I will be taking an 18 year old legal orphan out to lunch to congratulate her on good grades. I am no longer paid to represent her, but … for example she has come to terms emotionally with the fact that her adoptive parents dumped her at the age of 10 for being too much hassle, and I did her name change back to her birth name pro bono, and will be driving her place to place to change her ID.
DCF workers don’t have the time and cannot be bothered, of course. Their casework is focused on infants and toddlers, not 18 year old legal orphans adrift in the system. She is fortunate to have pro bono counsel, and that she signed back in before the “freeze” and has a roof over her head. She has two more years of high school as she is special needs but will, I think, ultimately be employed in the culinary field if she doesn’t give up.
Not an easy life she has – her parent’s rights were terminated in New York State and she was sent here to be adopted only to be dumped like defective goods.
Ah yes, wasn’t National Adoption Day Yesterday? The big celebration where thousands of dollars are spent to trumpet how great it is to take kids from their parents and adopt them out? These celebrations are held in the courts themselves! No wonder parents fighting to regain their children find it hard to trust the courts or court-appointed counsel. No way that I can support this event and participate in it and retain credibility with those folk I serve, whether children or adults.
I sometimes fantasize standing outside one of the court-supported National Adoption Day celebrations dressed in black, like a Native American bearing witness on Columbus Day.
There is more than one side to every issue, to be sure. And when someone voluntarily surrenders an infant and that infant is adopted, this CAN be the best result. But when parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents who are fighting to retain their children are sundered from those same children often for economic and social-stigma reasons, there is NOTHING to celebrate – and 800 of such children reach the age of 18 with neither their birth families nor an adopted family – every year.
And the outcomes for those children, “our children” are pretty grim. 37% experience homelessless; 59% experience depression, 43% had been pregnant or gotten someone pregnant, 54% are unemployed, and of those employed, 47% were employed 20 hours or less. 90% are still receiving MassHealth [is this a bright spot?] See the report “Preparing Our Kids for Education, Work and Life: A Report of the Task Force on Youth Aging Out of DSS Care” at http://foundationcenter.org/pn…
Are you saying that there are fit parents whose children are being snatched from them? I haven’t seen it. Are you saying that some adoptive parents fail miserably? I’m sure there are.
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p>Are you saying we should do a better job for children who are abandoned by their parents? I agree. But what’s wrong with celebrating part of the system that works well. I’m no DCF apologist, but I attended the event in Worcester and I did not see anyone “trumpet how great it is to take kids from their parents and adopt them out”.
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p>For my money, I’d like to see the system streamlined a bit. I believe we spend too much time and resources protecting the rights of “parents” whose only claim to that status is DNA. We appoint them counsel, give them repeated attempts to slow down the process, frustrate the wonderful people who wish to provide care and love to the unfortunate children, all in the interest of their parental “rights”, which frankly seem more like property rights, the way we deal with it.
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p>I agree with you that we, as a society, have a responsibility to these children that we do not fully meet. Just don’t try to tell me that we need to focus more effort on protecting their biological parents.
The kid Amber is writing about was “dumped” by her adoptive “parents”. So don’t assume all adoptive “parents” are wonderful, ok? She changed her name back to her birth name, because birth parents are always birth parents, even if sometimes they are not fit and stop being legal guardians.
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p>On a related note, there is another good article in the Globe today about donor children looking for their birth parents. I found Heather’s quote to be interesting: “Mostly,” Hannah imagines saying, “I just want to make sure you know I exist.” The standard story is that kids might need to know their parent’s medical history, or feel something is missing by not knowing about their heritage. But what she feels is missing is not within her, it is that her father doesn’t know she exists.
We can agree that DNA does not create parenthood. Siring a child does not make a man a father, nor does giving birth make a woman a mother.
