Sparkling Lauren, a super special sparkling surrogacy and a "gayby"

[So Many Lies]

^ 'grifted gypsy', very funny.

Just find it interesting Fresh got them to speak to her more or less on the double.

[kunoichi66]

Sorry, Viola!

I suspect the cover story in Iceland is that she had a one night stand with him during a vacation and his husband has graciously agreed to have the child in his household. Ironically, because it's traditional, not gestational surrogacy, a DNA test would confirm it's her baby.

I found some more amusing/interesting reading

http://learninghappens.wordpress.com/20 ... -learning/

http://sandradodd.com/misconceptions

http://eligerzon.com/blog/2012/05/radic ... tive-post/

No, no, no. :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead:

I could spit acid right now - HOW CAN YOU EVEN THINK THAT?"!?!

[intheknow]

To answer a previous poster's question I have been in contact with DOCS multiple times prior to, and after, the death of Elijah. Prior to his death I reported the family perhaps five times, maybe more. I reported them to DOCS, Qld Police and NSW Police. At no time did any of those agencies take my concerns seriously. At no time did anyone contact me to confirm they had followed up on my reports. During the time of Aisha's lost night I faxed the local police as a last resort because I felt they may take my concerns more serious in writing. I sent pictures of the truck as my key concern at the time was the girls traveling with no car seats, in the back of a truck with very little ventilation. I was fearful they would be in an accident and be killed.

After the death of Elijah I wrote to the Qld Minister responsible for DOCS. I received a response which suggested I remain in contact with DOCS and report any further concerns. I have done so once since this time. Noone from DOCS has even contacted me again.

So yes, I have been in contact with authorities and, to my knowledge, nothing was done. I live every day with the niggling thought that if they had listened earlier then Elijah may not have died.

I have kept this a secret until now however it appears nothing will be done for those remaining girls unless the media gets involved. So media, if you are reading, here it is.

[So Many Lies]

My God. At least you tried.

[August]

DOCS couldn't find them. David's paranoid delusions drove him to buy that truck so they could hide in plain sight.

COMMUNITY Services Minister Pru Goward has called for a formal briefing about her department's failure to find a transient family of seven despite receiving repeated calls reporting concerns for the family's welfare.

The Department of Family and Community Services confirmed yesterday it had received three reports about the Fisher family between last November and January as they stayed at various locations across the Hunter.

Lauren Fisher gave birth to her youngest child and only son, Elijah Rainbow, on November 26 in a "freebirth" at a makeshift hippie commune in bushland near Singleton without any medical intervention.

Her husband and Elijah's father, David Fisher, has now been charged with the murder of Elijah after the pair fell into a river from a Queensland bridge on Saturday night.

The Newcastle Herald has learnt that the Fishers, including their four daughters and a heavily pregnant Lauren Fisher, started to call the Hunter home more than a month before Elijah's birth.

Continued Page 2

Transient family went undetected in Hunter

From Page 1

They remained in the Hunter until at least the end of January before continuing their transient life, where they slept in a truck and trailer, elsewhere.

The Herald understands that concerns were raised to several government agencies, including the Department of Family and Community Services, before Elijah's birth.

It included a report to the department on Christmas Day after one of the young girls had been missing overnight from a bush camp.

A spokeswoman confirmed yesterday the department had received three reports about the Fishers between November and January.

"Community Services' caseworkers made all feasible attempts to contact the family, but were unsuccessful due to their transient lifestyle," the spokeswoman said. "As part of our response to these reports, Community Services asked NSW Police to help locate the family.

"After January, Community Services received no further reports about the family before the baby's death."

Ms Goward said her department would release "any necessary documentation to Queensland police that may assist with their investigations" if it was requested.

"The death of any child, particularly one so young, is a tragedy," Ms Goward said.

"At my request, the Department of Family and Community Services is providing me with a formal briefing."

A Hunter New England Health spokesman said there was no record of concerns being tabled to the Child Wellbeing Unit before Elijah was born, despite the Herald being told it was contacted.

On the topic of calling, I guess you need to do what your conscience tells you to do, but bare feet and unbrushed hair is not sufficient reason to be taken, and her non-existent sense of danger is not that much worse than tens of thousands of other really dumb people. And you can't force someone to love their children. I guess DOCS at least made her get car seats, even though Lauren doesn't use them.

[So Many Lies]

I can't find anything about David ' s paranoia lead to bus buying. Is that on the blog somewhere?

