u/Sophie_Parke

TW: miscarriage

Bio Mum and Dad have visits with my 3yo foster child each week. A few months ago, I found out bio mum was pregnant but not long after I was told that she miscarried.

Last week they gave my 3yo a jumper that had “forever sleeping” and then the name and also a reference to being a big sister. My FC had no idea Mum was even pregnant and the jumper has left her so confused. Mum and Dad call it her “sissy jumper” so she keeps asking me about where her sister is and when she can see her.

I have no idea how to broach this subject in an age appropriate way. I think because she didn’t know about the pregnancy she hasn’t really comprehended what the jumper means since she found out the same day that she even had a sister coming.

She’s also about to move to a long term placement and I know the carers have miscarried before and I’m so worried the jumper will unexpectedly trigger them. Should I warn them about the jumper? Is there anything else I can do?

To top it all off, bio Mum is pregnant once again and there’s no chance of them keeping it (or getting the 3yo back) unless they do a massive 180. Visits are getting dropped to monthly next week and she’s looking at adoption with the new family. I’m just a short term carer and not an adoptive house but I still want to support her through this so any help is appreciated!!

I’ve had my 3yo foster child for the last 7 months after being her respite carer on and off for a year before this. I’m sadly her 3rd placement and only took her on short-term due to the lack of carers. I’m only young myself so have no interest in long-term care at this stage.

We went through the honeymoon period where she was amazing. Then I went overseas in May for a few weeks and she stayed with a respite carer. After getting back her behaviours escalated dramatically, even the daycare have mentioned it to me on multiple occasions. Very demanding, no manners, screaming if she didn’t get what she wanted, biting/kicking/scratching/hitting etc. Nothing super out of the ordinary for a 3yo, especially a foster child.

I reinforced boundaries and manners and she seemed to be turning a corner and doing great until today.

I picked her up from daycare and she was happy, I strapped her in her car seat and then by the time it took me to close her door and walk around to the drivers side to get in myself, she somehow transformed into another kid.

Straight away she just lost it and started screaming at me. Then she kept saying “Shut up” whether I was speaking or not she just kept repeating it. Then out of nowhere she goes “I will cut you”. I couldn’t believe it!! But then she started repeating that as well.

I was so overwhelmed and taken aback I didn’t know how to deal with it. I just said “I know you’re feeling mad right now but that isn’t very nice to say”. I was driving so couldn’t really do much else in the moment besides talk to her and try to calm her down.

Later I had a chat with her and she knew right away what she’d done wrong because she told me “I told you to shut up” and then “I wanted to hurt you”. She has no noted history of physical abuse, she’s in care due to really young parents who weren’t able to care for her appropriately.

I asked if someone had said those things to her before and she said her caseworkers name. I’m not sure though as she does have a history of lying. She’s even screamed in public multiple times “Stop hitting me” when I wasn’t. Or “you’re hurting me” when people aren’t even touching her. And has said on numerous occasions that “Mummy hit me” which isn’t possible as she only has supervised visits.

I’m at such a loss on what to do. I have so much experience and training but I’m just blanking on the best way to handle this. I’ve been thinking about if she should be seeing a psychologist or something so these don’t escalate but I’m also aware she’s probably just repeating what she’s heard someone else say (maybe from daycare?).

Any advice is welcome! ☺️ Thank you

I have a recently turned 3yo daughter who is in daycare 5 days a week and has been for about 18 months. She’s always tried to delay going home but eventually will walk out with me. I like to let her have some time finishing up what she’s in the middle of.

She does the opposite in the mornings though and cries when I leave and doesn’t want to leave home either. I do trust the educators so I just drop and run and leave them to console her. She’s always fine after a minute and plays happily all day.

However, in the last few weeks, pick up has gotten significantly worse! As soon as I turn up, she runs and hides and refuses to leave. It usually ends up in me needing to carry/drag her out as she goes limp and as soon as we leave the room, she screams!! Absolute ear-piercing scream. I’m surprised people haven’t come running to the car park yet. She then yells “you’re hurting me” when I have to put her into her car seat. And even has yelled “don’t hit me” when I definitely have never done this and sometimes she also tries to bite me. And then will proceed to squeal the whole way home.

I have no idea what to do and I’m so exhausted! I dread pickup time. I’ve tried talking about how she’s feeling, offering a cuddle, validating how she feels but nothing seems to work and she just loses it. The screaming hurts my ears and I get so overstimulated but try so hard to keep my composure and stay calm and talk her through it but I am STRUGGLING!!!

