Review of Hope’s Boy by Andrew Bridge

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Review of Hope’s Boy by Andrew Bridge

Andrew Bridge’s “Hope’s Boy” is a book about the experiences of children who have been brought up under foster care. Bridge was brought up under foster care himself when growing up. He uses his own experiences with foster care to develop the story. It is a motivational and inspirational story that creates hope in readers that nothing is impossible in life. During foster care, children undergo both risk ad protective factors in the experiences. Both the risk and protective factors often occur at different stages of life. It also occurs at different levels, including; individual, parent, and environmental levels. This paper analyzes the risk and protective factors at an individual, parent, and environmental levels explore in the book.

In the memoir, Bridge explores both risk and protective facts that can either expose one to the risk of being mistreated or protect them from mistreatment. Both risk and protective factors occur at different levels or stages of one’s life. To overcome the risk factors of mistreatment, one has to have strong protective factors, just like Bridge. Bridge has strong protective factors, including his personality, that made him be able to mitigate the risks he faced at different levels of his life (Bridge, 2008, p. 76). At the beginning of the story, Bridge explores the risk factors that he faced while being brought up by his mother and later on when he was adopted into foster care. As the story progresses, especially in chapter 10 of the memoir, the author explores how his protective factors helped him navigate some of the risk factors he was exposed to to become a successful person in life.

At an individual level, as a child, one is prone to several risk factors. One of the main risk factors at this stage of life is age (Bridge, 2008, p. 83). A child is more at risk of being mistreated because of their age and inability to make decisions for themselves. In the story, Andy is forced into foster care because he was a child, and he was not able to challenge the decision to take him into foster care. After being taken into foster care, he is mistreated by the family that took him away from his mentally ill mother.

Since Andy was a child, he could not challenge the mistreatment he underwent under foster care. In this case, it his age as a child that exposed her to a higher risk of mistreatment and exploitation. Andy was only 5 years old when he was taken into foster care. At this age, he was expected to start going to school (Bridge, 2008, p. 83). His age exposed her to the risk of being molested and mistreated by the foster family. Besides, the foster family used the fact that Andy had attained the school-going age to separate her from her mother.

At a family level, some of the risk factors that one can encounter include; neglect, poverty, and poor parenting. In the story, Andy was exposed to the risk of mistreatment since he had no family to protect him. Andy’s mother was mentally ill, and she could not be able to take care of his son as a mother would do (Bridge, 2008, p.86). His grandmother was poor hence unable to provide for his needs (Bridge, 2008, p. 87). In this case, these factors contributed to Andy being forced to be taken into foster care. Since he had no one to follow up on in his progress while in foster care, he was mistreated.

Besides, Bridge admits that Andy’s family had a history of maltreatment. This fact exposed Andy to a higher likelihood of being mistreated. Besides, Andy was faced with the risk of adopting some of the mental issues faced by his mother, such as aggression. Being aggressive exposes one to a higher risk of being mistreated (Bridge, 2008, p. 95). It gives those with the intention of mistreatment that excuses to mistreat you when you portray aggressive behavior.

The environment plays a vital role in determining the risk and protective factors in one’s life. In the story, Andy’s environment, both being raised up by his mother and grandmother and while in foster care, exposed him to risk and protective factors (Bridge, 2008, p. 102). Some of the risk factors that Andy was exposed to while being raised by his mentally ill mother include; mental illness and aggression. Being raised by a mother with mental health issues, Andy risked developing mental health issues. He admits that most of the time, he was disturbed by her mother’s mental health (Bridge, 2008, p. 111). Although he wished he was in a position to help his mother, he could not because he was young.

On the other hand, when being brought up by his grandmother, he risked hunger, starvation, or malnutrition since her grandmother was struggling to provide food to her grandson. Besides, he risked getting uneducated because her mother was uneducated and did not value education (Bridge, 2008, p. 98). While Andy was being brought up in foster care, he was facing the risk of mistreatment and lack of affection from his foster parents.

In most cases, children brought up by foster parents risk mistreatment since the foster family does not view them as their own. In this case, they are more likely to mistreat them as they lack the emotional attachment to the children (Bridge, 2008, p. 108). However, Andy gives hope to other children who are foster care as he manages to overcome challenges and risks associated with foster care by having strong protective factors such as patience, resilience, determination, and hard work.

ReferencesBridge, A. (2008). Hope’s boy. West Michigan University. https://webauth.wmich.edu/cas-web/service 3A%2F%2Fgowmu.wmich.edu%2Fc%2Fportal%