Every day Sara Scott-Hitchcock goes to work, she gives her all.
Working in the youth services field, every person she supports she does with motivation — to be who she needed in out-of-home care.
As a 12-year-old, all Sara wanted to do was go home.
She recounts living at set residences across the region in foster care for weeks — or at best — months at a time.
Slowly she’d get comfortable before it was all taken again in the blink of an eye.
Calls at 8pm to say she was to be picked up the next day and moved on, getting home from school to find all her belongings packed up into the car of a child protection worker.
She was placed anywhere across the region, from Wangaratta to Euroa.
Sara said in one year she moved placements five to six times alone, missing school because of the constant upheaval.
After one of her longer stretches of 12 months in one place, she had begun to settle until it was “the same thing all over again”.
“That was really challenging for me, the sudden changes and not knowing where I was going or how long I was going to be there. Can I unpack my bags? Can I decorate the room? I never knew what I could or couldn't do,” she said.
“I was so vulnerable and so young, I just went wherever my worker would take me.
“And to this day I don't know why some of them changed, but I'm really glad I don't know because a part of me goes ‘well, it's better for me not to know’.”
Growing up in an environment of instability caused responses she’s brought into adulthood and constantly works through.
“It's never planned with the young person — it was never planned with me, it was always planned around me and I really hated that,” she said.
“A big thing for me that I still struggle with is control issues, because I hate allowing people to have control over my life and a lot of those decisions.”
At 17 years old, Sara was accepted into the Education First Youth Foyer and found stability in the two-year stay.
Along with working three jobs and balancing Year 12, she also completed a Certificate III in Business — her sights were set on a career in business admin or accounting.
However The Foyer steered her in another direction, somewhere she’d been before, but this time on the other side.
“I never thought I would be back doing what I grew up in,” she said.
Sara began to understand she had something to offer that not all youth workers possessed — her lived experience in the system.
“I think it’s just given me a bit of an edge in connecting with them through if they (the youth) have got any trauma or anything like that ... or if they just want to have a chat about their experience and have somebody really understand it,” she said.
Sara herself has overcome barriers, with a mindset of creating a life she deserves.
But also in recognising the effects of intergenerational trauma and in turn, mending relationships.
“All I've ever wanted was to just give myself a life that my parents couldn't give to me at the time due to their own trauma, mental health and stuff like that,” she said.
“So I really just wanted to give myself a life and opportunity just to be treated the same as all the other peers in my class.
“I really just wanted something different for me, but my family, they’ve really turned a corner in addressing whatever they needed to address to be present parents for all of us.”
Sara has left out-of-home care and is following a career path she’s passionate about, and has moved interstate by herself.
In finding stability, she has had the chance to work through her own trauma and unpack her life prior.
“I think I will always have some form of therapy or a counsellor in my life,” she said.
“Even though I'm feeling so good mentally — everything's good — I'm just really trying to get those support networks put in because I know maybe one day that when I'm not feeling so good, at least I know what to do and where to go.“
Thinking of her 12-year-old self, she feels a sense of pride.
“I think everything that I've done, I've done for myself and with the support of friends and family, The Foyer and organisations like that,” she said.
∎ Caitlyn Grant and Megan Fisher are opening the conversation for young people on all things from mental health to success stories in their weekly column, Let’s Talk. If you or someone you know has a story, contact caitlyn.grant@mmg.com.au or megan.fisher@sheppnews.com.au