross borders into unfamiliar territory. She hovers between the loyalty and love for a child whose blood intertwines with her own, alongside the palpable loneliness and heartbreak that it can bring.
Already the mother of three children, Sara quickly realised that the trauma her nephew was forced to bear so early was something she too would have to confront. She found herself teetering on and, at times, tripping over behavioural issues that didn’t exist within her other children.
“We knew our nephew had some challenges. When he was three or four, he never outgrew the public tantrums. And they seemed to be getting worse, and we weren’t sure why,” explains Sara.
“And our son, he’s only eight months old, so we’ve seen how he progressed and how our nephew wasn’t progressing in the same way. We became concerned, and we started asking questions, and it was still quite a while before we were told that preverbal trauma can manifest years later in behavioural and developmental issues,” says Sara.
Challenged to take on a long list of varying roles, Sara began to feel the strain of this gravitational pull brushing past her with the weight of a thousand suns.
As she reached out for support, she was met with roadblocks, false promises and lost the hope that red lights would eventually turn green. A slow tidal wave began to form until, one day, it all came crashing down.
“We were denied the assistance we really required. And things were put off and put off and put off until it got to a breaking point. I actually had a nervous breakdown. I snapped and asked for my immediate respite. And then I was accused of abuse and neglect, and I lost the custody of my nephew for a bit over two years.”
Sara was eventually able to regain custody and clear her name of these devasting and false allegations. And, as she began the process of putting the pieces of her and her nephew’s lives back together, she was determined to make a change.
Kinship Circle is Sara’s reaction to a crisis, aiding in the liberation and unity of carers across the ACT who may find themselves amid something of a whirlwind.
“I developed the website in order to bring all the information together, so I’m still adding things to it. That’s going to be an ongoing thing as new things come up. But the idea is to have as much of the information together as possible. So as a kinship carer, you can just come here [to Kinship Circle] and find what you need”, explains Sara.
Alongside this information, Kinship Carers can become part of a support group building strong ties within the carer’s community across the ACT.
“The support group is there for anyone who wants to come and have a chat and share stories and share advice and get to know other carers so that I don’t feel so alone. Because it’s often very isolating to be a kinship carer,” says Sara.
Kinship Carers is slowly transcending into a safe space, where careers face a baptism by water as opposed to fire, where heavy air suddenly becomes light, and carers can take a moment to breathe.
And while Sara explains that her website is still slowly evolving, her ferocious and persistent march towards a future where carers can feel empowered to take on this new role is only getting stronger.
“We’re very lucky in Canberra that we have quite a lot of resources that can help people and that that you’ve got to know where to find that,” says Sara.
”That’s part of what I want to do—bring that knowledge to people. I’ve also been selected to be on the Carer Wellbeing Joint Committee. I have a voice on behalf of kinship parents and, hopefully, I’ll be able to help with some systemic changes as well. Because the system is definitely changing, but it’s changing very slowly.”
For more information visit kinshipcircle.com
