Child Collectors Extraordinaire

[dianapavelovna]

And here's Adeye Salem trying to guilt people into adopting... again.

http://www.nogreaterjoymom.com/2014/01/ ... -busy.html

Why oh why does she feel that people who are already scrambling to get things done have the resources to bring another child home?

Ugh, this shit pisses me off so much. Very few families are truly prepared to withstand the mental, emotional, physical, and financial strains of adopting a child like Hasya or Susanna's Katie and Tommy. The kids in that post from Adeye look like they're probably average kids, but any kind of coercion in adoption - especially religious - is completely unethical to me. This is why we see stories of fundies adopting and then seriously harming or killing their adopted kids. They're not prepared and may not even truly want to adopt, but they believe they can and should do it because JESUS.

[Cheetah]

I really wish Adeye would post more about her kids and not some religious ramblings about adoption. I'm really interested in how Hasya is progressing,

I agree... this blog has gotten extremely vague on details of her family (what I find interesting about mom blogging)... her right of course, to keep her family more private, but if it keeps up much longer I'm going to cut her off my blogroll as 'rah rah adopt 14 year old foreign kids before they age out of the system because Jesus' is getting boring.

[chaotic life]

Ironically, I struggle with the question of whether to adopt again or not (not now, my hands are too full right now but in a few years when these kids start leaving the nest). The more I read these child collectors, the more convinced I am that I do NOT want to overstretch myself and risk not giving everything *these* kids need to them.

I'm at 8 living children, nine total. We've done four adoptions over the last ten years. Yes, it's crazy here and yes there's quite a few special needs but the only one on par with most of these collectors is the one who died of Cystic Fibrosis, and they all came one at a time so I could integrate and bond with them one by one.

Part of me knows that as these kids leave, I could handle one (maybe 2 if they were siblings) more. The rest of me looks at these families and sees how they get so caught up in the do-gooder nonsense that they lose sight of being able to truly and fully be the parent the kids they collected deserved. I'm sorry, but I DO judge. Adding them one by one and trying to give them a full life is a full-time job for me (and trying to work, finish my education and not take away from them is a constant delicate balance). I won't bring children into my home that I cannot give them 100% of my ability to mother, nor will I take that away from the kids who are here.

The more I read, the more people like Adeye try to push for someone like myself to ignore logic, finances and sanity, the more I dig my feet in and think, 'nay, this family is good the way it is now,' and walk away from this stuff.

The one thing I have always been conscious of is to NOT let myself get sucked into the collector mentality. That's the worst thing I could do for my kids!

[lilwriter85]

Ironically, I struggle with the question of whether to adopt again or not (not now, my hands are too full right now but in a few years when these kids start leaving the nest). The more I read these child collectors, the more convinced I am that I do NOT want to overstretch myself and risk not giving everything *these* kids need to them.

I'm at 8 living children, nine total. We've done four adoptions over the last ten years. Yes, it's crazy here and yes there's quite a few special needs but the only one on par with most of these collectors is the one who died of Cystic Fibrosis, and they all came one at a time so I could integrate and bond with them one by one.

Part of me knows that as these kids leave, I could handle one (maybe 2 if they were siblings) more. The rest of me looks at these families and sees how they get so caught up in the do-gooder nonsense that they lose sight of being able to truly and fully be the parent the kids they collected deserved. I'm sorry, but I DO judge. Adding them one by one and trying to give them a full life is a full-time job for me (and trying to work, finish my education and not take away from them is a constant delicate balance). I won't bring children into my home that I cannot give them 100% of my ability to mother, nor will I take that away from the kids who are here.

The more I read, the more people like Adeye try to push for someone like myself to ignore logic, finances and sanity, the more I dig my feet in and think, 'nay, this family is good the way it is now,' and walk away from this stuff.

The one thing I have always been conscious of is to NOT let myself get sucked into the collector mentality. That's the worst thing I could do for my kids!

Well said CL and I really admire you and I also question and judge these families. I like Jean, but something seems off.

[JesusFightClub]

From Adeye's comments:

We have been fighting for six years now - SIX YEARS - to free our little girl from an orphanage in central Asia. We can barely feed and clothe our children at home because of the financial toll this has taken. We can barely pay our bills, but we manage nonetheless and we have so much joy and love in our little home!