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p>That all being said, I have personally witnessed the following:
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p>1. A decline in the services available for both children and parents each year for the last 10 years, despite a brief but not lasting uptick in services in 2006-2007. This has become so extreme that social workers go to a foundation set up with donations from attorneys such as myself to even be able to provide summer day camps for kids in foster care. See http://onecanhelp.org/
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p>2. An aunt denied as the custodian and adoptive parent because “she had too many pets” despite being a retired police officer, a college graduate, and providing superb care to each and every pet – in order that her neice and nephew could be adopted out of state by an Anglo couple rather than their African American Aunt in Boston.
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p>3. A Father denied custody of his son, despite uncontested evidence of a bond, and no abuse ever, because the father did not have housing, and when he suceeded in getting housing, being told, “You took too long”. The same divorced father had paid child support for a child from his marriage [another relatiohnship] all the way through college.
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p>4. An epileptic mother who had a seizure in a courthouse having her child removed there and then – and when I was appointed to represent that child it took 11 months and thousands of dollars in State money to get that child home.
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p>5. The well known fact that NO statistics are kept as to how many adoptions disrupt.
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p>Further, if you were a 12 year old wanting nothing more than to live with a parent or grandmother, how would it look to YOU if your attorney was out there celebrating National Adoption Day?
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p>I don’t know where your hostility comes from – I do know where my concern comes from so while I won’t stand there and mourn in black – and ruin a celebration for happy people, I will adamantly witness that this particular state-funded celebration is a day of pain for many.
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p>Certainly, there are biological parents who are not competent or safe to raise the children they sire or give birth to – but YES I have personal knowledge of competent parents denied return of their children, and that the services available for struggling parents are not lavish as you would suggest, but meager.
Siring a child does not make a man a father, nor does giving birth make a woman a mother.
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p>Sorry but that is flatly untrue. Fathering a child makes you a father, and giving birth to a child makes you a mother. Whether they end up as that child’s legal parents is a different story, but it’s a biological fact that they are that child’s father and mother. Ask Heather from that Globe story.
Here is the link: http://www.mass.gov/legis/laws…
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p>A man may “sire” a child by donating a sperm – but must learn and accept responsibility to be “a father”. There is a difference between the biological act of being a progenitor, and the cultural role of “father”.
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p>Similarly, with surrogate parents, a woman may loan her womb, with no commitment to raise a child. There is a difference between the biological act of carrying a child to term in the uterus, and the cultural role of “mother”.
if he fills that cultural role. Like John Lennon, being raised by his Aunt Mimi because his mother Julia was young and single and didn’t “accept responsibility” and was killed by a bus, did that mean Mimi became his “mother”? I don’t think so.
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p>my family was just visited by a cousin we never knew we had, the grandson of a woman who apparently had a romance with my grandfather when he was visiting his father in England and was drafted into WWI. His mother found the identity of her father when the British Infantry records for WWI were posted on line this year and was able to contact his children here. It was very exciting for everyone. My grandfather never even knew he had fathered a child, and certainly never fulfilled any cultural role in her upbringing. But that didn’t stop my Aunt from having him as a father, and us from having a family re-union with a whole new branch of family. No one used the word “sired”, even though they were British and might think that word respectful. It isn’t here.
His mother found the identity of her GRANDfather on line.
I understand that kids can now “age out” at 21 and not 18…is this no longer true? If so, i assume budget cuts has something to do with it.
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p>If so, our system is so broken…let’s cut $1 million (for example) and end the lefline we give these 18 to 21 yr olds and put them on the street. Then, as that stats you provide indicate, they will fall further into disarray and cost society even more money down the road. I sorry to frame it like that, but I think we have to. Human service advocates must frame this as an investment that will save money in the long run…this counters the knockledraggers who rant and rave about all the “free loaders” the system supports. A ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure (of course we ain’t curing nothing when we ahve to send someone to MCI Walpole because we didn’t offer them a lifeline 5 years before).
Any child can have their parent’s rights terminated – and be removed from their home on mere suspicion [reasonable cause to believe is the legal phrasing].
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p>There are fewer “services” every year to bring families back together, none the less, most children are reunified with their parents or other relatives.
