Child Collectors Extraordinaire

[Ukfundielover]

This lady started off writing quite lucidly and with intelligence.. And then she mentioned putting soap in the mouth of her newly adopted, developmentally delayed 10 yr old, on the flight home...

lisagarcia.net/adoptionblog?feature=1267636&postid=4420778

Really? Is that a thing now? I can't even imagine. Having read on I'm not sure special needs adoption is for her.

Child collector a-go-go...

[OkToBeTakei]

He wouldn’t stop, so I calmly took him into the bathroom (he was happy to go because that was his favorite place to be) and I put soap in his mouth. He was a little shocked and didn’t know what to do at first but then he started laughing again, so I put more soap in his mouth and this time he got really upset. He crumpled to the floor and started crying and crying (for the first time all week) and I left him there until he was ready to come out.

This woman is an animal.

[France Nolan]

The yelling and door slamming was getting old. I made a comment that I wished I still had "the bunny". (The bunny was an animated toy that he HATED and the kids use to put it in their rooms to keep him out.) I then remembered that the "lion" in the sensory room that sung and moved was another thing that I made the kids not get near him for the same reason. I went and dug it out. The next time he opened the door and screamed, I hit the button just in front of him. He immediately screamed and went and hid his head under the covers. He didn't make another sound!

I can't get over that post. The way she derives pleasure from abusing this child is sickening.

[Emme]

Yeah I was fucking PISSED when i read that. She adopted through Reece's Rainbow. I'm disgusted that she would take a traumatized kiddo and leave him upset with soap in his mouth. WTF.

[NurseNell]

I read today that Ghana has closed all adoptions for a year so the system can be cleaned up of abuses.

[chaotic life]

Ghana has been nearly closed for awhile. Meanwhile, DNC is moving and I've heard adoptions are coming back out of Sierra Leone again, despite the history there.

That woman with the Bulgarian children only sounded sane if you DON'T count that she slapped Benjamin in the face while still in the apartment in Bulgaria. You also have to pretend you don't know that "discipline" in these circles is merely a euphemism for spanking. Her behavior with a child she is still a STRANGER do is simply monstrous, as are her expectations that they be "normal" immediately after she rescued them from a Bulgarian orphanage.

[ILoveJellybeans]

Aww thats horrible :( Poor child :(

[gardenvarietycitizen]

Okay, I had to read that post for myself just be sure, because I thought for certain I was reading things wrong in the excerpt here on FJ, but I wasn't.

She put the soap in the kid's mouth and left him in the bathroom -- ON THE PLANE????? Oh yes, she DID.

How on earth does that even cross anyone's mind as being remotely okay? The soap itself is bad enough (and certainly the main problem), but right there on the damn plane?? I guess no crew noticed, or what??

ETA: Also their problem with the kids throwing soiled TP in the trash rather than the toilet sounds like they just come from a country with bad plumbing. Throwing out TP that way is normal in plenty of places...

[NotALoserLikeYou]

As if what she did wasn't scary enough, it indicates that they have no knowledge about properly dealing with special needs kids, or adopted kids. And yet they are adopting special needs kids. There are doctors who spend YEARS figuring this sort of thing out. And she thinks she can just train them with pain.

[NurseNell]

ETA: Also their problem with the kids throwing soiled TP in the trash rather than the toilet sounds like they just come from a country with bad plumbing. Throwing out TP that way is normal in plenty of places...

In Colombia you don't flush the paper. That's true in a good part of the world.

[Fundylicious]

My kids grew up in Asia and still throw tp in the trash- I do too, from reflex, sometimes.

That poor little kid. :cry:

[already hungover]

Okay, I had to read that post for myself just be sure, because I thought for certain I was reading things wrong in the excerpt here on FJ, but I wasn't.

She put the soap in the kid's mouth and left him in the bathroom -- ON THE PLANE????? Oh yes, she DID.

I'm sure all the other passengers were THRILLED. I know I would have been.

[August]

Okay, I had to read that post for myself just be sure, because I thought for certain I was reading things wrong in the excerpt here on FJ, but I wasn't.

