Clear Sky - Elise’s Story

Elise is 10 years old with 2 teenage sisters. The girls haven’t seen their dad in 5 years due to him serving a prison sentence. They live at home with their Mum, who they absolutely adore, though Mum struggles with drug and alcohol dependency. 

One night, everything changed. A car pulled up outside of the house and the children were taken from home and moved into separate foster care homes across the county. Elise protested and reached for her sisters in fear, not understanding why they couldn’t stay together. 

Elise felt confused and abandoned. Where was Mum? Why couldn't they be together? She didn't understand why the people who were supposed to love her had let this happen. 

Elise struggled to trust her foster carers. She kept waiting for her Mum to come back, for things to return to normal. The uncertainty was overwhelming - nothing felt permanent or safe anymore. 

Elise’s school contacted Clear Sky and asked us to help her with the transition between home and foster care. She had become withdrawn in the classroom and was starting to fall out with friends and found it hard to spend time with anyone. 

Elise at Play Therapy

Elise received 18 weeks of play therapy where she was able to work through her concerns using a range of creative art and drama. 

Over time, Elise started to come out of her shell. She formed a trusting relationship with her therapist whom she came to depend upon each week to be a reliable adult that she could chat to, knowing that she had her full attention and that the therapist was working only to support her and only her, in that time.  

Gradually, Elise began to trust that others would be there for her as they had been before. She started to return to her old self in the classroom, engaged more with her foster family and agreed that her therapy sessions could draw to a close. 

Elise knows that people understand her worries and how to articulate these and that her teachers and foster carers realise that she is not badly behaved but in need of ongoing reassurance. 

We were able to help the teachers in the school to recognise a pattern of behaviour where Elise may have been experiencing a bad day or struggling with peer relationships.