Children with disabilities are one of the main groups of children in Bulgaria who are vulnerable to being separated from their biological parents and placed in alternative care (Nunev, 2010), most commonly Small Group Homes (SGHs) (Ivanova, 2020). Despite the wide-scale closure of large orphanages which has occurred through the extensive process of ‘de-institutionalisation’, children with disabilities continue to be placed in SGHs where they experience a similar ‘institutional culture’ as in the orphanage (Mulheir, 2012; Ivanova, 2020). Opportunities for children with disabilities who are separated from their biological parents to be placed in family-based care is very limited and often their placement in SGHs is due to the way disability is perceived (the pervasive medical view of disability inherited by former communist bloc countries (Vann and Siska, 2006)) and therefore the common belief that children with disabilities need a special type of care from specialists and hence cannot be cared for by parents (Bilson and Markova, 2007). In 2021, statistics showed of the approximately 2000 children in foster care in Bulgaria, only 180 were children with disabilities (9%) (Kachaunova et al., 2020). When compared to the statistics of children in SGHs, where approximately 3400 currently live, 41% of which have disabilities, it is clear that there is a much higher representation of children with disabilities in non-family-based care than family-based care (Kachaunova et al.,2020).

There has been some development in foster care for children with disabilities in pockets across the country through the work of local actors and NGOs in partnership with local governments. However, the purpose and practices of foster care are misunderstood by the general population and receive a lack of support in Bulgaria (Ivanova, 2015). When children with disabilities are deemed suitable by social workers for placement in foster care, foster parents are required take on these children without additional training or support. For these family-based care initiatives for children with disabilities to be successful (preventing placement breakdown and further disruption for the child), an understanding of the needs of the foster parents in Bulgaria is required. There is no published research available about the needs and experiences of foster parents in Bulgaria who are fostering children with disabilities. This research fills this gap by learning from the small population of foster parents in one region of Bulgaria who have experience of fostering children with disabilities.

This study aimed to understand the experiences of foster parents caring for children with disabilities in Bulgaria and to use their perspectives to:

1)           Find ways to encourage more foster parents to foster children with disabilities;

2)           Improve support and training for foster parents who care for children with disabilities;

3)           Expand and develop foster care services for children with disabilities in Bulgaria.

In order to achieve this, the study asked the question: ‘How do foster parents experience caring for children with disabilities in Bulgaria?’ The study also asked ‘What are foster parents’ recommendations for a) encouraging foster carers to foster children with disabilities and b) improving services and practices related to foster care for children with disabilities in Bulgaria?’. The purpose of this question was to identify from the perspective of foster parents themselves what the development needs are for foster care for children with disabilities in Bulgaria. Based on foster parents’ recommendations, the study identified key principles that should lie at the heart of any training before care commences, and identified areas for continuing support needed to prevent placement breakdown and foster parent burnout.

This study investigated an issue not previously addressed through qualitative research in the Bulgarian context. Therefore, the Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) approach was employed to gather experiences of foster parents without preconceived bias. IPA provides the opportunity to understand an experience from the perspective of the experiencer and therefore make recommendations based on the findings knowing that the research has truly understood the issue from the participants’ perspective (Smith and Nizza, 2022). IPA studies both illuminate a lived experience and add a depth of understanding to prior quantitative research (e.g. Radulova’s (2021) survey of foster parents’ challenges) (Smith and Nizza, 2022). Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with 6 foster parents with experience of caring for children with disabilities. The sample is in line with sample sizes used in IPA studies which are purposefully small to enable researchers to study a phenomenon within a homogeneous group of participants (Smith, Flowers and Larkin, 2022). With such a small group of foster parents in the whole of Bulgaria fostering children with disabilities, it took many months to identify and recruit willing participants to share their experiences in the focus region, therefore making the data collected in this study rare and unique. Semi-structured interviews were used to gather rich data through extensive (up to 1.5 hour) interviews with participants. Interview data was also contextualised through the researcher’s year-long involvement as a practitioner working at an NGO which provides support to foster parents caring for children with disabilities in the study’s focus region in Bulgaria. The interviews were conducted in-person with current foster parents (n=3) and ex-foster parents (n=3) between July and November 2021 in Bulgaria. The interviews focused on the experiences of the foster parents through asking how they came to be a foster parent, their positive and negative experiences, support networks, experience of separation from the child, and engagement with social and educational services. The researcher used probing questions to dig deeper into issues of interest for each individual participant. Participants were encouraged to freely share their perspectives on their work. Interviews were conducted in the Bulgarian language then translated to English using an adapted version of the Committee Approach to preserve meaning and cultural relevance. Interviews were analysed in English using the IPA approach. Analysis was conducted case by case, allowing themes to emerge from each interview separately. Themes were then compared across foster parent groups (i.e. current and ex-foster parents).

Initial findings show that a significant challenge for foster parents caring for children with disabilities are the perceptions of others. Perceptions identified were both positive and negative and came from their closest family and friends, social workers, the foster children’s biological families and the wider general public. The perceptions of these groups of people influenced the way foster parents perceived themselves and their work, caused anger and frustration, had an impact on their day-to-day lives (e.g. traumatic encounters with members of the public) and influenced foster parents’ decisions to continue fostering. Initial research also suggests that the longevity of a foster parent’s commitment to fostering and their agreement to foster children with disabilities is tied to the support they receive from their personal familial networks. Fostering children with additional needs was identified to be a whole-family commitment, meaning the primary foster parent required extra support from their relatives and that the impact of separation from the foster child not only affected the primary foster parent, but all those who had been supporting them. Additional findings from this study demonstrate to the emotional implications of fostering children with disabilities and the specialist roles these foster parents are supposed to take on without training or equipment. The findings of this study are expected to have a considerable impact on the way foster parents are trained and supported when caring for children with disabilities and therefore improve the quality and longevity (where necessary) of care for children with disabilities in foster care. By improving support and training for foster parents, the long-term aim of the research is to work towards realisation of family-based care for all children with disabilities in Bulgaria. The research also has relevance for neighbouring Eastern European countries who are tackling similar challenges with alternative care and deinstitutionalisation.

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