Offers a clear, child-centred way to explain why a child may miss, love and want to return to a home that was unsafe. The visual can support conversations with children and young people in care, foster care or kinship care, helping adults acknowledge attachment, loss and uncertainty without treating a wish to go home as evidence that home was safe.
A simple visual comparison gives children a way to name the pull of the familiar alongside the worries that can come with a new and unfamiliar home. Two paths show what may feel known, including family, siblings, bedroom, belongings, loved people and familiar rules, even where difficult experiences were also part of home life.
The opposite path identifies common changes after a move: different adults, routines and rules, a new home, unfamiliar people and not knowing what will happen next. Thought bubbles, including “I know what happens here” and “What if I don’t belong here?”, make the emotional conflict easier for a child, teenager or caring adult to discuss.
Social workers, foster carers, kinship carers and residential care staff could print the poster for life-story work, placement-support conversations, return-home discussions or one-to-one sessions following removal from home. It may also help parents and professionals respond calmly when a child says they want to go back.
The central message is that wanting to return home does not mean that home was safe. Used as a safeguarding, child welfare or trauma-informed conversation prompt, it can validate a young person’s attachment to family while keeping attention on safety, stability and their feelings about change.
