Aftermath of ASFA: Trading Custody Rights for Mental Healthcare
Click here to see our video entitled, “He’s My Son” which has been presented publicly at:
October 2009
Adoption Support Group, Metropolitan Family Services, Vernon Hills, IL
Family Advocacy Forum, Omaha NE
November 2009
Family Defense Center, Chicago, IL
June 2010
ACMHAI meeting, Glen Ellyn, IL
In 1997, the federal government passed the Adoptive and Safe Families Act which provides millions to states for the purpose of increasing adoptions. It was successful. However, it neglected to consider that large numbers of those children were severely traumatized. Time has shown that many of these children have disorders that are so severe, their behavior can’t be appropriately managed in their family homes. The state’s solution is to once again make them a ward of the state, separating them from their families. This way they access even more federal funding. For families, it is essentially the only way that they can get their critically ill children into a residential treatment facility.
Custody relinquishment for the sake of mental healthcare. The Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law refers to this practice as “barbaric.” NAMI calls in “unthinkable.” GQ Magazine called it “the unspeakable choice.”
We call it the Devil’s Deal. Trading custody rights for mental healthcare.
To schedule a speaking engagement or presentation of “He’s My Son” contact me at tonihoy@comcast.net
[...] comment on the return of the Russion adopted child. Please see her blog and review her slideshow at http://scopeandcircumstance.wordpress.com/hes-my-son-3/. I understand this is a controversial topic, and if you are moved to comment, kindly consider your [...]
[...] the thread of thought and experience, it’s best to review her her blog and slideshow at http://scopeandcircumstance.wordpress.com/hes-my-son-3/ and then see her guest [...]
[...] He’s My Son [...]
We have had to do this to get our adopted son help. We were advised to do a lock out to get him residential help.In the four weeks he has been in “shelter care” he has been beat up so bad they busted his ear drum, had innapropriate sexual contact witha 13 yr old boy, raped by a 17 yr. old, and then ran away and broke into a care and now sits in a juvenile dept. of corrections. So much for getting help! Our world is falling apart and I am regretting this decision. But he needed help bad He has Been diagnosed with many things and was very abusive, but only in our home. Outside of our home he was the victim. I only wanted help for him but I think I have hurt him worse. I hate the system.
First I would like to thank you for sharing your story with everyone. I am in the same position as you was. I have a 16 ½ year old adopted daughter who has been hospitalized 7 times and in the detention center once all spanning from May 2010 to current for violent and out of control behavior toward her younger sibling and I. She is very violent and has even threatened to kill me. I was instructed by the preservation agency to do a “lockout” so she could get the long term mental health services she needs. I was contacted by DCFS and was told to return her to my home or I would be charged with neglect. She returned home for 3 days before having another violent episode and is now on her 8th hospitalization for homicidal threats. I have a 12 year old child in the home that has witnessed nearly every violent episode and is now petrified to be in the same household with this girl. All the agencies and hospitals do is send her back home after two weeks. Can you direct me in the right direction or perhaps give me a little insight of how I can get some much needed help?
Our family is on a horrifying roller coaster. My now 15 year old adopted son is diagnosed with ADHD, Bi-Polar and RAD, he has a LD, he is very aggressive and defiant. He has had been hopitalized 5 times, residentially placed 1 times, foster home 6 times and now back a ward of the state for the 3rd time.The legal system and DCFS says his illnesses are my fault; however, he came into my heart and home at the age of 3 years old-he had been abused and neglected. As I reached out to him to show him love, structure, guidance, support, attention and stability-never once would I have thought we would end up in the court system- fighting to regain custody of my son and get the medically needed help that he is entitled too. The court system says they go by the law and does what’s in the best interest of the child. How is removing a child from his family, placing a child in a foster home giving him the same treatments he was receiving at our home helping him when the same meltdowns that occured in our home are happening in the foster home. How is it that the foster parent can put my son in a hospital for one month-no visits, 1 call; the caseworker can call me and tell me I have a right to go visit my son, but, when he is released he is put right back into the same foster home-This is my fault. The Legal System and DCFS had the foster parent come to court and accuse me of telling my son bad things about her and I told my son to tear up her house. Does the system not see that more intense medical help is required. I have been told by the current caseworker that because I did not contact the then caseworker PRIOR to contacting the police DURING one of my son’s meltdown at our home and he attacked me and torn up our home(again), they disregarded the fact that I did call the caseworker-who never answers her phone, then I called the police and lastly I called my attorney-this is a violation. I have been told by DCFS that I must always contact the caseworker first when my son has a meltdown-disregarding the FACTS that my son could be in the midst of seriously harming a family member or himself; call the case worker and lock ourselves in a room until help arrives. My son has expressed several times that he wants to come home-to his GAL and caseworker; what he receives in return for this is bribery by his GAL.-to say what they want him to say in returns for games, ice cream and unfulfilled promises. His caseworker has told me that foster/adopted youths have a right to live without consequences basically-its okay to fight parents and others in their home. It’s okay to damage our/others home/properties-holes in wall, break glass, put aluminum foil in microwave, turn gas on to try and blow up house, threaten to kill us when we are asleep. But they(GAL, caseworker, DCFS, State Attorney) would never adopt a youth within the system. Where is the justice hear, I am committed to my son, where is the commitment by sytem!!!