Not sure if this is a factor but she dropped her naps at daycare about 3 months ago so often is super tired at pickup. She naps for 2-3 hours on the weekends. Daycare tries to get her to nap each day but she refuses. I tend to drop her off about 10am as she sleeps in a lot and is slow to get going in the mornings and I pick her up about 5:30pm and the centre closes at 6 so she’s often one of, if not, the last one there. Then we go home, play for a bit, have dinner, bath, tv/read and cuddle and bed.

Thank you for any help!

I have a recently turned 3yo daughter who is in daycare 5 days a week and has been for about 18 months. She’s always tried to delay going home but eventually will walk out with me. I like to let her have some time finishing up what she’s in the middle of.

She does the opposite in the mornings though and cries when I leave and doesn’t want to leave home either. I do trust the educators so I just drop and run and leave them to console her. She’s always fine after a minute and plays happily all day.

However, in the last few weeks, pick up has gotten significantly worse! As soon as I turn up, she runs and hides and refuses to leave. It usually ends up in me needing to carry/drag her out as she goes limp and as soon as we leave the room, she screams!! Absolute ear-piercing scream. I’m surprised people haven’t come running to the car park yet. She then yells “you’re hurting me” when I have to put her into her car seat. And even has yelled “don’t hit me” when I definitely have never done this and sometimes she also tries to bite me. And then will proceed to squeal the whole way home.

I have no idea what to do and I’m so exhausted! I dread pickup time. I’ve tried talking about how she’s feeling, offering a cuddle, validating how she feels but nothing seems to work and she just loses it. The screaming hurts my ears and I get so overstimulated but try so hard to keep my composure and stay calm and talk her through it but I am STRUGGLING!!!

Not sure if this is a factor but she dropped her naps at daycare about 3 months ago so often is super tired at pickup. She naps for 2-3 hours on the weekends. Daycare tries to get her to nap each day but she refuses. I tend to drop her off about 10am as she sleeps in a lot and is slow to get going in the mornings and I pick her up about 5:30pm and the centre closes at 6 so she’s often one of, if not, the last one there. Then we go home, play for a bit, have dinner, bath, tv/read and cuddle and bed.

Thank you for any help!

I have a recently turned 3yo daughter who is in daycare 5 days a week and has been for about 18 months. She’s always tried to delay going home but eventually will walk out with me. I like to let her have some time finishing up what she’s in the middle of.

She does the opposite in the mornings though and cries when I leave and doesn’t want to leave home either. I do trust the educators so I just drop and run and leave them to console her. She’s always fine after a minute and plays happily all day.

However, in the last few weeks, pick up has gotten significantly worse! As soon as I turn up, she runs and hides and refuses to leave. It usually ends up in me needing to carry/drag her out as she goes limp and as soon as we leave the room, she screams!! Absolute ear-piercing scream. I’m surprised people haven’t come running to the car park yet. She then yells “you’re hurting me” when I have to put her into her car seat. And even has yelled “don’t hit me” when I definitely have never done this and sometimes she also tries to bite me. And then will proceed to squeal the whole way home.

I have no idea what to do and I’m so exhausted! I dread pickup time. I’ve tried talking about how she’s feeling, offering a cuddle, validating how she feels but nothing seems to work and she just loses it. The screaming hurts my ears and I get so overstimulated but try so hard to keep my composure and stay calm and talk her through it but I am STRUGGLING!!!

Not sure if this is a factor but she dropped her naps at daycare about 3 months ago so often is super tired at pickup. She naps for 2-3 hours on the weekends. Daycare tries to get her to nap each day but she refuses. I tend to drop her off about 10am as she sleeps in a lot and is slow to get going in the mornings and I pick her up about 5:30pm and the centre closes at 6 so she’s often one of, if not, the last one there. Then we go home, play for a bit, have dinner, bath, tv/read and cuddle and bed.

Thank you for any help!

I have a recently turned 3yo daughter who is in daycare 5 days a week and has been for about 18 months. She’s always tried to delay going home but eventually will walk out with me. I like to let her have some time finishing up what she’s in the middle of.

She does the opposite in the mornings though and cries when I leave and doesn’t want to leave home either. I do trust the educators so I just drop and run and leave them to console her. She’s always fine after a minute and plays happily all day.

However, in the last few weeks, pick up has gotten significantly worse! As soon as I turn up, she runs and hides and refuses to leave. It usually ends up in me needing to carry/drag her out as she goes limp and as soon as we leave the room, she screams!! Absolute ear-piercing scream. I’m surprised people haven’t come running to the car park yet. She then yells “you’re hurting me” when I have to put her into her car seat. And even has yelled “don’t hit me” when I definitely have never done this and sometimes she also tries to bite me. And then will proceed to squeal the whole way home.