[bumblebee]

The thing is that especially before Elijah, unless you knew the family personally or had otherwise had 1st hand contact, I can see that a lot of organisations wouldn’t take you seriously unless they posted actual abuse evidence online (rather than just neglect and laziness). And all she’d have to do to in response is say she exaggerates her sparkling adventures to increase eyeballs on her blog or enrage people who hate her for her legitimate alternative childcare lifestyle etc. I imagine a lot of these agencies are swamped with people who’ve witnessed or suspect 1st hand with families who are a lot easier to find and try to regulate than the Fishers. After Elijah and David and the fact that Lauren basically skipped out on everything, they might pay more attention but even then again they aren’t the easiest people to locate and aren’t even in Australia at this point

[Idolatry]

This whole mess made me think of this news story (guardian UK, news)

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/j ... dew-family

If Iceland won't let you name your kid Harriet, it's about as un-rainbow as you can get.

What exactly does she think will happen to a nine months pregnant woman who shows up in Iceland with a return flight in two months??? It was really stupid to blog this. It's a small country, it's an island, it clearly has a lot of stupid rules, and shit is about to get real.

[happy atheist]

Here is "Daniel's" post about fostering from the Globalgayby blog. It's not all awful:

July 16, 2013

by Daniel

0 comments

Things I wish I knew before fostering

Slightly off topic to surrogacy, but related to parenting. I am working up the nerve to post something a bit more personal in the future, about our experience fostering, but still processing how I will write it, and how much I will share. Till then, these are things I wish I had known before fostering.

family-two-dads

Nothing will prepare you for your foster kid crying for their biological parent

No amount of forethought yourself will prepare you for that first time (or second, but the first is the worst). We were reading to our foster kids one night, and the younger one was making distracting noises. We calmly explained that if he continued to make noises while we were reading, we would leave the room with his sibling, finish the reading with them, and then return for sleep time, meaning he would miss out on hearing that night’s story. He very defiantly continued to make the noises, so we explained that was his last chance, and tomorrow he would know not to make loud noises during story time. This set him off completely and he cried and cried, throwing every possible thing out he could think of, first promises and pleading, then threats and anger, and finally just sobs for mamma. Nothing you might know factually about the biological parent/s matters at this moment, logic will not help you calm the child. They are upset, and their idea of parent is what they want to solve the hurt. It was very hard not to give in at this point, but we knew what the kids needed from us was stability and discipline, so we had to stand firm. But, just like logic does not always help the child, knowing we were pursuing a good course of action did not help us deal with the heartache of hearing a child in our care express suffering.

Watch every episode of Supernanny

The lessons taught on this show are invaluable. Especially the concept of staying calm, establishing clear rules, and sticking to a consequence system designed to teach the child. The time out in a chair was particularly valuable, as well as having a calender with a sticker system for earning small rewards for meeting goals met. My parents raised me with spanking, but I felt even with a difficult child, the clear system of time out, and losing privileges worked far better than the threat of physical punishment would have.

Ensure you have a working timer with alarm

We used our armwatch timers 4-5x a day. Everything from establishing a time limit for getting dressed (taking too long meant no sticker earned for that task) to turn lengths on the computer, having an alarm was extremely helpful. We also used it for reading homework, and a failure to concentrate meant the time would start over again. Having the length of time outside our direct control (the passage of time being a constant) meant there was little to argue with when the alarm sounded.

Talk about goals with your child *before* entering a public place

This is a Supernanny concept, but it is so valuable it bares listing here. Before going into a store, a restaurant, or a public setting, announce goals and things not allowed to the child before leaving the car. Ensure they understand and agree to these concepts before leaving the car. Failure to follow along means either a short time out to the car, or an end to the event all together. For example the first time we went to the public pool, it ended with the kids running around naked, pulling the keys out of the lockers, throwing them inside and locking the door after. I had another father laugh and say “got enough to do?”. The next time we went, before going into the pool, I got down on their level, and let them know that touching keys, or leaving my presence, would mean we leave the pool and won’t come back for another week. Their desire to swim outweighed their desire to mess with the keys, and the next visit went much more smoothly.

Anticipate problems by thinking ahead

Before the first kids were placed with us, we put locks on our hardware closet, the greenhouse door, and other areas we knew the children should not access unsupervised. Likewise, an adult can normally anticipate problems before they happen, and communicate to the child their expectations. If I see a candy display at a child’s height at a playplace, I will let them know beforehand not to dig into it, rather than waiting and hoping they will stay away. This also makes consequences much more logical for the child. I told you not to touch the candy display right when we got inside, yet you went in and took candy, thus we will not be having dessert tonight.