She put the soap in the kid's mouth and left him in the bathroom -- ON THE PLANE????? Oh yes, she DID.

How on earth does that even cross anyone's mind as being remotely okay? The soap itself is bad enough (and certainly the main problem), but right there on the damn plane?? I guess no crew noticed, or what??

ETA: Also their problem with the kids throwing soiled TP in the trash rather than the toilet sounds like they just come from a country with bad plumbing. Throwing out TP that way is normal in plenty of places...

Yeah, we've found that after having Chinese visitors. I've also seen instructions on the backs of toilet doors for all sorts of variations of usage. Taking a crap: not as universal as you'd think.

[jude noelle]

This lady started off writing quite lucidly and with intelligence.. And then she mentioned putting soap in the mouth of her newly adopted, developmentally delayed 10 yr old, on the flight home...

lisagarcia.net/adoptionblog?feature=1267636&postid=4420778

Really? Is that a thing now? I can't even imagine. Having read on I'm not sure special needs adoption is for her.

Child collector a-go-go...

Hi everyone -- long time lurker, first time poster. I was actually coming here to see if anyone else had seen this woman's blog. I read it three times because I could not believe what she was saying. She came across as callous even before the soap incident with comments about how, upon meeting the 13 year old visually impaired boy for the first time, that he seemed so "needy"and how it was a "off-putting." :shock: Her condescension toward their language and country was also noted, adding that if people didn't like her refusal to speak anything but English to the boys, they could adopt their own kids and speak whatever language they like.

Her coldness scares me -- those poor boys.

[nomi]

I very rarely post here, but I came across this facebook page last night in my insomniac online ramblings. It's basically an online black market for readopting children. It's shady, sketchy, and disgusting reading the ads and then the comments.

https://www.facebook.com/secondchanceadoptions

[chaotic life]

Actually, as icky as it feels and looks, Second Chances is not shady or illegal. Second chances is run by a legitimate adoption agency who charges fees, requires homestudies and requires children to be placed in safe and appropriate environments the same as children coming into their first adoptions. Second Chances is run by Wasatch International Adoption Agency, a legitimate adoption AGENCY and not a facilitator. Photo listings are legal in the US and used by every state to search for families for their foster children.

I get the gut reaction to the FB page. However, this really is one of the BEST options for families that really and truly cannot continue to parent a child via adoption.

The reality is that not all adoptions DO work. Children who have been traumatized and hurt don't easily trust and families who don't know how to help those children get in WAY over their heads and it becomes a mess for everyone. It is heartbreaking, but there are times and occasions that staying in the home environment is not a viable option.

I have a co-worker who worked as a CPS worker for YEARS. The one child he adopted from the system perpetrated on two biological children in the home and has spent the last three years in an RTC for sex offenders. He and his wife go back and forth constantly on whether to dissolve the adoption because of the heavy burden of child support the state requires them to pay for this child. Their family had four children, only one adopted. He was a well experienced, highly decorated CPS worker who foster parented for YEARS before they adopted one foster child. They knew he had been sexually assaulted as a child and was at risk. However, when the wife got cancer, they had to rely upon family to help out, who ignored their rules and boundaries to keep everyone safe and he perpetrated on the daughters. The state took over by charging him and sentencing him to the RTC, which he has been completely unable to earn his way out of because he continues to refuse to correct the underlying behaviors.

It DOES happen even in experienced and good families that a child who has been hurt cannot function in a home, sometimes any home.

I would rather see a family use a legitimate, experienced adoption agency that requires all the steps and carefully screens and vets potential families than some of the other horrifying ways I have seen children gotten rid of.

I have seen children put in questionable group homes. Like the other adoption thread going, I've seen far too many children placed in these "ministry" group homes where no actual support is provided but a Hepzzibah House style of care is provided. My own DH was placed in one of those religious group homes--his only crime was truancy and his biological mother threw him away for it. Those homes are not fit for ANIMALS. They have NO oversight except by their religious groups, and some of those groups are far too lax in oversight. They offer no therapy, no real healing. They are shelters for kiddie jail and orphanages.

