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Are you a kinship care family in West Lothian?
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Are you caring for a child or young person in your extended family?
We can help
Children First West Lothian’s Kinship Care Support Service offers support to help kinship carers look after the children in their care. Call us on 01506 652436 or email westlothian@childrenfirst.org.uk
Understanding kinship care families
When children can no longer live with their parents, members of their extended family may step in and care for them. This is known as kinship care. Being part of a kinship care family can be amazing. It can also be challenging, for a child in kinship care and their kinship carer. A child may have had difficult experiences before coming into kinship care and need support to recover. A kinship carer may have taken on the role suddenly and find it hard to manage competing demands from their life before they became a carer for example work, other childcare responsibilities or other family demands.
At Children First we understand what life can be like for kinship care families and we’re here to help.
Supporting kinship care families
We can offer you a safe space to talk, support to overcome the challenges you face and help you to build confidence and achieve your goals as a kinship care family. This might include:
- Talking about the struggles and challenges you and your family may be experiencing.
- Support with the grief and loss that you can feel when becoming a kinship carer.
- Help to understand your child’s behaviour and how their experiences may have shaped their development
- Ways to strengthen the relationship between you and your child
- Advice about your financial and legal rights as a kinship family, including other sources of additional support that might help your family.
- Practical support with the things that your family need most, for example family activities, opportunities to meet other kinship care families.
Get in touch
Get in touch to find out more about how we might be able to support your family
Call us: 01506 652436
Email us: westlothian@childrenfirst.org.uk
Our partners
Children First West Lothian Kinship Care Support Service work in partnership with West Lothian Council Kinship Care Service. The service is part-funded through the West Lothian Whole Family Wellbeing Fund and can be contacted at Kinship@westlothian.gov.uk