Fifty-One Moves

Ashcroft, Ben

• Publisher: Waterside Press
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781908162496
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Self Improvement

It is shocking that although just one per cent of children are taken into care by local authori­ties, almost 30 per cent of prisoners have been in care. Ben Ashcroft's heart-rending account of abandonment, loneliness and rejection in family life, the care system and beyond begins at age nine and ends with him turning his life around after being moved from pillar to post, crime, drugs, 'going missing' and custody. Ten years on, he works to motivate young people from similar backgrounds to believe that they can do the same; that whatever life throws at them they should "Never, ever, give up". It is also a warning to parents, professionals and carers alike: to listen to what young people have to say, to make time for and reassure them and to recog­nise the often small but important things that make a difference in the bewildering world of growing-up.'A powerful book that gives a hard-hitting account of the care system… and is vital reading for anyone wishing to learn about the true effects of multiple placement moves and the resilience it takes to "never, ever give up"'— Guardian'Perhaps this inspirational memoir will encourage psychologists and social workers to spend more time listening to children and finding ways to build on their strengths and interests'-- The Psychologist'Challenges the core concepts we have as members of society, or indeed as child care professionals'-- Dr Peter McParlin (from the Foreword).The book was described as inspirational, powerful, emotional, compelling and required reading for anyone interested in the care system when released on Kindle, e.g. 'An inspiring and moving account of the trauma and distress caused to a young boy by his family and our care system'-- Sarah; 'A very raw book…but this only adds to the sense of passion and honesty with which it is written'-- Fiona Sorsby, Bingley, West Yorkshire; 'This motivational read is such a hard hitting tale…it's heartfelt and gives such a clear first-hand account of life living in a care home…A brilliant worthwhile read about a man who truly turned his life around'-- Stacey Spencer.

8Move #1

We can see the social worker through our net curtains in the front room. He knocks on the door and we all go to it not knowing what he’s going to say or what he’s going to do. We open the door and he asks if I’m Ben? Then he asks Robert and Natalie in the same way, and they say “Yes” to his question. We let him in and go to the front room where we all sit down on the settees.

He starts again with the questions.

“When was the last time you saw your Mom?”

“Does she normally do this?”

We answer him but he can see we’re all scared and he tries to reassure us everything will be fine and that we will be looked after. He makes some phone calls in the garden and speaks for a little while to different people then he comes back inside the house and into the front room. He asks, if we have any relatives we could go and stay with? I say, “No!” and Robert says, “No!”, but Natalie says her friend will let her stop at her house.

I’m not sure which friend’s house she went to but she got took there by another social worker and me and Robert were left with the man who originally came. He made phone call after phone call trying to find us accommodation in a children’s home or a foster placement. After what seemed like hours, he said, “Right, I’ve found you a children’s home in Ovenden called ‘Cousin Lane’.”

Robert and I looked at each other with fear in our eyes not knowing what to expect when we got there.

“Will we get bullied?”

“Will they like us?”

“Are they friendly?”

“Will they accept us?”

We get a few belongings together and say goodbye to Pippy the dog who I will miss very much. I loved Pippy, she was the nicest dog I’ve ever met with her temperament, she was a beautiful Border Collie crossed with an Alsatian, with long black furry hair. We head for the social worker’s car and Robert jumps in the front seat and I jump in the back.

We drive to Cousin Lane, it only takes five minutes because it is just two miles from our house. We pull up outside the home, halfway along the lane. It’s a big house, two knocked into one, with red bricks and grass around it with a path. It also has green privets surrounding it that have been trimmed really nicely.

As we enter a member of staff comes to greet us and shows us to the staff office. In there is one other member of staff. They ask us more questions and then show us too our separate bedrooms. We each have our own, I have the one on the end of the corridor facing the back garden, the room is quite small with a window to the left and a single bed under the it. Robert’s room is half-way up the landing. Once we had put our things that we had with us in our rooms we went and met the other residents. There were about five other young people there and they were all friendly to me and Robert, but this wasn’t my home.

All the other kids smoke here too like Robert — and me sometimes. So after the staff had left us in the main room, we got talking with the other young people there and became friends quickly. Before an hour was up it seemed like we had known each other a long time. They showed me and Robert where they smoked and told us things they would do when they got bored or felt mischievous. They told us that if they didn’t want to go to bed then they would refuse to go to their rooms and let the staff chase them around, because the staff can’t hit them! It was all a new world to me, all I’d known until then was fishing, rugby, football, the dam and the woods.

But it was fishing I was missing the most, something I hadn’t done for a long time. I missed going to the dam and the river and seeing my friends.

So the night comes and it’s time to go to sleep. Everyone has a set bedtime and the time depends on your age. A member of staff calls me and tells me to go brush my teeth and to get undressed and into bed. I say, “’Night” to Robert and then everyone else and make my way up to my room. I get inside and close the door and sit on my bed in a daydream asking myself if this is real? Is this really happening to me? Last night I was in my own bed with my own covers in my own surroundings and now I’m in a children’s home feeling all alone and wondering, “Whatever’s going to happen to me?”

I start to cry and lie on my pillow face down as I do so. So no-one can hear me crying like a baby. I just wished I was in Sowerby Bridge but my wish didn’t come true, just the start of the nightmares to come.

I cried myself to sleep that night in Cousin Lane.

9The First Cut is the Deepest

I woke up early that next morning thinking I was still at home. But I wasn’t, so I dragged myself out of bed and went downstairs to find Robert but he wasn’t up.