Right. So you're struggling to pay your own bills, you are struggling to feed your own kids and you are one paycheque from disaster. That sounds like you'll really be able to manage a child from another country who will undoubtedly cost you much more and be fairly distressed when you get her.

This is where this utter fucking insanity leads you.

[ILoveJellybeans]

That's horrible :( Does she not realise that if you cant feed the ones you have, another would make it even worse. Its not like the expenses stop once they are here-this little girl will likely need expensive medical care, as pretty much all adopted kids at least have developmental delays and traumatic pasts, which will likely mean she will need the help of a few professionals, like speech therapists, physical therapists...and seeing as Adeye pushes adoption of children with special needs, at most she could be taking home a seriously ill child who is 12 and newborn sized and will need all sorts of therapies, surgery, dental care, feeding through a tube, which could mean millions of dollars of medical costs in total.

[Joan of Snarc]

We have been fighting for six years now - SIX YEARS - to free our little girl from an orphanage in central Asia.

So it sounds like the country and the people/organizations involved are just siphoning money from Americans and have no intention of letting the adoption actually happen (the gravy train would come to an end then.) You DO have a responsibility to the children you already have; if you can barely feed them perhaps it's time to cut your losses rather than continue to feed corruption. With a suffering orphan in the middle of all that, it's really a sad situation.

[Emme]

I think the worst case that I have read in the GOMI thread is this : http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.fr/2012/12/overwhelm.html .

No. Just no. I feel sick for her poor daughter. Molested, refused birth control, pregnant at 14 and forced to keep the baby and gived to her parents. Oh, and in the same time, her brother have (what seems to be) schizophrenia and killed himself. No. Just no.

FWIW, I think the molestation is not tied to the pregnancy. My understanding is that it was a past incident? Still terrible though.

[chaotic life]

I did not read all the way back in the blog with the pregnant teen, far too trigger for my own past abuse to keep reading. However, the mother makes it clear they do not know WHO the father of the baby is, and they don't intend to find out because she's afraid anyone who passes a paternity test might seek paternal rights over the baby.

There were claims by the teen girl that one or more of her brothers molested her. I did read back to where the CPS involved occurred though. My opinion (and yes it's colored by my own past, my own experiences as an adoptive mother of kids with mental health struggles, and my own viewpoint as a healthcare professional) is that the reports to CPS were 100% justified and appropriate. Everything I see in her writing is that a large part of why they are trying to get the full help they are now, and not denying who the mother of that infant is now is BECAUSE of CPS involvement in the situation.

As for not being able to pay for your family and still fighting for an adoption, it's a BIG DEAL. We did that with one adoption and swore it would never happen again, and we didn't walk into it understanding or seeing that would happen. Our second adoption was of a medical needs child. We used my modest inheritance to cover the adoption expenses and we were financially stable in our lives. We certainly weren't rich but we weren't living paycheck to paycheck. Then, we brought him home and he was not stable and frankly was in a medical crisis. We were traveling an hour each direction for doctor's appointments multiple times per week. I had to pay for gas for a 12 passenger van, transport five children and cover feeding them along the way. Suddenly, we went from financially stable to struggling to put food on the table and living paycheck to paycheck. It was scary. We had to borrow grocery money several times from family members.

I had NO idea what it was going to cost us. We had health insurance to cover the medical bills for the most part. We had more than sufficient funds for our daily needs as a family, even adding another child. I did not understand the financial and emotional toll a child with that significant medical needs and in a medical crisis would take on the entire family. I swore I would NEVER adopt in circumstances that would risk that level of insecurity to the family again.

That is actually why we did a foster-adoption on the next adoption, because we wanted to use the fostercare system to cover the adoption costs themselves so our funds could the medical and financial needs of the family. Having done it before, we integrated an even higher needs child into the family well that time, but a LOT of that had to do with the support that comes through adopting through the foster-care system that is not available to international adoptions.

