After my second helping of brats and fresh corn and salad, we meet a gentleman who has, by coincidence, adopted three older, abused children. The oldest boy was, in his first few years of life, splashed with boiling water, peppered with cigarette burns, and sexually molested. The other boy and girl were treated almost as badly. So what's the story 18 years later? The older boy is in prison, and the younger boy has court cases pending. The girl is about to enter the army, and she just might turn out to be a success. All three hated their adoptive parents, and weren't afraid to say so, in words and in deed. The girl ran away from home (like Mary), and the boys were violent. The older boy had to be removed from the house for a time to keep everyone safe.
An hour later we spoke to a 73 year old woman who had, by coincidence, adopted five troubled children (not related to each other). Two of them were not turning out well. One was headed for jail, and the other had attacked her just a week ago. Picture a strong 16 year old boy/man punching holes in his wall, and then going after this frail 73 year old woman who has been his provider, guardian, and mother for the past ten years.
"After the incident," she recounts, "he started to cry and just couldn't stop. He knew what he had done, and couldn't come to terms with it. That's what makes it so hard. That's why I don't just get rid of him, even though he is a danger to me."
The pattern is clear. Sometimes these damaged children cannot be fixed, at least not with present day methods. Of course my kids weren't treated this badly, at least I don't think they were, so I am not discouraged. If anything, I am encouraged, because we are not alone. There are thousands of families like ours that suffer in silence, believing their stories are somehow unique. They are not.
But wait, there's more.
I'll try to summarize the key points in one or two paragraphs. Children adopted from Russia are often older than those adopted from Korea, China, Mexico, or Central America. And their first few years were not pleasant. Neglect is typical, and abuse is not unheard of. Serious medical conditions go undiagnosed and undisclosed. You just don't know what you're getting. These kids come to America and try to adjust, and sometimes the outcome is tragic. Rebellion and violence are common, as the adoptive parents try to cope.
Why don't we just give up? Why don't we just put them back into the system? Because we have been brainwashed into thinking that this is their last chance. We are their "forever family". (How many times have you heard that one?) If we give up on them, we are branded as failures, and these rejected children will surely wind up in jail, or worse. We hear this over and over again, and nobody stops to question it. Nobody stops to ask whether it is really true.
Step back a moment and take a look. The two families that we talked to both have kids in jail. What we're doing isn't working. The outcome that we fear is already taking place, despite our best efforts. Something is terribly wrong. Is there an alternative? The article says their is. Admit that you cannot raise these children. Set pride aside and admit that they would do better somewhere else. If your kids are a danger to you, or making no progress at all, perhaps they need a second home. The article says some of these kids use the first home as their "scapegoat". They have to blame someone for their bad behavior and their sad lot in life. They can't blame themselves. That is simply too much to bear. (Even adults rarely take responsibility for their actions.) And they don't remember their first few years, when the train first jumped the tracks, so they can't blame their past either. That leaves their new home and their adoptive parents. When these kids move to a second home, they often do much better. Realize that the second home is no better than the first. In other words, it's not your fault. The two households are just as loving, just as patient, and just as well trained. But the kids can blame the first home for all their troubles, and grow and flourish in the second. It's a revolutionary thought, and I think it's right.
If I had read this article 5 years ago, I don't know if John and Mary would be with us today. You must realize that John was more violent and more dangerous than I have let on in these pages. There are things I just don't want to write about in a public blog. And both kids wanted to leave, and told us so regularly, just as the article describes. We should have said, "Fine, off you go.", and put the wheels in motion. But I don't think there were any viable options at that time. We could have put them back into the system, but DCFS wouldn't have known what to do with them. Organizations like Mending Hearts just didn't exist, or they were not well known. Today, it is possible to move your troubled children to a second home, instead of kicking them to the curb and locking the door in blind terror, or putting them on a plane back to Russia, as was done in a case that made the national news. There are alternatives.
To be Fair, John isn't violent any more. He has come a long, long, long way in the past couple years. He annoys us from time to time, but we don't fear for our safety. It didn't have to turn out this way though. He could have stayed the course, or things could have gotten much worse. We got lucky. Not so for others.
According to the New York Times, at least half of our prisoners are mentally ill. They weren't all neglected as children of course, but for those who were, can't we do better? I think of the two families we talked to, with two kids in jail and two more headed in that direction. The cost to society is enormous, and I don't even know how to describe the heartache for the families involved. We've seen our son carried away in handcuffs; we know, but I can't begin to describe it. If there is a better approach, we owe it to ourselves and our children to implement it as soon as possible.
Returning to the graduation party, it occurs to me that there are those who understand, and those who don't have a clue, with a vast gulf between the two. This tired, 73 year old woman understands; we give her a big hug as we head home. The others at the table, listening in on our conversation, just can't imagine what life is like with these kids. You love them as you would any child, but some days you wish they would disappear, never to be seen again. Even a peaceful meal at the dinner table, or at a restaurant, can explode into violence at a moment's notice. You can never let your guard down, and your entire life is spent walking on egg shells. Nobody should live like that. The "normal" parents, sitting nearby, are worried about a C on their son's report card, or their daughter coming home 20 minutes late from a friend's house. That's it! I almost have to laugh. When they start to get a glimpse of my world, they are appalled. "My God, why don't you get rid of those kids and get your life back?" Oddly enough, for the first time in 10 years, I am starting to think there is a grain of truth behind their ill-informed advice. Once we had diagnosed John's carbohydrate induced microbial imbalance, (with a blood test to prove we weren't just waving magnets around), and once we understood Mary's reactions to red#40 and MSG and cats and lavender, we could have passed all this information on to the second home, where the kids could have started fresh. The author of the Time article spoke to a second Mom, who acknowledged, referring to the first family, "Maybe I'm just reaping the benefits of all their hard work."
Hard work is right. I can tell you from personal experience, it's exhausting! What parent can do this for more than five years and not become damaged themselves?
Rarely do we actually see a true revolution. And yet I think, I hope, a revolution is brewing in the adoption industry. Perhaps, ten years from now, the two-home approach will become the accepted standard of care for abused children who remain stubbornly antisocial in their first placement. When all else fails, the parents, and the children, just need to move on.