I have seen children dumped off at hospitals with information to have them locked away in mental hospitals indefinitely. I've sadly seen quite a few of these cases, and almost always the information those parents use to have the children admitted are embellished or flat-out made up. There are ways these children can be lost in limbo in acute psychiatric facilities, and ways that unscrupulous families with good lawyers can ensure they don't get nailed for the bill as well.

I have seen children unceremoniously dumped into fostercare with no warning and sometimes with no real action to warrant throwing the child out except the family is simply tired of dealing with them. This option as least does provide some oversight and standard of care for the child, but older children labeled as trouble will rarely find a happy, stable ending on the other side of this choice.

I have seen children transported across state lines into "respite" homes. These respite homes are NOT within the state system, not within regulation by anyone. We offered respite to a child who was being thrown away and we are a SAFE environment. The family who left their child with us never even asked to see our last homestudy. I vetted their situation more than they vetted us. I have seen children sent to collection farms, people who take private respite but require child support and surrendering any monies for the child and continue to blackmail parents to keep the children there. Some of these farms are HORRIFIC. I personally got the state, a lawyer, and the courts involved in the child that was dumped at my doorstep. Most of these families hold the threat of the authorities over the heads to treat children like commodities, because them they ARE paychecks. The state did a safety investigation of my home to ensure it was a safe place, and I welcomed them. The sending state opened a case against the family for their choices, and that act alone provided protection for my child from the people who dumped him until the courts took control and gave us guardianship of the child permanently. I cannot express enough the dangers of the underground movement of these children into ad hoc respite homes across state lines, but several of these homes have been unearthed and published in the press. The problem is that those who have been brought into the light of day are a mere fraction of what happens with these children.

So, given these options, I would MUCH rather see a private adoption working with families to keep the child safe and well cared for while searching to find an appropriate new home for the child. WIAA does this. WACAP does this. Holt does this, though they don't have an entire division devoted to it and typically only do it for children who were originally placed with Holt. There is a NEED for adoption agencies that work in this division of adoption, to provide support to families, safe foster placements when children cannot remain in the home and appropriate, well vetted new placements for the children to find safety and permanency.

I would love to say rehoming children never happens. But, that is the talk of naivety that is only possible when you don't know about the ugly side of what happens when children cannot and do not remain in their first adoptive homes. Given the other options I have personally known and seen, I would much rather see the work of WIAA, even though it feels distasteful to see it on FB, than those other options.

Hell, I ended up doing respite with a child who was dumped at my doorstep because I attempted to tell the first family what options WERE legal, legitimate and safe and they were staunchly opposed to going through legitimate and legal avenues. They had already thrown the child out and were dead set they were going to get rid of him one way or another. Of course, I learned after the fact that they were also insulted that I tell them to use legitimate and legal avenues when they had done it underground twice before. How dare I suggest that what they had already done twice was not okay to do yet again!

[chaotic life]

FTR, I'm not saying something like Second Chances is a good system, most definitely not a perfect system, but it IS better than most of the alternatives that exist and that ARE used to re-home children when a family decides they are done with them.

[dianapavelovna]

I totally agree, chaotic life. WIAA's Second Chance is the right way to go about disruptions (and disruption can be best at times). But they list way too much detailed information about each kid's symptoms and behaviors publicly on the internet. When I write profiles for our adoption photolisting for kids I work with, I have to be very careful about what I write - the goal is to be honest but not write anything that could be embarrassing to the child - it is public with their photo after all. If a family is interested and inquires, then they get more detailed information about the child's behaviors and background. I HATE how WIAA lists so much information so publicly. (And many of the first adopters are really snarkworthy based on the profiles).

[chaotic life]

The best I can tell you is that the names are pseudonyms. However, I agree, the level of detail they post does make me cringe. I also cringe at how often the first adoptive families have failed to get ANY help for the kids, much less qualified help.

Some parents there do try hard first not all though.

The best I can figure is that WIAA and the families are trying to be honest and not conceal the problems the kids are having. However, a lot of what they list really does need to be given privately if a family expresses interest in the child. I think WIAA's program is better than the alternatives, not perfect. I wish there were no need for such types of adoptions AT ALL. I think it is heartbreaking that a child who has suffered so much and lost everything is given a promise that it is all over and about 25% of the time those words are just flat-out lies which just cause more pain and suffering and loss for the child to face and try to overcome.

