Thread:SpiritedDreaming/@comment-24534644-20160601010520/@comment-26397825-20160621041857

One option I could see is something I used in a backstory for my own character; foster care.

Sometimes children are given to foster carers rather than simply dumped in an orphanage by the system with the hopes of adoption. You could have her being picked up after say, a couple of weeks on the street - long enough for her to realise no one is coming to pick her up, but not long enough to have to worry about things like irreversible malnutrition.

Then, she could be placed in an orphanage, but due to her own abandonment issues and say, children being children and bullying her over being abandoned as she was and her faunus heritage, the orphanage owner could put in an application for her to be fostered out to someone. She is shipped off to a foster home, which is a much closer and more familial setting than an orphanage. I'd suggest doing this after maybe a few years of Merrilee being at the orphanage and showing no signs of 'improving her attitude' or making an attempt to get visiting wannabe-parents to notice her due to abandonment fears.

The foster home could give her a better sense of belonging, but depending on the scenario again could give her some more social issues. I knew a girl who was fostered to a family that had four kids of their own already; it sounds perfect on paper, adding another kid to a big family so they get a real sense of belonging and brothers and sisters who are around their age and can play with them, but something I noticed is that the blood children of the foster parents tended to exclude the foster child from activities - often without even meaning to.

And then there was the fights, which often led to things like "You're not even a real part of this family", "They're not your parents, they're mine" "Your parents don't want you" being thrown around, especially once teenagerhood hit. And though the parents can be the best meaning people in the world, sometimes their actions can hurt the foster child more than it would if they said it to their blood child; excluding them from a day out because they've been grounded for instance.

So something like that could be used in her backstory.

To break it down, I think the beginning of being abandoned as a child - near an orphanage or in a place where people are likely to find the child quickly so it's less 'douche parents because douches' and more 'douche parents because lack of money or circumstances have changed and the parents simply can't look after the child anymore, but don't want the shame of having the orphanage know who they are' - is a pretty good idea. If you wanted, you could make her just a smidgeon younger - say, 3 - so that her memory of who her parents are disappears, but the knowledge that she was abandoned doesn't.

Then, being put in an orphanage for a few years - say 3 or 4 so she's 6 or 7 - but showing no 'improvement of attitude' or atempts to be noticed and adopted. Afterwards, the orphanage matron or patron (depending on if you want the orphanage to be run by a male or female) can suggest foster care for her instead, and she could be put in the care of a couple with a few children roughly around her age already. This would also play into her insecurities, as she could view it as the orphanage owner deciding they can't be bothered with her as well and giving her up.

How you have her experience with the foster carers go is entirely up to you, but I provided a real life example of how something that sounds perfect on paper can turn out in real life that you could use if you wanted.