Cathy Glass - Damaged - The Heartbreaking True Story of a Forgotten Child

Certain details in this story, including names, places and dates, have been changed to protect the family’s privacy.

HarperElement

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published by HarperElement 2006

Copyright © Cathy Glass 2006

Cover layout design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2015 Cover images © Jessamyn Harris/Getty Images (child, posed by model); Shutterstock.com (background)

Cathy Glass asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library

This book is a work of non-fiction based on the recollections of Cathy Glass. The names of people, places, dates and the detail of events have been changed to protect the privacy of others. The author has warranted to the publishers that, except in such minor respects not affecting the substantial accuracy of the work, the contents of this book are true.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins eBooks

HarperCollins Publishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication

Source ISBN: 9780007236343

Ebook Edition © JANUARY 2009 ISBN: 9780007279753

Version: 2016-08-17

Damaged

Hidden

Cut

The Saddest Girl in the World

Happy Kids

The Girl in the Mirror

I Miss Mummy

Mummy Told Me Not to Tell

My Dad’s a Policeman (a Quick Reads novel)

Run, Mummy, Run

The Night the Angels Came

Happy Adults

A Baby’s Cry

Happy Mealtimes for Kids

Another Forgotten Child

Please Don’t Take My Baby

Will You Love Me?

About Writing and How to Publish

Daddy’s Little Princess

The Child Bride

Saving Danny

Girl Alone

The Silent Cry

To my family for your continuing love, patience and understanding.

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Also by Cathy Glass

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter One: Emotional Blackmail

Chapter Two: The Road To Jodie

Chapter Three: The Arrival

Chapter Four: A New Little Sister

Chapter Five: Self-Harm

Chapter Six: A Very Troubled Child

Chapter Seven: Contact

Chapter Eight: Julie

Chapter Nine: Disclosure

Chapter Ten: Reporting

Chapter Eleven: Cooking And Cleaning

Chapter Twelve: Monsters

Chapter Thirteen: Integration

Chapter Fourteen: The Park

Chapter Fifteen: Past And Present

Chapter Sixteen: The Spider’s Web

Chapter Seventeen: Nosy Cow

Chapter Eighteen: Fire

Chapter Nineteen: Special Little Girl

Chapter Twenty: Christmas

Chapter Twenty-One: A New Year

Chapter Twenty-Two: The Fox And The Owl

Chapter Twenty-Three: Granddad

Chapter Twenty-Four: Friends

Chapter Twenty-Five: Denial

Chapter Twenty-Six: Links In The Chain

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Silence

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Assessment

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Therapy

Chapter Thirty: Green Grass And Brown Cows

Chapter Thirty-One: High Oaks

Chapter Thirty-Two: Overnight Stay

Chapter Thirty-Three: Goodbye

Chapter Thirty-Four: Progress

Epilogue

Suggested Topics for Reading-group Discussion

Acknowledgements

Sample Chapter

Cathy Glass

Moving Memoirs eNewsletter

About the Publisher

In Britain today, there are over 75,000 children in the care of their local authority. These are the lucky ones. Concealed behind this figure are countless others; defiled, abused and undiscovered by Social Services, often until it’s too late.

This book tells the true story of my relationship with one of these children, an eight-year-old girl called Jodie. I was her foster carer, and she was the most disturbed child I had ever looked after. I hope my story will provide an insight into the often hidden world of foster care and the Social Services.

Certain details, including names, places and dates, have been changed to protect the innocent.

The phone rang. It was Jill, my link worker from the fostering agency.

‘Cathy, it’s not two carers, but five,’ she said. ‘Five, since coming into care four months ago.’

‘Good heavens.’ I was astonished. ‘And she’s only eight? That must have taken some doing. What’s she been up to?’

‘I’m not sure yet. But Social Services want a pre-placement meeting, to be certain she doesn’t have another move. Are you still interested?’

‘I don’t know enough not to be. When?’

‘Tomorrow at ten.’

‘All right, see you there. What’s her name?’

‘Jodie. Thanks, Cathy. If you can’t do it, no one can.’

I warmed to the flattery; it was nice to be appreciated after all this time. Jill and I had been working together now for four years and had established a good relationship. As a link worker for Homefinders Fostering Agency, Jill was the bridge between the foster carers and social workers dealing with a particular case. She coordinated the needs of the Social Services with the foster carers, and provided support and help as it was needed. An inexperienced foster carer often needed a lot of back-up and explanations of the system from their link worker. As Jill and I had been working together for some time, and I was an experienced foster carer, we were used to each other and got on well. If Jill thought I was up to the task, then I was sure she meant it.

But a pre-placement meeting? It had to be bad. Usually the children just arrived, with a brief introduction if they’d come from another carer, or with only the clothes they stood in if they’d come from home. I’d had plenty of experience of both, but none at all of a pre-placement meeting. Usually there was a meeting between everyone involved in the case as soon as the child had been placed in foster care, but I’d never been to one held beforehand.

It was my first inkling of how unusual this case was.

The following morning, we went about our normal, quiet routine of everyone getting up and dressed and having breakfast, and then the children made their way off to school. I had two children of my own, Adrian who was seventeen, and Paula, the youngest at thirteen. Lucy, who had joined the family as a foster placement two years ago, was fifteen and now a permanent member of our family, just like a daughter to me and a sister to Adrian and Paula. She was a success story: she had come to me hurt and angry and had, over time, learned to trust again, and eventually settled down to a normal existence where she had only the usual teenage angst to fret about, instead of the turmoil she had known as a child. I was proud of her, and she was testament to my belief that love, kindness, attention and firm boundaries are the basis of what any child needs to flourish.