Adoptive Parents Want To Return Son

I know a couple that adopted a teen. They were aware going in of many problems (she had been institutionalized for years) and they went very slowly through the process. The teen acted perfect for the first few months, then began manipulating and pitting the parents against each other, lying, stealing, threatening violence, tearing apart the house, etc. They held on for a few more months (all the while the child was in therapy, indeed had been in therapy for years), until finally even the therapist told them to send her back. It broke their hearts, but even with every type of help available the situation became unbearable. Just short of the finalization of the adoption, back she went.

The couple are wonderful people. They aren't quitters, and had raised biological children. I think they just didn't know their limits. When I heard the litany of problems this teen had I had an idea of the gravity of the situation. I just can't judge them for letting her go.

These damaged children need prayers. I don't know what the ultimate solution is and suspect that there may not be an answer to the plight of many of these kids.

Some friends of ours adopted a little boy who had severed RDD. These were wonderful, prayerful parents who quickly found themselves living in fear for themselves and for their other children. It was the saddest situation you can imagine when they had to have the adoption dissoved. The parents consulted therapist after therapist and were told over and over that this child needed a special home, could not be around other children, etc. They were devastated.

For those who think this is the same as having a biological child with special needs, keep in mind that for children born with special needs – the parents may have years of good times and special memories before mental illnesses make themselves known. For older, adopted children with RDD – it is almost immediate that the child begins pushing back against the parents who want only to love him/her. They don't have 10 years of bonding and Christmas' and birthdays to look back upon. After seeing what my friends went through, I will not question these parents who have nowhere else to turn. After enduring infertility to have their dreams of parenting shattered – I know this decision must be killing them. Please don't judge these parents. None of us can understand the hell they are going through.

I'm seriously trying not to go into "full rant" mode, here…

Look: I empathize with what the parents are suffering; it's horrible, no one would (or should) wish that on anyone, I assume the parents entered this in good faith, and it certainly sounds as if the state dropped the ball terribly. I also repeat what I said, earlier: it's not at all wrong to seek police or other institutional protection/intervention, if a child (whether biological or adopted) becomes dangerous to self or others.

That being said: I get a "seaweed-down-the-back" sort of revulsion-feeling when I hear people say, "They're really suffering; don't judge them!" With all due respect: that's the sort of creeping proportionalism which seeks to legitimize abortion for rape/incest victims (or for parents of a baby with Trisomy 13, etc.). No one's saying that the parents set out to be shallow or cruel. But I'm saying, as clearly as I know how, that abandoning your newly adopted child is wrong… and shutting off your head in order to follow your "heart" (which, in modern times, means "emotions/passions") is no answer to these tough issues. Saying "I can't bring myself to blame them, because I can't imagine what they've endured" (or, worse: "I suffered something just like that, and I say that we can't blame/judge them!") is an attempt to have your heart do an end-run around your head… which results in many of the horrific evils that we have today.

Think about this: haven't we heard from (perhaps otherwise-well-meaning) people the plaintive cry, "You've never been raped! How dare you judge her for choosing not to continue that pregnancy"? Haven't we heard the same with cases of in-utero children with supposed "gross fetal abnormalities"? "You haven't faced that, so don't judge!" How about in-vitro fertilization? "You don't know what it's like to be infertile! Don't judge, and don't throw your abstract theology at a heart in pain!" The problem is, "abstract theology" is the compass which points to True North, while our foolish hearts (Jeremiah 17:9) lead us in every other direction. I say this again, in all earnestness and with no sarcasm: have some sense! This "follow your heart" way leads to destruction, no matter what your sympathies (good-hearted though they are) might say. No, the parents aren't evil; but they're making a terrible mistake. Is that so difficult to accept?

Call me insensitive, if you like. (You'd be wrong.) Go ahead and try to dismiss my experience as "someone who just doesn't know/understand/etc." (B.S.) But the fact that our culture doesn't treat adoption with the sacredness that it treats natural birth is no reason to think that our culture is doing rightly. It means that our entire culture has missed the mark. These children are no more "returnable" than you are.

I'm a lawyer who deals with a variety of legal areas where this kind of situation comes up (family law, bankruptcy, etc.). I've had more than one family tell me stories like this. Sometimes the entire rest of the family sleeps inside a locked room out of fear of the out of control child. Eventually, the child has to be institutionalized. Unfortunately, there just are mental illnesses so severe that there is no other way to deal with them. Once the parents and CPS finally figure out that institutionalization is the only possible answer, the only question is who is going to pay for the institutionalization until the child turns 18. I know of one family that is paying double the statutory amount of child support until the child turns 18. They tried their best, and they aren't shirking their duty. And, technically, the child is still legally theirs. But there was no other way. I, too, was skeptical the first 10 times I heard stories like this. They are very, very rare as a percentage of all adoptions. But, like every other bad thing in life, they do happen. Once the child is institutionalized, it's kind of moot whether the legal papers are changed to remove the adoptive parents as legal guardians. The fact is that the child leaves their home, because there is just no other choice.

Anonymous @ December 25, 2009, 9:39 AM wrote:

I'm a lawyer who deals with a variety of legal areas where this kind of situation comes up (family law, bankruptcy, etc.). I've had more than one family tell me stories like this. Sometimes the entire rest of the family sleeps inside a locked room out of fear of the out of control child.

Yes… and it's horrific when that happens.

Eventually, the child has to be institutionalized. Unfortunately, there just are mental illnesses so severe that there is no other way to deal with them.

True enough. (You'll note that this fact was already mentioned, above.)