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p>If a child does not “go home”, by age 18:
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p>1. That child is no longer entitled to appointed counsel.
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p>2. DCF does not have to provide housing or anything else unless the 18-21 year old signs themselves back in AND DCF has funding AND decides to allow sign in. My understanding is that there is either a “freeze” or extreme reduction in allowed voluntary sign ins for DCF custody.
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p>3. A child who was in foster care, under the new law, is almost certainly entitled to MssHealth and tuition/fee waivers.
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p>4. To be “entitled” to continuing counsel and care, a child has to be so cognitively limited that they are viewed, to use the old term, and adjudicated as “retarded”.
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p>5. No statistics are kept or gathered as to how many adoptions “disrupt” -i.e., unravel leaving children as legal orphans. My personal data set is skewed, as I am often faxed appointments to represent a child after their “permanent disruption” disrupts leaviong them with neither biological parents nor adopted parents.
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p>I don’t agree with the poster who thinks stripping parents and children or their legal relationship to one another should be further streamlined. In fact, under the Adoption and Safe Families Act, this process HAS been speeded up and the safety net for children diminished not improved.
You are so right. It costs $48,000.00 a year to lock someone up in State Prison – and a lot less to have a sufficient number of competent group homes and educate and support these young people who have been failed by their parents and everyone else. It is not THEIR fault that the very adults who were supposed to care for them were not competent to do so, or prevented from doing so as the case may be.
And have tried to provide background, but I bet it is not enough. The question is, how much information would need to be enough for readers to understand that children can be removed from parents who are actually not unfit?
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p>So here are at least a couple of cases:
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p>Adoption of Leland, where a father who was not unfit was tricked into bringing a child into Massachusetts, who was then removed from his care and kept from him until the Appeals Court stepped in:
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p>http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/…
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p>It is important to remember that just because parents are accused of abuse, or neglect, does not mean that these accusations are true. Sometimes they are – and sometimes they are not.
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p>The increase in cases where children are taken, and their parent’s rights are terminated in fact led to more legal orphans, not more successful adoptions. See:
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p>http://www.geocities.com/ncgal…
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p>Tell me if you want more background.
that gays have now been banned from adopting or forstering via constitutional amendment in at least 4 states, most recently Arkansas Nov 4th. Thus it is difficult to celelbrate adoption when it is becoming a system of special rights for heterosexuals. The willingness of people to adopt and foster is wonderful. But the legal system built around the institution is flawed in many ways, and appears to me to be getting worse rather than better. Funny, but i would have thought that all those careless heterosexuals would be happy for gays to come and clean up their mess for them. But no, we’re apparently too filthy to even be allowed to do that. So the kids suffer. Nicw job, bigots.
for single people to adopt. not just gay couples or gay people.
but if you think the target was single heterosexual people, you are mistaken. this is part of a larger strategy to prevent gay people from having families.
I expect the Adoption and Safe Families Act [so called] to create as much human wreckage and heartache before it is amended as the so called “Indian Program” did.
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p>Just a couple of links: http://sp.oxfordjournals.org/c…
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p>[About social eugenics]
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p>About the social eugenics theory as applied to Native Americans in the USA until about 1970:
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p>http://www.amnestyusa.org/amne…
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p>Or, to quote 1984:
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p>All Americans are equal – its just that some are MORE equal.
AmberPaw, you are apparently paid by the state (when you are not working pro bono) to represent the interests of mothers and fathers whose children are the subject of adoption proceedings (presumably cases brought by DCF or cases initiated sua sponte by a judge). You sound like you are a vigorous and effective advocate. I give you a lot of credit for that. But I will stick to my guns on the point that National Adoption Day is a great event and that we should do more to encourage the adoption of abandoned children by “wonderful” adoptive parents, even if it means making it easier to override the objections of failed biological parents.