I have no idea what to do and I’m so exhausted! I dread pickup time. I’ve tried talking about how she’s feeling, offering a cuddle, validating how she feels but nothing seems to work and she just loses it. The screaming hurts my ears and I get so overstimulated but try so hard to keep my composure and stay calm and talk her through it but I am STRUGGLING!!!

Not sure if this is a factor but she dropped her naps at daycare about 3 months ago so often is super tired at pickup. She naps for 2-3 hours on the weekends. Daycare tries to get her to nap each day but she refuses. I tend to drop her off about 10am as she sleeps in a lot and is slow to get going in the mornings and I pick her up about 5:30pm and the centre closes at 6 so she’s often one of, if not, the last one there. Then we go home, play for a bit, have dinner, bath, tv/read and cuddle and bed.

Thank you for any help!

I am late 20s and have been cheering for 10 years. It’s the thing I put above everything and love it more than life. I honestly figured I’d be doing it at some capacity forever.

I’ve left three different gyms in this time. The first one closed down, the second I got bad health issues (long covid) and the coaches weren’t happy with me and the third didn’t have a competitive team for me. I’m now at my 4th gym and have been for 3 years with no issues.

However, we recently attended an international competition (which I’ve done before at this gym and loved) where I was bullied, excluded and felt like my coach didn’t handle it well at all. I was on Valium, hospitalised and cried nearly every day. It all escalated to the point where I was asked not to come back to the gym (from a massive misunderstanding!) when I was still overseas with 4 days to go. I ended up paying a lot of money to fly home early.

The owner wants to have a chat with me as she feels it wasn’t handled well from their end either and assures me it’s no more disappointing news.

This has now turned into whether returning to cheer at all is the right option. I’m sick of the drama and just want to cheer. Even if I get let back to this gym, I’m not sure I want to go back. I also was up for summit next year and then worlds eventually but I don’t think I could trust going international with them again.

I have no idea what to do. I loved cheer a week ago but now I am just so emotionally drained that I’m thinking of just retiring. Maybe try a new sport or something.

Anyone else been in this position, how did you handle it and what did you end up doing? I feel like I’m at such a cross roads

I’m overseas in Hawaii right now for a sport comp and this trip has genuinely been one of the worst experiences of my life.

Within the first 48 hours I was teased nonstop about my hat, bikini, socks, literally everything. Called embarrassing and “brave” for being seen in public. Fat shamed twice (I’m literally 55kg). Excluded from things constantly.

One of the girls had late check in so we let her keep her bags at our apartment. We both needed to go food shopping so we went together, but as soon as we got there she ditched me for the 13 year olds and I ended up walking back alone without anything because I couldn’t carry shopping by myself.

When I went to my coaches about it they basically said they can’t control what other people do or say and for me to just go home if I’m that upset. Eventually she ended up saying she will talk to the team but this was after being told to go home and that she doesn’t know why everyone’s now crying.

Then two other girls messaged me saying they’d also been crying because of exclusion/bullying so we hung out together.

Someone must’ve overheard our convo bc the next day I got spoken to about saying that this coach doesn’t care. I owned it and said I genuinely don’t feel she cares. She never once asked if I was okay or needed anything. She just kept saying I hadn’t given her a chance to even talk to the team yet and now she’s upset with me bc I said she doesn’t care.

The next day 4 girls were standing with me making dinner plans but never actually included me so I assumed I wasn’t invited. A couple mins later they said I could come but I had soaking wet clothes on from swimming and needed 10 mins to change. They basically said they couldn’t wait because everyone had to enter the restaurant together, so they went without me and said they’d meet me after. So I was a bit annoyed they couldn’t wait 10 minutes for me to run up and change to be able to go to dinner too.

A couple hours later they messaged saying to meet them at IHOP. There’s one literally next to my apartment so I started walking there, then they changed plans and said no, the OTHER IHOP which was like a 30 minute walk away.

I called asking where they were because I didn’t feel safe walking that far alone at night in a foreign country through secluded parks. I had literally been assaulted the day before which they knew, so I was already on edge.

And they were like “oh we’re getting an uber.”
So they got an Uber from basically outside my apartment but expected me to walk 30 mins alone in the dark in a foreign country.

I asked if they could stay on the phone with me while I walked and they hung up because “we’re in the Uber now, let us know when you get here.”
I ended up calling my club owner because I was alone, scared, upset and lost. She was furious they left me alone and spoke to them at training the next day. I didn’t ask her to confront them or even know she was going to.

Now they barely talk to me and I’m basically being iced out by half the team.

So now I’m stuck overseas with a team I don’t even want to be around anymore. I’ve cried almost every day here and honestly just want to go home. I feel so unsupported and hated by everyone and I don’t even know what I’ve done wrong.

AITAH? Should I have just sucked it up and kept everything to myself and stop being so sad and scared?