Transference, Questions, Poverty and Its Consequences

This cabbage, undamaged within the bug-chewed outer leaves, will be my lunch today and has nothing to do with this post, other than maybe symbolically representing the rest of this post.  As in it's what's on the inside that matters, right?

I found that even with all this frustrated spewing I do, lengthy posts, long diatribes, still I had ninety something unpublished drafts.  Posts I thought the better of publishing.  I don't even dare re-read them for fear of spiking my own blood pressure.  I'll just delete them unread.  I've been so scared, so scarred, so damaged by what's been endured here for so long.

You think I'm drumming up support for my plight, or looking for sympathy?  What good would that do me?  I'm venting.  I'm bolstered by y'all's commiseration as our lives are so similar in the adoption of older children  Go back and read the 4,000+ pages and understand I've not even begun to describe what's happened here.

A former caseworker, the one who'd supervised my adoption of a sibling group of five children, four of which violently bombed out of living their entire teenage years here with us, well he's working on his PhD, and sent me a list of interesting questions to which he needs input.

"I know you'll probably say no," he stated, which was certainly my initial response, as I'm so traumatized, but I read further and was intrigued with the tact he's taking, especially regarding the lack, no the dearth, of post-adoption resources where so many parents find themselves astonished to be facing such danger, destruction, and aggression.

I'm in, I do have something to say.

4. Emphasize funding for post-adoption services. No money is dedicated to postadoption services while significant funds are set aside for other programs, such as independent living for youth with a goal of APPLA. Children who have been adopted from foster care outnumber those in independent living programs by 10 to 1. Funding for post-adoption services should be increased so that it is at least equal to that dedicated to supporting independent living. As use of APPLA is reduced and independent living services are less urgently needed, Congress should reallocate the funds currently used for independent living to post-adoption services.

I'm not in any mood to encourage adoptions anymore.  I'm too shocked, stunned and flabbergasted from the trauma.

Yet I mourn for all the great kids in the foster care system that simply need a parent.

Until adoptive parents are treated like human beings, I won't encourage anyone anymore to walk into the line of fire.  I can't begin to describe how badly you'll be treated, not only be raging traumatized children, but also by the professionals who should be helping you survive.

This man, Tom, was extremely helpful to me back then, he was very interesting and full of knowledge.  It's not a stretch to refer to him as brilliant.  I've been incredibly blessed by the caseworkers who've helped me along the way in the adoption process both here and in Texas.  I've picked their brains dry in my attempts to learn all that there is to be learned.

Yet when I've sought outside help for family safety, or for children who severely and desperately need psychiatric help?  Oh my goodness.  I've often been treated like I was the problem.  If I parented differently then maybe they wouldn't be schizophrenic, ODD or bipolar?  Diagnoses that arrived here with them before they ever met me?  Hello?

"I had a razor and I was gonna cut 'em," my very beautiful 15 year old told me on the phone yesterday from her 10-13 psychiatric placement.

Always logical I dumbly responded, "Where in the world did you even get a razor?"

"The unlocked office," she stated flatly, "But I didn't jump out any window, the staff is just dramatic."

There was no point in me pointing out the fallacy of this logic.  Her reality is not anyone else's reality. I just sighed to myself and repeated for the millionth time, "You need to understand that this behavior can get you locked up," which isn't always the right thing to say, as Dr. Mandy has reminded me that all a kid hears is, "You're gonna get locked up," unable to differentiate, or to comprehend that assaults are illegal offenses that get one arrested.  They always feel deeply justified in hurting someone.  This lovely girl will verbalize that she hears voices telling her to do this or that.

Indeed the police had been called, she'd been put into maybe her fifth 10-13 psychiatric placement in two year's time.

This was not the post I'd come downstairs to write.  I had other thoughts banging around within my skull this morning such as Sarah's exasperation yesterday to learn that Tiger's Milk bars number one ingredient is high-fructose corn sugar, plus I'd just read this fascinating expose on organic fig newtons.  Unreal.

