Our States

and
"Bad" Families
By Shelley Calissendorff
Foster Focus Contributor
Ever had rose petals thrown at your feet?
No, me neither, but I felt as though I
came close a couple of times.
Becoming a foster parent and adopting a
child from foster care are two of the
things in my life that made me feel like I
was really, REALLY appreciated!
Beyond those two things, when a family
comes in contact with their states child
welfare agency, appreciation best NOT
be what youre looking for. In fact,
unless you are wanting to do something
FOR your states child welfare agency,
you can expect to be treated consistently
with disrespect and belittlement. NO
rose petals.
No criminal record? Never abused or
neglected a child in your life? No problem! If you GO TO your states child
welfare agency looking for help, you too
can be treated just the way they treat a
street-drug-addicted felon.
Some parents did not have the good fortune of being raised themselves by functional, emotionally stable, loving parents.
And yet, as Mother Nature would have
it, they become parents themselves one
day and they have no template of good,
healthy parenting to draw from when
parenting their own children.
They may have mental health issues
which could lead them to use or abuse, or
to have addictions to, any number of different substances or lifestyle choices.
When drugs, food, sex, gambling, etc.
become unhealthy habits, its usually
because these viceswhichever ones
they be, are subconsciously being used
as a form of self-medication--as a way to
soothe the user, to comfort them, and to
make it seem as though their life is more

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bearable.
When parents who were not well parented themselves, find that they too are now
parents, and they are self-medicating a
LOT, well, this is when these families
become ripe for child neglect, abuse and
abandonment.
When children are in a home where
addictions run rampant, children naturally fall down the list of priorities. Its
common sense, really, isnt it?
Tragically, many of the children born to
parents meeting this description will
eventually end up in the care of their
states child welfare agency.
When I use the word tragically, please
dont misunderstand meits tragic
when a childANY child is neglected,
abused or abandoned; its tragic when
child welfare agencies have to get
involved; it MAY be a tragedy, or a blessing (to that child) when a child is
removed from their biological parents,
depending on a wide array of circumstances. Its also entirely possible that an
employee of a states child welfare
agency could simply follow procedures
and end up causing massive suffering.
Often times, services
that are supposed to be
government funded are
not accessed and
instead of helping to
keep families together,
they are all too often
torn apart.

very quiet crisis happening in this country. Families are adopting children and
are learning eventually that the child or
children they have adopted are severely
mentally ill.
These sick children are this way possibly
because they were born like that and
inherited their condition through genetics. More likely however, the mental illness, or emotional disturbance that the
adopted child suffers from is the result of
early childhood trauma and/or the lack of
a healthy, secure bond with any other
human being prior to being placed in
their adoptive home.
Certainly, children raised in their biological families can and do have invisible,
less evident health needs. Children
raised in adoptive families are many
times more likely to be diagnosed with a
serious, invisible, mental health concern.
According to the NIH (National Institute
of Health), a 2011 study states that up to
45% of adoptees have one or more moderate to severe health conditions.
(Personally, Id bet an arm the number is
MUCH higher.)
Parents waiting to adopt are required to
take 14 hours of core training in some
states, but 30 hours are required in others. International adoptions require just
10 hours of core training.
Additional training on the needs of children with serious, invisible, mental
health concerns are often times available,
but not required.

What happens when

very well intentioned
parents who were
some of the lucky
ones--raised by good,
functional
parents
decide that they want
to adopt?
There is a little known,

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The vast majority of adoptive parents are

NOT psychiatrists, psychologists, mental
health counselors, pediatricians, or child
behavior specialists.

We WILL NOT be one of those parents

on the news who locked their children in
a closet!
We wont!

They are regular people with BIG hearts

and a lot of love to give.
When it comes to serious, invisible mental health concerns, very often, love and
patience are NOT enough!
Historically, in the United States of
America there is an ugly tale of how we
have handled and warehoused our children with simhc (serious, invisible,
mental health concerns). Gut wrenchingly horrible. The good news is that
today we (for the most part) no longer
institutionalize these children.
The bad news is, we also do NOT come
even close to adequately preparing the
parents of these children to be their special needs care-givers. Parents are unprepared in the sense that they dont know
how to switch up their parenting, but also
that they dont have the resources and
often times not the funds or health insurance to meet their childrens simhc.

When we are at our wits end because we

have already turned to everyone we can
turn to, we have already gone into massive debt, we have already ruined our
marriage or lost our house, we have
already possibly considered suicide, quit
our job, lost our friends and alienated our
neighbors.
We have dug as deep as we can possibly
dig.
We have given everything we have to
give.
And, we have received precisely ZERO
casseroles.
THEN is when we call our states child
welfare agency, and what we get is their
special kind of very consistent, onesize-fits-all treatmentthe very same
treatment that down-on-their luck, no
template of good parenting, self-medicating-type parents get.

They are NOT bad parents!

They are well-intentioned, underresourced, hard-working, un-neglectful,
un-abusive parents who find themselves
at the end of their ropes.
Tying a knot and holding on to the end of
that rope will get them only so far.
When that knot starts to slip out and the
ground is a long ways below, some adoptive parents of simhc children will call
their states child welfare agency desperately looking for help.
And let me tell you, from my own personal experience, a parent has to be pretty darn desperate to call their states
child welfare agency!
WE KNOW this is a risky thing to do!
We know we may well live to regret such
a choice! But, when we DO that, we are
SO desperate for help, for support, for
resources--we have already determined
that the help and resources we need are
unavailable to us elsewhere.

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NO parents, under any circumstances,

should ever be treated by any other
human being (government employee or
otherwise) as though they are the lowest
scum of the earth.

SAMHSA, Substance Abuse & Mental

Health Services Administration, and
ACF, Administration for Children &
Families. Administrators stated in a letter
to every state child welfare agency that:
The impact of complex trauma for children who have experienced maltreatment
can be profound, derailing them from
healthy development, impairing social
and emotional functioning, and compromising health.
And, that they and their agencies are
committed to improving the life outcomes for children who have experienced the complex trauma associated
with child abuse and neglect and exposure to violence and are prepared to offer
technical assistance as needed dated
July 11, 2013.
The problem is in the states. Our U.S.
States and Territories have yet to evolve
to the point of understanding these problems.
They dont see the big picture, and they
certainly arent even close to finding
solutions, let alone funding them!
Let our states join the rest of us in this
century, and begin to understand how
very important it is to treat ALL KINDS
of families with the RESPECT they
deserve (no rose petals required!)
whether they be asking for help, or, offering it.

Thats not to say that some of us dont

make mistakes because MANY of us
DO!
To varying degrees but we are still
people and more often than not, there are
very valid reasons behind the mistakes
that we make. Not to excuse those mistakes, but merely to explain that they are
often a normal (albeit not healthy!) part
of being human.
Agencies within our federal government
understand early childhood trauma (often
referred to as complex trauma).
They understand what causes it, how to
prevent it, and are even finding better and
more effective ways to treat it than ever
before.
The CMS, Center for Medicaid Services,

Shelley Calissendorff is a long-time advocate for animal, environmental and humanitarian causes; after volunteering as a Court
Appointed Special Advocate (CASA), and
adopting a daughter with special needs from
foster care, She added foster-adoptive family
advocacy to her list.
The founder and administrator of three
Facebook pages, you can Like her work at
PreserveFamiliesWithRADChildrenNow,
BIG4MashUp and at Smile.At.Your.Baby.
Follow on Twitter @SmileAtYourBaby

Foster Focus Volume 4 Issue 8

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