Clear consequences designed to teach

One of the children we took care of would wake in the middle of the night and wake everyone else up by playing with toys. We wanted to teach the concept of laying calmly in bed, and using imagination to entertain until sleep came again. First we decided to remove the toys from the bedroom at night, but the child would still wake up and play with pieces of trash or whatever could be found. Next we decided to use the concept of an “exercise day”. If the child woke everyone else up at night, they must have too much energy, so we would have an exercise day the following day. This meant no computer time, and all non school/eating/homework time was spent burning excess energy, either on a walk, using the exercise equipment at the playground (climbing a ladder, jumping jacks, etc) and any complaints of it being boring were met with a “remember how boring this is compared to laying quietly when you wake up at night” and any complaints of being tired were met with a “yes I am tired too, because someone woke us up last night, remember how tired you are with an exercise day when you think about getting up to play in the middle of the night”. After only two occurrences of exercise day, the child learned to stay calm through the night, even if they woke up. Exercise day was not used for any other problem, since the concept did not apply of burning extra energy.

Ask the child about their behavior

Before deciding to discipline the waking in the night, we wanted to make sure there was not some deeper problem, like missing parents, or school bullies. Ask first. Why are you kicking off your blanket when it is time to sleep? If the answer is because they are hot, that is not a situation to discipline. Sometimes they just don’t know yet how to communicate what they want or need, and their behavior might seem at first glance like rebellion when it is just a poorly formed communication.

A set schedule is best

The first kids that were placed with us both had supposed sleeping problems. One took forever to go to sleep, the other “needed” sleeping pills (serotonin). Both children were under 10. After a week of having a set sleeping time, with nothing exciting an hour before bed, and the problems disappeared. 7:30 was calm time, 7:45 was brush teeth and change into pajamas time, 8 was time to go under the blankets and we would read for 15 minutes, and then sing for 5 minutes. Finally we kissed them good night, wished them a good sleep, said something positive about them, and left the room quietly even if they were not yet asleep. Not only were we able to stop the sleeping pill, but both stayed in bed and quiet other than a few instances (which are to be expected, they are kids not robots). We attribute this solely to the predictability of a consistent schedule.

[alba]

Here is "Daniel's" post about fostering from the Globalgayby blog. It's not all awful:

Maybe I'm misreading this, but to me this looks like he's saying they didn't even give the crying kid a cuddle. Seriously? A child in your care is distressed, and you don't even comfort him?

Ask the child about their behavior

Before deciding to discipline the waking in the night, we wanted to make sure there was not some deeper problem, like missing parents, or school bullies. Ask first. Why are you kicking off your blanket when it is time to sleep? If the answer is because they are hot, that is not a situation to discipline. Sometimes they just don’t know yet how to communicate what they want or need, and their behavior might seem at first glance like rebellion when it is just a poorly formed communication.

You mean like not assuming defiance when in fact the child was missing his parents? :roll:

[DaffyDill]

Here is "Daniel's" post about fostering from the Globalgayby blog. It's not all awful: ...../snip

I hope my paraphrasing wasn't taken as meaning their foster parenting was all bad - that wasn't my intention at all. Some things IMHO they did well, other parts...not so well, as mentioned by alba in the post above, I couldn't believe they didn't at least try to comfort a distressed child who had been torn away from his/her home and family unit, no matter how dysfunctional it may or may not have been.

On the other hand, these guys certainly seemed to understand a childs need to be safe and secure in a stable environment, and they had certainly given a lot of thought into their parenting.

Anyway, I only meant to post a few impressions I had, not to critique them exactly - I have no right to do that, and it's not fair given I have never met them.

[August]

Maybe I'm misreading this, but to me this looks like he's saying they didn't even give the crying kid a cuddle. Seriously? A child in your care is distressed, and you don't even comfort him?

You mean like not assuming defiance when in fact the child was missing his parents? :roll:

To me that reads as not giving in and letting them continue with story time. If there are two parents there one can easily continue with story time while the other takes the tantrumming child away.

[August]

I can't find anything about David ' s paranoia lead to bus buying. Is that on the blog somewhere?

Way way early on, she talks about peak oil and how they want to be in NZ when it happens.

This was about the truck

Camping in suburbia

21 July 07

David’s main vision for the Freedom Truck was the ability to camp incognito — where ever, whenever. Our first main test of this was after we left Leeton. We camped in suburban Wagga Wagga on Friday night as we needed to do some shopping. “Wagga†(think of “Ouaga†to get the pronunciation right) is a virtual metropolis in comparison to Leeton, so we had a list of items to purchase from camping, truck and department stores. (My favourite purchase has been a thermometer that can read inside and outside temperatures. I love looking at it and reporting the difference between our cozy Freedom Truck setup and the winter outdoors!)