I'd listened to a podcast on transference, on my goodness,  As classically defined by Sigmund Freud it is a form of projection. The client redirects her feelings about some significant person in her past from that person onto the therapist. Thus for example if the client feels anger towards one of her parents the client pretends the therapist is that parent then starts getting angry at the therapist instead. This process occurs unconsciously and one of the goals of psychoanalysis is to articulate it in order to attempt to resolve the conflict between the client and the person towards whom the emotion initially was felt. 


Traumatized children's feelings toward birth parents are spewed out upon the hapless adoptive parent.  Duh, we are all text book cases.

I was also irked at a poverty report, it's what I've been saying pretty much in regard to women who repeatedly get knocked up by various men.  Ladies?  Birth control, if not some restraint?  Who sleeps with unemployed felons, with lounge lizards, and other males who won't legally commit to raising the children?  Who thinks that's OK?

I don't know what CPS can, or will, do with the flood of meth babies needing adoptive homes.  This once was an issue I'd be standing there willing to help by providing a loving, stable home, yet nowadays, 25 years later, I'm too bruised, battered and damaged by, I dunno, everything to help.

Instead, I think I'll post Tom's list of issues, if anyone is interested in corresponding with him, with helping, let me know.  He's hunting for input and it is my belief that policies must change.  The caseworkers, the ones on the front, are overwhelmed by the numbers of kids they are dealing with, here in Georgia some caseworkers are covering several counties.  How is that even physically possible?

From the poverty report: "Front-line services for families are everywhere under strain as austerity measures increase the numbers in need while depleting the services available," it says. "It's also clear that the worst is yet to come."


From Tom's PhD Program:

 I know this sounds odd. FYI, below are the main barriers identified by the working group:

- financial disincentives for creating interstate adoptions;
- lack of standardized information about families seeking to adopt and about children waiting to be adopted;
- insufficient post-adoption support compared to support for youth aging out; and
- absence of a robust model for creating adoptions, including effective recruitment of adoptive families; appropriate caseloads, training, and supervision for workers; and significant youth involvement.

...and these are the group's recommendations:

1. Reward both sending and receiving states for creating interstate adoptions. In the current system, the state that sends the child to be adopted in another state enjoys a financial gain while the state that receives the child experiences a financial loss. Congress should change incentives so that both states are rewarded when a child is adopted across state lines.

2. Establish national standards for home studies and for descriptions of waiting children. Nationwide use of a standard home study, such as the Structured Analysis Family Evaluation (SAFE), will raise the average quality of home studies. A nationwide standard is also essential for increasing interstate adoptions, since mistrust of data from other jurisdictions is a barrier to adoption. Similarly, national standards for describing and disclosing each waiting child’s experiences and needs are critical, both for the process of matching children and parents and for preparing parents to meet the child’s needs. Congress should instruct the Department of Health and Human Services to establish these standards.

3. Eliminate long-term foster care as a goal. Children with a goal of Another Planned Permanent Living Arrangement (APPLA) exit foster care into “living situations” but have no family. “No family” should never be the plan for a child. Congress should create incentives for states to replicate existing effective initiatives for reducing use of APPLA.

4. Emphasize funding for post-adoption services. No money is dedicated to postadoption services while significant funds are set aside for other programs, such as independent living for youth with a goal of APPLA. Children who have been adopted from foster care outnumber those in independent living programs by 10 to 1. Funding for post-adoption services should be increased so that it is at least equal to that dedicated to supporting independent living. As use of APPLA is reduced and independent living services are less urgently needed, Congress should reallocate the funds currently used for independent living to post-adoption services.

5. Encourage development of a robust, comprehensive practice model of adoptions from foster care. Congress should support the development and use of a model that enhances the primary emphasis on safety with a more nuanced strategy for permanence. An effective model will feature child-specific recruitment, clearly defined roles and responsibilities for workers and supervisors, and youth involvement in collaborative permanency planning. Such a model will facilitate training of
frontline social workers and supervisors and will make it possible to develop measures of accountability for outcomes.