One of the staff asks if I’m okay and if I slept well?

I say, “I’m okay”, I’m not really — but I don’t want to tell anyone how I feel and that I cried myself to sleep last night. Instead I put a brave face on and tell the staff everything is okay.

They ask if I want to go to school today.

“School?” I say.

“Yes!” says the member of staff. We will drop you off and pick you up after school.”

I say, “Yes” and they tell me to have breakfast and get changed into my uniform.

I go up and get changed and ready myself for school. I don’t eat breakfast, I just want to get out of Cousin Lane and to be in familiar surroundings.

I get to school and the member of staff tells me to wait at the main gate after school and says that is where I will be picked up from and I then go into school. But I go straight out of the other side and down to the smokers’ corner at the bottom of the football pitch by the phone box. I bought a single cigarette off another pupil with some of the money Cousin Lane had given me for school.

The day passes and I’ve been told-off several times because I wasn’t paying attention, or I was messing about or not concentrating. The teachers don’t know what I’m going through: that I’m now living in a children’s home because my Mom left us home alone for two days just eating biscuits, cheese sandwiches and jam ones as well. Or that I cried myself to sleep last night and that it was my fist night in the care of social services, also I still don’t know if my Mom is dead or alive, so forgive me for not concentrating!

I sit wondering if they know any of this, that I’m just a broken-hearted little boy whose world is caving in around him and that I am just starting at a new stage in my life? It’s not the life I had in Sowerby Bridge, it’s totally different and that was only my first night.

School was over for today and I went and waited where the staff had told me to for my lift back to Cousin Lane. I thought about running-off but my heart sank as I realised I had nowhere to go. I thought about going and making a den at Hill Top Dam — the place where all my fondest memories and the happiest days of my life were. Then I considered the old factory down by the River Calder, but I was too scared to go there on my own and I had no food, money, or lighter to make a fire to keep myself warm.

As I’m stood in a daydream surrounded by my own thoughts, a horn beeps right outside the main entrance and makes me jump! I’m edgy enough as it is. It is the same member of staff to pick me up, so I get in the car and he says, “Have you had a good day?”.

I thought, “Are you having a laugh?” quickly followed by, “No, I’ve had the worst day. I’ve not been able to concentrate with all the things going on in my head and life. Plus moving to another place where I don’t know people. Living with five other young people and two to three strange staff I don’t know and have never seen before.”

But I replied, “Yes, not that bad” still with a brave face.

We get back to Cousin Lane and I go straight to find Robert but he wasn’t in, he was out with his friend who lived near Cousin Lane with my Dad and Molly and her three kids. So I got changed and went back downstairs to see if anyone else was about for me to mess with. There was one boy called James. I don’t know why he was there and I didn’t ask. He was a nice boy, friendly and of a similar age to me, 12-years-old. We played Connect Four for what seemed like hours and it kept me occupied.

Robert came in later with another boy from the children’s home, he said, “Hello” as he did so but it seemed like he didn’t really care. It seems that he was okay, not like me. I was feeling entirely lost and alone — the same feeling I had when I first moved to Mixenden. I went up to my room and started crying again, thinking “I can’t take this not being at home, and staying here makes me feel so alone my brother’s just getting on with it or at least it seems that way to me.”

I smash a light bulb that’s in my light socket and start cutting myself with the broken pieces of glass, not too deep just enough to take my mind off everything else that is going on. It seems to release something, but I’m still crying. It was the first time I self-harmed. One of the staff comes into my room and is taken aback by what she sees from a 12-year-old boy. She tries to take the bulb off me but I don’t let her have it and she knows — if she tries getting it by force — someone’s going to get hurt and I don’t care if it was me, I am past caring. So she shouts for another member of staff, Larry to come and join her in getting the bulb off me. He came running up the stairs and into my room to support the other member of staff. I just said I would give up the bulb myself because I was calming down a little. Then I threw it out of the window.

The woman cleaned the cuts on my legs and dressed them for me while Larry picked up all the bits of broken bulb. They have a chat with me and reassure me that everything will be fine, it just takes time to sort things out. Then I ask them to leave me alone and say that I’m going to go to sleep as I’m exhausted.

After the last 72 hours it feels like I’ve been on a terrifying rollercoaster which I cannot get off. They left my bedroom and I shut the door and started crying again. We’d still not heard anything from my Mom, I’ll ask about her when I get up in the morning but I’m sure someone would have told me if she had returned home or if anything had happened to her. I cry myself to sleep again that night as well, face down in to the pillow to drown out my sobs.

10Heartbreak

The next morning comes and I’m up early, but not in a good way like at Marton Heights. I got up early when I was at Cousin Lane because I couldn’t...

Table of contents

• Acknowledgements
• About the author
• Dedication
• Foreword
• 1Life Before the Moves
• 2Reading My Rights
• 3Fishing For Freedom
• 4Captain Ben!
• 5Winning
• 6Moving to Mixenden
• 7Abandoned
• 8Move #1
• 9The First Cut is the Deepest
• 10Heartbreak
• 11Kicking-Off
• 12Arrested
• 13And So, the Moves Begin …
• 14I Need Help, Not Moving
• 15Meeting John
• 16The Summer of ’97
• 17The Witch and Darren
• 18Running Home
• 19Back With Mom
• 20Spiralling
• 21Secured For Safety
• 22One Last Chance
• 23Medway
• 24Rock Bottom
• 25The Only Way Is Up
• 26Never, Ever Give Up
• Index