And camping incognito worked really well. Anyone who even noticed the truck would think that it was a freighter with legitimate business, and not that it was a campervan holding a sleeping family! Yaay, well done, David!

Your homework for 2008

22 January 08

From postcarbonbooks.com

You must read this book this year.

The world is about to run out of cheap oil and change dramatically. Within the next few years, global production will peak. Thereafter, even if industrial societies begin to switch to alternative energy sources, they will have less net energy each year to do all the work essential to the survival of complex societies. We are entering a new era, as different from the industrial era as the latter was from medieval times.

...

This is the book that has set us on a path of selling up and moving away from southeast Queensland. We believe that in the imminence of peak oil and that our privileged, fuel-run society will collapse as a result. We aim to somehow escape the worst of it by planning and acting now.

[hoipolloi]

Daniel's parenting "philosophy" is predicated on having children who can talk and respond when you speak to them.

Can't imagine how he or his less-than-enthusiastic partner would manage with a newborn...

[Mama Mia]

Lauren did work with DOCS workers in the wake of Elijah's death. She wasn't allowed to be alone with the children for a period, she had to get a vehicle that would seat them all safely (thus the Grifted Gypsy) and she had to take them to grief counselling. I'm sure there were other requirements of which we are not aware.

Soon enough, however, she left the state and all supervision and dropped even her pretence of compliance.

She was also contacted by DOCS on at least one other occasion, soon after Elijah's birth. Case workers made contact with her in Newcastle (I think it was after Aisha being lost overnight), but again, she soon moved on.

The fact that she is not only transient but moves from state to state makes it very difficult - community services departments are state organisations.

And finding her and working with her requires a lot of time and resources. If an over worked case worker contacts her, finds her to be polite and articulate and able to say the right words, finds that the kids are fed and not being abused sexually or physically - they are likely to move on to dealing with more straightforward cases. It's wrong, but it's the reality of the system.

If Australia is anything like the United States, if she's moving on after formal involvement with Child Welfare, it's only after either the investigation, or her actual case, if it's reached that point, is officially closed. Either because they could not substantiate abuse or neglect, or because she successfully met the requirements of her plan. I have seen some kind of borderline families like Lauren have their cases get very serious and the level of involvement bumped up if they up and move to another county -- let alone another state.

Overall I think people should try to remember that it's a really, really, really good thing that CPS, generally, has a philosophy of only taking children from their natural family in the worst circumstances and attempting to work with the parents in all other circumstances. Most of the parents who do receive in-home help - counseling and parenting classes and/or material supports, drug treatment, mental health care - whatever the issues are, are going to do better as parents and will be the best choice for their kids. Will they be what most people consider great parents? Probably not. But they will be capable enough at taking care of their kids, at the time, and have the bonus of attachment.

The vast majority of the time removal is going to be traumatic for the kids. They love their parents and it isn't like putting them in foster care is a guarantee of improvement -- especially for large sibling groups. If the parent doesn't get their act together and there is no suitable family member that steps up they are almost guaranteed to be separated. I'm sure with Lauren's huge Internet presence people would step up and take them all in, but that is not the case usually - and, frankly, seasoned social workers would find people crawling out of the interwebs to volunteer to become foster parents just to take a bunch of kids they've followed on a blog creepy as fuck ( sorry, but that goes doubly with a short-term social work intern who volunteered that info when the kids aren't even in the system -- even if they smiled and nodded politely at the time )

Are there lots of kids who should be pulled from their horrific homes but aren't? Absolutely. Are there kids whose parents are just really bad at " presenting" well and aren't the most stable, but should still have their kids, but they are pulled due to social worker bias? Absolutely. But if Lauren presents the kids being always filthy and not having any support with their education and having another sibling being taken away as a series of conscious choices, and gives a philosophical reasoning to support it, she's going to keep her children. Period. If you take the exact same situation but it's just that mom is too methed out to groom her kids, or didn't enroll them in school because it was too much of a bother, and the last two babies were just off living with one relative or another because mom didn't want to deal with another one -- you will have an entirely different result, if CPS didn't pull the kids they would likely require that mom enroll them in school, live in a house ( especially since they actually own one!), and take some parenting classes. I think her being white and, especially middle class, has a great deal to do with it --- but, IMO, it's even more that she puts a reason behind what she does, however off those reasons seem to be. It's the same with the physically abusive fundamentalists. If they were just flying into a rage and beating their kids CPS will react differently than if they say they are using extreme corporeal punishment because they are following the guidelines in a parenting manual that you can buy anywhere. In my area following anything anywhere near Peal level of punishment would still not be allowed, but the parents would likely only have to take a short series of parenting courses and promise not to do it again. The parent who can't give a good reason, especially if poor, and especially if a different ethnicity than the social worker ( I don't think it's always a matter of only white bias, but of same culture bias - at least at the investigative level - and always a class bias )would probably have the kids pulled and at the very least would have a more intensive level of supervision and more elements to their case plan.