[Marianne]

Chaotic Life, I just want to say "thank you" for your posts. As a child of the foster homes and foster families, I read this thread with great interest and emotion. All your post say what I think about adoption and children of orphanages and that many manager of foster homes or foster families should think. Thank you very much.

[greek_chorus]

I've been so absorbed with reading all about "Ruth" that I've been neglecting my favorite topic of all, Child Collectors.

I'm finally caught up with There's No Place Like Home and I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with Jean. On the one hand, I'm glad she takes the medical issues of her children seriously and doesn't just leave it up to god to make everything okay, and that she'll even send them to school if necessary. I'm a little disturbed by the number and frequency of their adoptions, but she and her husband do seem to have some financial means, though there are still only two of them raising 11 soon to be 13 children.

Lately I've been a bit bothered by the tone of her posts about the oldest new addition to the family. I don't doubt she loves M very much, and I'm sure she doesn't read her posts the same way I do. It just seems grossly unfair to all the children though, for their mother to be writing posts about their character flaws even if it is couched between happy photos and lots of love. I'm left feeling a little squicky about the whole thing. It's not like I think she should sugar coat everything and make it seem like foreign adoptions of children with special, medical needs is an easy-peasy-walk-in-the-park. I guess I would feel better about it if she didn't use their real names and the blog was a bit more anonymous.

I still can't believe they're going to adopt two more little boys in November. It just seems so unfair to everyone else, the new children as well as the one's who've been home for a few years. I wonder too if the older, bio kids really view the younger adopted kids as siblings or something other, not necessarily less than, but not quite the same as siblings.

[guidedbybobafett]

I just read the discussion of restraints in this thread, and I feel like I have to comment.

I was restrained on one of those boards in a medical setting when I was a young child, and I still remember the immense terror that I felt in that situation. My mother was there and trying to calm down, telling me it would be ok, that I was safe, and yet I was still inconsolable. I have incredibly intense claustrophobia, and cannot have my arms restrained in any way, ever. I would not chalk it up to that one instance, because nobody can know the origin of these kinds of things, but it has stayed with me throughout me my life. I cannot imagine how horrifying it would have been if my mother had, instead of trying to comfort me, been the one restraining me. Disgusting. The idea is making me cry.

[OkToBeTakei]

Was just checking out theresnoplacelikehome-family.blogspot.co.uk/

Jean with the 11 Chinese adopted children and 'bringing home' two more in November :shock:

ANYWAY she had a visitor. ourjourneyoffaith.net/

Now, is that not the woman who papped her daughter off to some institution?

[ILoveJellybeans]

She will have 13 kids under 13. That is too much, she doesnt even have any Jslaves to help out. How can she possibly look after that many, especially when she adopts them in groups. Adopted children need more time to settle in before you go and get more, especially from other countries, where they need to adapt to a whole new language and culture.

[Palimpsest]

Was just checking out theresnoplacelikehome-family.blogspot.co.uk/

Jean with the 11 Chinese adopted children and 'bringing home' two more in November :shock:

ANYWAY she had a visitor. ourjourneyoffaith.net/

Now, is that not the woman who papped her daughter off to some institution?

ourjourneyoffaith is the woman who adopted 3 (2 girls and 1 boy) children from Ghana. One girl is still with the family, one girl is in residential care, and the adoption of the little boy was disrupted. He was adopted by another family. The second girl and the boy definitely had serious RAD, and they are probably much better off away from this particular home.

Ourjourneyoffaith sees supporting people through adoption disruptions as her "ministry." I find her extremely annoying and whiny. The world is always against her. From memory: her husband cheated but she forgave him, they were in a car accident, she survived thyroid cancer and infertility to have more children she could cope with, then they adopted even more and there were awful problems, CPS investigated her (unsubstantiated), she lost her job (political reasons), they lost their farm (because people lied to them) . . . Everything is a CRISIS and life is very hard for her but she battles through with the help of the LORD. She makes me nauseous.