00:00The average foster carer is 55 years old but for India and Ryan the story looks a little different.
00:06The couple have been foster carers for two years and are urging more young people to consider this
00:11path as there is a lack of foster carers in the county. Nearly 2,000 children were in care across
00:17Kent at the end of last year and agencies say there aren't enough foster carers to look after
00:22them. I think if you speak to a lot of older foster carers as well they kind of all say
00:26like
00:27oh we wish we would have done something like this sooner so I think our friends as well maybe some
00:31of them were a little bit shocked as well because most of them are child free and like living sort
00:36of a different life to us at the minute or very career driven. I think they were like oh okay
00:41that's something different like not really heard of people our age doing that. The former teachers
00:46in Canterbury welcomed their foster son two years ago who cannot be pictured due to safeguarding
00:51reasons. They say many of their friends were surprised by the decision because fostering
00:56is often seen as something people do later in life. India and Ryan are no strangers to the fostering
01:02process. In fact India's parents were foster carers for about 20 years and Ryan says since knowing India
01:08and her family his perception on fostering has changed. I was worried about what sort of behaviours
01:14I might see and I thought I'm inviting someone showing those behaviours into my home it's a bit
01:19of a yeah it was a bit of a hard concept to wrap my head around but after seeing you
01:23and your family
01:24and how they've managed it and the support that they receive when dealing with those behaviours
01:27it made me realise that actually this is like a sustainable thing to get into it's not something
01:33you know you're not dealing with it all on your own and struggling you know you have got people
01:37that you can talk to and you can put things in place to to sort of make things easier for
01:42you.
01:42Foster carers work with a lot of professionals like social workers therapists and schools to
01:47ensure the placement goes well. India and Ryan want more young people to consider fostering as
01:52they believe the younger carers can offer children something different. It's a shame not more people
01:57do it because there's a lot of children that do need it I think that yeah they don't get it
02:01unfortunately. I think different children suit different foster families I think for some maybe
02:08they prefer being with an older couple maybe they might have even had a bad experience with a
02:12grandparent in the past so it might be actually better like better for them to sort of be with
02:17someone completely different to what they've been with before. The couple hope to foster more children
02:21as their family grows and they say if more young people in Kent considered fostering then more
02:27children can grow up with a stable home. Nayla Mahamud for KMTV in Chartham.
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