If you cannot meet your bills and feed your kids while attempting to bring home a child of this caliber, then you will not accomplish those once the child gets to the US. There ARE financial incentives, even with international adoptions, that you can tap into. You can get SSDI on a child, and depending on the state you can get it as quickly as it can be applied for and started. Legally, when you sign the visa paperwork, you agree to not seek government services on the child for two years after homecoming, but since they legally become a US citizen at homecoming, you aren't bound legally by that agreement (though I would argue you are bound morally). However, what SSDI offers is highly dependent upon the state you reside in AND it won't kick in for at least several months, potentially even longer. Sure, Adeye was likely getting more than $2K/month for her medically complex kids in CO between SSDI payments and getting CNA certification for herself and her DH to pay themselves for the nursing care hours CO provides, but CO is an outlier and most states pay less, some FAR less.

PLUS, you should never adopt these kids for an income boost, even if it's the unspoken knowledge that you can generate income. That income is SUPPOSED to meet the needs of the child being adopted, not financially support the family for adopting. There's a reason that foster adoptions require you prove you can meet all of your own living expenses without the funds that come from foster-adoption. International adoption pretends like there is no way you can end up with income on these kids and never asks that families prove it. Immigration requires you have an income 125% above the poverty level for your family size BUT they also someone else to co-sponsor a child if you don't have the income to accomplish that level. If someone cannot make their bills and seeks to adopt in the midst of that, then there is something VERY wrong with whomever is approving your bid to adopt in the first place.

[JesusFightClub]

If you cannot meet your bills and feed your kids while attempting to bring home a child of this caliber, then you will not accomplish those once the child gets to the US.

Chaotic life, I agree with you 100 percent. This was basically what I was trying to say, and I certainly would not mean to insult a mum like you. However I felt WTF?

"I can't feed my own children but I would like to bring home a severely damaged child BECAUSE I AM AMERICAN AND WE ARE TRUE CHRISTIANS HERE" is what these people come across as. I can't defend them. You are obviously an excellent foster and adoptive mum, but people who adopt children from war zones with PTSD and expect the fact that they are in AMERICA to fix everything disgust me.

I have PTSD myself and there are kids in my family who are suffering right now. That's without any of us being through a civil war. Also, we have the NHS and you do not. I can't imagine what a terrified African child being transplanted to America from an area where they may have seen a few horrible things feels.

[crad08]

Jean from There's No Place Like Home is adopting again. 3 girls in February last year. 2 boys in December of last year. Just one girl this time....

[OkToBeTakei]

Jean from There's No Place Like Home is adopting again. 3 girls in February last year. 2 boys in December of last year. Just one girl this time....

That makes 14! Wow.

[Marianne]

It's really too much.

But I wonder where they find the monney. The children seems to be in good health, they are going in vacation, weddings, etc... It costs a lot, and she doesn't ask for monney on the blog...

[Joan of Snarc]

Adeye says that Hasya's femur snapped. She doesn't have enough bone to insert a plate to strengthen it. Poor little thing.

Last Sunday Anthony preached in our beloved church. Completely unplanned and led by the Holy Spirit, he walked over to our Hasya who was at the back of the church. Daddy gently picked up his beautiful daughter in his arms and carried her to the front of the church.

"Do you see this child? Some day Hasya will be free of all pain and all suffering. Some day she will be standing in front of me in heaven and she will use her voice for the first time. And she'll be smiling. She may say thank you for giving me a life. And I'll say to her, 'No, sweetheart, turn and look next to you. HE is who you should thank. It's all for HIM. He just asked us to do it. You see, this life matters. It matters in heaven. And it matters here on earth. Her life matters for all eternity."

I like he knows what conversations will happen in heaven. Oh, and none of us matter for all eternity.

:roll:

[Cheetah]

Saw this while moonlighting on GOMI:

http://www.nogreaterjoymom.com/2014/08/ ... nd-us.html

Adeye is in the process of 'adopting' 4 frozen embryos. Which isn't snarkable on its own, except for the pompously religious language involved. Well, and 4 of them. On top of the multiple special-needs kids she's got already.

[lilwriter85]

I have been getting caught up on Jean from There's No Place Like Home. The two boys that they were recently adopted were baptized into the Catholic Church and two of Jean's older sons served as godfather. I thought it was interesting that the family wasn't really dressed up for the occasion. The girls did wear dresses, Jean and her husband seemed to be dressed well. But the sons who were the godfathers were dressed in shorts and polo shirts.