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p>I do not have nearly as much experience as you in adoption matters, but I am very familiar with hundreds of petitions for guardianship. I often have to explain to incredulous people that a father or mother who has not been seen or heard from in 12 years must be given legally sufficient notice before the court can consider granting grandmother or aunt/uncle guardianship. And children suffer (uncertainty, delayed benefits, school enrollment, etc.) while the prospective guardians attempt to track down these failed parents. In that context I have often wished for a system that focuses more on the needs of the child, and less on the possibility of redemption for failed parents who flew the coop long ago. Perhaps I let that unduly influence my feelings on adoption.
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p>I do have some direct experience with adoptions which are delayed at length by parents who use their biological status (with the assistance of court appointed and paid for counsel) to assuage their guilt about the miserable failures they have been as parents by not doing the right thing for their children, i.e. assenting to an adoption.
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p>Before you respond in outrage with more anecdotal evidence, understand that of course there are exceptions. You cite a father who wanted custody, but he was homeless, or the woman who lost her children because she had a seizure at the courthouse. Let me assure our less experienced readers (if anyone is still paying attention) that no one ever lost custody of a child simply because of a seizure, unless they were a character in a novel by Charles Dickens. And I do have concerns about the custodial capabilities of a father who is homeless. What was “too late”? Did the child suffer? Did the father do all a father should for his child?
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p>Step back. Isn’t it all about the children? “Stripping parents of their children”? Sounds like great drama, but I suspect the incidence of this pales in comparison to the frequency of adoptions unnecessarily delayed by mothers and fathers who wouldn’t recognize the best interest of their children if it came up and bit them.
I will again provide the link to the most recent study by DSS [before the name change to DCF] and The Home for Little Wanderers about the actual outcomes for children who are rendered legal orphans. In the last twelve months, cases where DCF sought custody increased by 15%. Do you really think there are 15 % more inadequate parents this year than last? Or that every child who wants to go home to a biological parent or grandparent is mistaken? Are there inadequate parents who cannot care for their children – yes.
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p>Is every parent who is alleged to be inadequate, in fact inadequate? No.
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p>Anyway, some links if you are actually interested in facts, and not just trumpeting the tune of the Adoption Industry – because make no mistake, Adoption IS an industry.
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p>On aging out: http://www.tbf.org/uploadedFil…
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p>A good blog in this area:
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p>http://michaelrichlaw.blogspot…
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p>I have taken the position that DCF must have custody and parental rights should be terminated when, in fact, that is in the child’s best interest. It is not a ideological issue.
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p>However, I see less and less in terms of services available for children, teenagers, or parents every year. And THAT is a fact.
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p>Adoption is just no panacea nor does every child removed from a less the perfect – but safe – home every receive a new home or an adoption.
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p>Further, again, I would lose the trust of those whom I try to serve were I to view “National Adoption Day” as a glorious celebration – until the day there is also a “National Reunification Day” because when that happens, the right way for the right reasons we all win.
I ask relevant questions. Are the children who are becoming “legal orphans”, as you put it, being “ripped from their parents”? How many are actually living with their parents when this happens? Go ahead. Answer that question. It’s a fact that I’m actually interested in. I bet you its about none. Kinda knocks a hole in your “They’re taking children away from fit parents” argument.
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p>I hope people read the Appeals Court case you cited in an earlier post. It provides a good case history about how these things actually work. How many man-hours, legal fees, court time and fee waivers were spent helping this individual fight his child’s adoption? Dollar value? $30K? 50K?
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p>The average citizen reading just your comments might believe that adoptee conscription gangs are roaming the streets. People love stories like that, just like they want to believe that sane people can get locked up forever in asylums or all fathers get screwed in Family Court. It plays to fears and simple mindedness.
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p>I don’t trumpet for the Adoption Industry (where exactly are they located?) I trumpet for parental responsibility and against people who would rather see child snatching conspiracy instead of balancing a child’s best interest over parental “property” rights.
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p>I have battled with DSS/DCF on numerous occasions. They are a deeply flawed agency. And I recognize that the process that facilitates an early termination of parental rights (in an attempt to encourage adoptions) has not had the effect its proponents sought. I’m just not as quick to brand it kidnapping. We have to do more to get these kids to safe stable homes.
