Finding a place to call home: Tyler's* story

After suffering years of severe neglect and emotional abuse, Tyler moved into one of our children’s residential care homes. Here, our staff team have helped him grow into a confident young boy.

Tyler started life in a violent and chaotic household, suffering physical and emotional abuse from his parents from an early age.

He and his older siblings were frequently tied up outside their back door for ‘bad behaviour’ and would often go hungry.

The children were eventually removed from their home by social services after the eldest child told a teacher about their parents’ violence towards them.

Tyler was nine when he moved into one of our children’s homes.

When he arrived, Residential Manager Caroline Morris, was devastated by what she learnt:

Transitioning to care was difficult for Tyler. After growing up with so little, the care and support he received was confusing. Caroline recalled: "He wanted to strip his room bare because he said he didn’t know why we‘d given him nice furniture and belongings like books. The truth was he didn’t feel deserving of them, which is something we often see in children who’ve experienced neglect and abuse.”

After a few months at the home, Tyler started to exhibit volatile behaviour, shouting, screaming and smashing up his room on several occasions.

The difficult experiences in his early life left him with a lot of rage. But he soon learnt that no matter what he did, the staff were always going to be there to love him and give him the care that he needed.

Caroline said: “This is a process these children go through. They rebel and they're going to push those boundaries. They’ve never had that safety so they're pushing to see, are you going to stick with them? Or are you going to give up on them?”

“It’s very powerful when you say to a child ‘it doesn't matter what you do, we’re going to stay here, we're going to love you and guide you through it all’.”

Staff at our children’s homes are trained in early childhood trauma and therapies. They also work closely with a clinical psychologist who supports them in helping children like Tyler work through their trauma.

In cases where children need further support, there is access to services outside of the home, such as play therapy, art therapy, music therapy, and even equine therapy.

While staff have supported children through many childhood milestones, such as learning to ride a bike or learning to swim, Caroline says that it’s the smaller life moments that often hold more meaning for children in care.

It took weeks of gentle encouragement to get Tyler to sleep in a bed. The staff team would sit next to him all night slowly trying to coax him off the floor, because sleeping on the floor was all he had ever known. It was a real breakthrough moment when he slept in his bed for the first time.

Tyler started to join in with activities other children his age enjoyed, such as playing football. He couldn’t believe they had a living room where they sat together, watched a movie and ate snacks.

Because of his earlier malnourishment, Tyler is still very small for his age. But he’s a different boy from the broken lad who was brought to the service four years ago.

With the unwavering support of the team, he is learning to trust people again and is chatty with his peers and staff. But Caroline admits that these journeys are not easy for children in their care:

"Our children have had to do so much work on themselves. They’ve had some extremely dark times in the past few years, but they got through it. It’ is quite incredible how far they’ve come. They’re just the most amazing children, and we are all so, so proud of them."

The world might see children in care differently. But they deserve the same as any child. Your support could help them feel safe and loved, and give them what they need to thrive.

*This story is based on several true stories of young people supported by Action for Children. The case of ‘Tyler’ is used to illustrate what they’ve been through and how we support them.