[KateFowler]

FWIW, I think the molestation is not tied to the pregnancy. My understanding is that it was a past incident? Still terrible though.

Annie Kitching's aka Nellie McFall is horrible. She and her hubby are thankfully on the "child abusers list of MI" indefinitely because once you get X number of hotlinings, it is automatic.

Annie was super-mad when a zillion mandated reporters hotlined her family -- despite knowing they were legally obligated to do so. Her adopted daughter, the one who got pregnant at 14 after Annie refused to let her get birth control, had accused Annie's husband, one of her biosons AND her adopted brothers (bio-half-brothers, also adopted from russia) AND Maxim (a foster kid who was removed from Annie's home for cause) of sexually abusing her!

Annie also let Maxim move back into her home the day he turned 18 -- and aged out of US foster care. Because what her clearly desperately in need of calm and stability adopted girl A needed in her life was a kid who might have sexually abused her living on her home? Who does that?!?

Annie also refused to take Ilya (the adopted son who committed suicide at 17) to a psychiatrist for the longest longest time -- but thoughtfully scheduled an exorcism for him (?!). She knew Ilya (and his half-sis A) came from a family with a long history of mental illness - she's blogged that's why the kids ended up in the Russian orphanage! -- yet didn't think him telling her he'd been hearing voices was worthy of being medically assessed!!

Last but SO not least, Annie's blogged about the horrors of the Russian adoption shutdown! Of how damaged HER ex-Russian orphans would be had she not "saved" them!!

(My thinking is that her Russian kids would probably have been better off staying in russia - as I can't imagine worse life outcomes than knocked up at 14 & dead at 17 !!).

[iheartchacos]

Did I read that right? Jean is already adopting again? As in, next in line after the two boys?

[Mama Mia]

Annie Kitching's aka Nellie McFall is horrible. She and her hubby are thankfully on the "child abusers list of MI" indefinitely because once you get X number of hotlinings, it is automatic.

Annie was super-mad when a zillion mandated reporters hotlined her family -- despite knowing they were legally obligated to do so. Her adopted daughter, the one who got pregnant at 14 after Annie refused to let her get birth control, had accused Annie's husband, one of her biosons AND her adopted brothers (bio-half-brothers, also adopted from russia) AND Maxim (a foster kid who was removed from Annie's home for cause) of sexually abusing her!

Annie also let Maxim move back into her home the day he turned 18 -- and aged out of US foster care. Because what her clearly desperately in need of calm and stability adopted girl A needed in her life was a kid who might have sexually abused her living on her home? Who does that?!?

Annie also refused to take Ilya (the adopted son who committed suicide at 17) to a psychiatrist for the longest longest time -- but thoughtfully scheduled an exorcism for him (?!). She knew Ilya (and his half-sis A) came from a family with a long history of mental illness - she's blogged that's why the kids ended up in the Russian orphanage! -- yet didn't think him telling her he'd been hearing voices was worthy of being medically assessed!!

Last but SO not least, Annie's blogged about the horrors of the Russian adoption shutdown! Of how damaged HER ex-Russian orphans would be had she not "saved" them!!

(My thinking is that her Russian kids would probably have been better off staying in russia - as I can't imagine worse life outcomes than knocked up at 14 & dead at 17 !!).

I agree that the way they have treated the teenage daughter is horrible. But for clarification, the former foster son who moved back in with the family seems to have moved back in before she made the accusations.

I don't know that her life would of been better in Russia, as her life there was also horrific. Her story of only having food ( butter and sugar on a slice of bread) made specifically for her once, at her Grandmothers, was heartbreaking.

While being pregnant at 14 is never a good thing , there are certainly worse outcomes. I just can't stand the way the mother just basically swept her out of the way as an inconvenience once she had the baby to dote on. Completely ignoring that it is her daughters child, not hers.