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p>I think your initial post is misleading, polemic, and does little to further the important discussion of how we can better serve children who get dealt very tough hands.
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p>But I’ve had enough. I’ll give you the last word.
I, too, appreciate Amber’s advocacy and passion, but I have seen, as well, the side of this issue you describe. You put it succinctly and aptly when you state:
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p>
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p>Redemption. Not a word that is often raised in the context of adoption, but it is one that paradoxically fits. I can’t tell you how many kids I’ve taught over the years who lived with others, often no relation, because a parent hasn’t been seen or heard from in years–and these kids are the fortunate ones. Some of them have parents blow in and out of their lives once or twice every eight years. At least these kids, though, have a home and someone to shelter, nurture, and love them. The children in state custody deserve the same, and if we are making it difficult for prospective parents to adopt children in need because there’s always the possibility…. Well, never mind.
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p>BTW, for many years I taught some of the most egregiously unfit parents who ever walked the earth during my years with the Department of Correction.
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p>Sometimes children really do grow to hate and despise their parents for good reasons.
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p>Thanks for taking the time to say what you said.
I have a number of friends who have adopted and raised children. They are loving parents. Their children have thrived. I don’t know the all of the circumstances of how these children came to be adopted–most of the children that I know were given up as infants. Some of the kids have had special needs, and their parents have made great sacrifices on their behalf.
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p>Surely, these families deserve some recognition, as well.
There should be recognition for birth parents as well as adoptive parents for a job well done.
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p>The United States of America is the least child friendly and least family friendly of any industrialized nation as well as demonizing the poor and conflating neglect and poverty. See http://media.www.thecowl.com/m… US – UK rank lowest in child welfare.
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p>See also: Eichehner, Maxine “Rethinking the relationships…” http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/pa…
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p>No one has to take AmberPaw’s word here. I am not attacking adoptive parents – I am attacking the Pollyanna belief that adoption is a panacea or always succeeds. I am also statiung the reality that our out of control economic system destroys families and so does our child welfare system. And so does children, having children themselves.
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p>Article: “Infant adoption is big business in America”
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p>http://www.originscanada.org/i…
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p>In raising a special needs son my husband and I saw of the seven children in his class, six marriges fail from the difficulties presented from high maintenance children with no supports no respite and no flexibility in the work place.
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p>To me, it seems that it is easier to “shoot the messenger” by attacking me for shedding light on the failed concept of adoption as an altruistic panacea. It is neither always altruistic nor a panacea – and the hostility towards homemaking, parenting, and nurturing in our society is endemic and shocking.
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p>Research is progressively documenting better outcomes in flawed, but not dangerous birth families then from removal even with adoption.
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p>See: Doyle, Sloan School of Management, regarding such outcomes [removal vs reunification]
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p>http://www.econ.ucsb.edu/semin…
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p>There is no perfect solution. All families, whether created through birth, with or without marriage, or by adoption in this country are strugglng. There is simply inadequate support for parenting and removing the children of the poor and working class who are not abusive is wrong, pure and simple in my eyes.
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p>I am not talking about parents who abandon their children – I at least will give links and statistics. I am talking about a harsh reality you may not have experienced and may not have faced.
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p>Before you jump all over me again, please read:
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p>http://www.nccpr.org/reports/a…
It seems, judging by the comments made thus far, that you have touched a nerve, AmberPaw.
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p>I was both uplifted and depressed by your post (nice feat that… !-) as I realized I have a rather rosy view of adoption. I’m sorry to hear that yet another of our social systems is deeply flawed. Can’t we get anything right?
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p>Growing up, my parents divorced as did the parents of all but one of my friends: which friend was also the only one of us who was adopted. And so, perhaps naively, I’ve always associated adoption and commitment.
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p>I am horrified to read about this child ‘dumped’ by her adoptive parents. How can that happen? Don’t they have a legal responsibility?
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p>In any event, I’ll add her (and you) to my prayers for a righteous outcome.