Once the parents and CPS finally figure out that institutionalization is the only possible answer, the only question is who is going to pay for the institutionalization until the child turns 18.

Here's where you go off the tracks, I'm afraid. "The only question" for whom? For secularists whose only concerns are the ramifications under a particular civil/legal system? I assure you, anyone who's concerned with the moral dimension of this issue would have far more concerns than that. The moral dimension (i.e. the "rightness" or "wrongness" of an action) was the point of the original post…

In fact, your own comment betrays the fact that you've restricted your consideration to "tactical" concerns (abstracting from moral concerns), when you limit your consideration to "the years until the child reaches age 18"; are you unaware of the fact that parenthood entails moral responsibilities that go far beyond the beginning year of legal adulthood?

I know of one family that is paying double the statutory amount of child support until the child turns 18.

Are you listening to yourself? You're describing the financial cost of the child's welfare as if you'd describe the cost of a traffic ticket! Aside from the fact that the "statutory amount" is an arbitrary limit set by civil government (and praise God that my parents didn't feel that they were entitled to withhold anything beyond that amount, for my brother and me!), and not diminishing the real financial burden you describe, surely you can see that a portrayal of a situation purely in those (financial) terms is rather a shallow way to view it? It betrays a "child = commodity" mentality which is the antithesis of human dignity!

They tried their best, and they aren't shirking their duty. And, technically, the child is still legally theirs. But there was no other way.

Perhaps. But you imply (in your wording) that their hands are washed of the affair when the child turns 18. Legally, perhaps; but legality has never been the measure of morality for any sane person.

I, too, was skeptical the first 10 times I heard stories like this. They are very, very rare as a percentage of all adoptions. But, like every other bad thing in life, they do happen.

Of course… but we're talking about the moral gradient of "washing one's hands of an adopted child"; it's quite possible to acknowledge every last scrap of pain and suffering, while still saying that the "hand-washing" decision is simply wrong.

Once the child is institutionalized, it's kind of moot whether the legal papers are changed to remove the adoptive parents as legal guardians. The fact is that the child leaves their home, because there is just no other choice.

See above. If you were concerned only with civil details, and if humans had no more dignity than did any rock, tree or feeder pig, then you'd be right; but "legal guardianship" is not the whole of–nor even the most important aspect of–the issue. That's why Christians regard adoption, marriage, and other "family-causing" actions as covenants, and not mere contracts (i.e. exchange of goods).

Susan,

That's a horrifying anecdote, beyond question. But if you're trying to use it (and your other comments) to convince me that the parents should be entitled to police/medical intervention which could safeguard their basic safety, then you're trying to convince someone who already agrees with you. See my earlier comment, above.

Any families who take such children ought to be provided with intensive family counseling from the beginning, therapy for the children, respite care, and whatever other help can be offered.

Absolutely true.

It ought to be recognized that some children are so damaged that they cannot be adopted.

That's possible… but I'd be leery of being too quick to make such a judgment call. Again, it'd be useful to ask yourself: "what would I do with the child of my body, if this were to befall them?" The answer should be the same.

I imagine that if this child is kept in an institution, the woman will maintain her legal tie to him and even visit him regularly.

You imagine (though I don't know how you can imagine it with certainty). You might even be right. If so, then most of my objections would dissolve.

But now they want to force her to take him home, and she is in fear for her own life, and she doesn't want to be responsible for the harm caused by his molestation of other children.

Think again: what would you do if the boy were your biological son? If police protection is needed, so be it (see above); but demonizing the child is a real danger for the indignant defenders of the parents, here.

She tried to do a good thing, and now she is in an impossible situation. Give the poor woman a break! Does she have to die to satisfy you?

Wow. Let me try that rhetorical device on you, Susan, and see how you like it:

"Susan, do all of the RAD children of the world have to be rounded up into concentration camps (and perhaps euthanized) to satisfy you?"

Let's avoid the hysterical-sounding accusations, shall we?

How many children should bear psychic scars from being sexually molested (one of my daughters was raped by a disturbed 12 year old when she was 9) by a mentally ill boy because the state wants to return him to a situation of inadequate supervision to save money?

Answer: none. I note, though, that you instantly assume that "the state" (by which you really mean the people who worked with the boy) are interested only in shameful financial advantage; and you assume that they can't possibly know what they're saying, when they judge the boy to be ready to leave institutional life. What conditions *would* satisfy you personally, Susan, that any given child with RAD, etc., could be ready to return to "mainstream life"? Or do you think they should all be improsoned indefinitely, by definition?

And anything but 24 hour a day in line of sight observation by an adult who has immediate back up from other adults is often inadequate in a case like this.

It can be. It can also be the case that thus-and-so child could benefit from the "non-institutional" life without spreading mayhem wherever he goes. You recited some horror stories of "RAD adoptions"; anyone with the research resources could match you, case for case (and probably far in excess of yours), with horror stories from natural-born children who turned on their parents, siblings, etc.

Let me say again: I fully agree that all necessary resources should be given this family to ensure (as much as possible) basic safety of everyone; but you go farther, I think, and imply that a complete "do-over" is not only allowable, but necessary. In that, I think you are quite mistaken.

I adopted an 11 y.o. boy from foster care. He came with his own baggage. Now that I'm his dad helping him with his baggage is my responsibility. When I signed the papers before the judge she told me that I know had all the responsibilities and privileges of parenthood. So do the Westcots. While they may have a case to demand additional support from the state for the care of their son, by going out and publicly attempting to return him because he isn't what they hoped he would be is just another form of child abuse. I would hope they never are permitted to adopt another child.