Eta: could you explain what you mean by a " child abusers list" regarding a certain number of hotline calls? I realize it varies by jurisdiction, but generally a higher number of calls will, of course, increase the likelihood of investigation and intervention. But there isn't some set number of calls that would make a family automatically assumed to be child abusers. That wouldn't make sense because you always have a few families who have a vindictive ex or neighborhood feud or crazy in-law who will call a million times. So you really can't judge guilt based on number of calls alone.

[KateFowler]

Annie landed herself on (then off, then back on again) the Michigan Child Abuse and Neglect Central due to a combination of:

- substantiated incidents within a year or so (foster son removed for cause, runaway/truant kids, pregnant 14 yo, suicide of 17 yo, etc)

- getting hotlined by multiple independent mandated reporters (hospital social worker who told 14 yo she didn't have to relinquish her baby, therapist to whom sexual abuse was disclosed, pedi who Annie flipped out on when not-yet-pregnant girl requested bc pill, etc)

http://www.michigan.gov/dhs/0,4562,7-12 ... --,00.html

http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.com/2013/0 ... e-two.html

http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.com/2012/1 ... r-met.html

[patsymae]

Annie landed herself on (then off, then back on again) the Michigan Child Abuse and Neglect Central due to a combination of:

- substantiated incidents within a year or so (foster son removed for cause, runaway/truant kids, pregnant 14 yo, suicide of 17 yo, etc)

- getting hotlined by multiple independent mandated reporters (hospital social worker who told 14 yo she didn't have to relinquish her baby, therapist to whom sexual abuse was disclosed, pedi who Annie flipped out on when not-yet-pregnant girl requested bc pill, etc)

http://www.michigan.gov/dhs/0,4562,7-12 ... --,00.html

http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.com/2013/0 ... e-two.html

http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.com/2012/1 ... r-met.html

Hitting some of your links and trying to think it through, but stopped at:

"Then, Elya killed himself, and since we were already "in the system", that event sent some ball sliding down some path, into a waiting cup, which then set off one heck of a nasty surprise - we'd hit the "magic number" and we were now placed on the "Central Registry" of people guilty of child abuse and neglect. At this point our SW was clearly both horrified and appalled that it had come to this. Apparently there is some mathematical formula which gets people on this list...."

Then Elya killed himself and...WTF?

[Mama Mia]

Annie landed herself on (then off, then back on again) the Michigan Child Abuse and Neglect Central due to a combination of:

- substantiated incidents within a year or so (foster son removed for cause, runaway/truant kids, pregnant 14 yo, suicide of 17 yo, etc)

- getting hotlined by multiple independent mandated reporters (hospital social worker who told 14 yo she didn't have to relinquish her baby, therapist to whom sexual abuse was disclosed, pedi who Annie flipped out on when not-yet-pregnant girl requested bc pill, etc)

http://www.michigan.gov/dhs/0,4562,7-12 ... --,00.html

http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.com/2013/0 ... e-two.html

http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.com/2012/1 ... r-met.html

Thanks for the clarification, that makes more sense. The Pediatrcian made a report just because a mom complained about birth control being discussed....are you sure? because that sure doesn't sound like a mandated report issue. Or is that just an assumption the mom made?

[KateFowler]

Then Elya killed himself and WTF?

Annie's adopted Russian son killed himself - after months of complaining about hearing/seeing demons. Aware severe mental illness ran in his biofamily, she elected to delight in his newfound interest in the bible rather than be concerned his hallucinations. For months and months.

Maybe the poor kid was so far gone that nothing would've helped. But I can't help but think that getting him TREATMENT sooner, from state-licensed healthcare providers might've made a difference:

"The Catholic Church does not teach that mental illness is caused by demons, but I'm not sure why not. Especially for Elya, there was a spiritual battle going on. I rather wish I'd thought earlier of having him receive the Sacrament of Anointing - even Exorcism. I'd stop at nothing to save him. From the very beginning, his response to his psychosis was to get a Bible, to carry it around and even to memorize verses from it. Why didn't I take him seriously?"

http://nelliemcfall.blogspot.com/2012/1 ... guess.html

[iheartchacos]

She is disgusting.

[KateFowler]

These kid kollectors have 14 kids - and yet have been approved to adopt TWO MORE. High-needs, special needs kids -- of course!

http://redemptionwhispers.blogspot.com/ ... -wish.html