TL/DR : Pulling kids is a big deal, and not something to be taken lightly.

[happy atheist]

I hope my paraphrasing wasn't taken as meaning their foster parenting was all bad - that wasn't my intention at all. Some things IMHO they did well, other parts...not so well, as mentioned by alba in the post above, I couldn't believe they didn't at least try to comfort a distressed child who had been torn away from his/her home and family unit, no matter how dysfunctional it may or may not have been.

On the other hand, these guys certainly seemed to understand a childs need to be safe and secure in a stable environment, and they had certainly given a lot of thought into their parenting.

Anyway, I only meant to post a few impressions I had, not to critique them exactly - I have no right to do that, and it's not fair given I have never met them.

My post wasn't in response to you. Someone said they wished they could see the info, that's all.

Way way early on, she talks about peak oil and how they want to be in NZ when it happens.

This was about the truck

Obviously the best solution when you're worried about the world running out of oil is to design your lifestyle around driving around in a truck having as many kids as possible.

Did they think Australia was going to turn into Mad Max?

[Mama Mia]

Wow, did Lauren and these guys talk at all about parenting philosophies? Because they seem about as far to the controlling extreme as you can get. I don't understand why she would give a child to these guys, if she does actually believe in the free expression, child led, parenting style she constantly talks about. That makes no sense to me. If she did feel called to be a surrogate, or even a surrogate specifically for a particular type of couple -- wouldn't she pick a couple who would raise the baby in a way more closely aligned with her values? I mean, it wouldn't be reasonable to expect an exact match - but the exact opposite? So strange. They seem incredibly regimented. I fear they presented as parenting that way only because it was high needs foster children, and assuming that any child they had from birth would be easier. But they have no way of knowing what their actual child will be like.

[happy atheist]

Hellena has commented on the surrogacy announcement, denouncing us for daring to question She Who Sparkles.

[chaotic life]

Sadly, Helena is the perfect stooge for a Narcissti like Lauren.

I don't see a lot of red flags in the couple's parenting of foster kids. You cannot parent hurting foster kids the same way you parent children who you have from birth and they have no emotional baggage involved. I just assumed that they will learn like every couple when they find themselves with a newborn.

Most of what they blogged about working with foster kids is decent information, but its also stuff that doesn't apply to children who don't have emotional struggles, which a biological newborn would not have.

I do wonder if they have remembered that with Lauren's mental health issues, this child will be at risk of developing them himself as he grows. I just don't think they have investigated and considered a lot about having her as the biological mother of this child.

[Idolatry]

Ah, Hellena, what a great friend. We all need the kind of friend who can bail you out when you break laws in other countries after blogging to brag about it.

[So Many Lies]

Wow, did Lauren and these guys talk at all about parenting philosophies? Because they seem about as far to the controlling extreme as you can get. I don't understand why she would give a child to these guys, if she does actually believe in the free expression, child led, parenting style she constantly talks about. That makes no sense to me. If she did feel called to be a surrogate, or even a surrogate specifically for a particular type of couple -- wouldn't she pick a couple who would raise the baby in a way more closely aligned with her values? I mean, it wouldn't be reasonable to expect an exact match - but the exact opposite? So strange. They seem incredibly regimented. I fear they presented as parenting that way only because it was high needs foster children, and assuming that any child they had from birth would be easier. But they have no way of knowing what their actual child will be like.

Maybe their style is right for the foster kids they've had. I think routines are good for a start.

But I do find it awfully strange Lauren should,as she puts it, "allow someone else to parent the child" in a manner that is contrary to the philosophy she espouses.

On the other hand she was all babywise in the past so maybe it resonates with her.

But I think it's just that she doesn't really have any core values.

[ViolaSebastian]

But I think it's just that she doesn't really have any core values.

Armchair psychiatrist time. I tend to think that Lauren exhibits symptoms of Borderline Personality Disorder. She has such an unstable sense of self and such a varying self-image. People change, but to go from fundamentalist Christianity to super-sparkly Rainbow brigade is quite the leap. She engages in risky behaviors, such as Elijah's infamous Rainbow birth with no potential for medical intervention, driving near cliffs, and allowing the girls to engage is all kinds of dangerous situations. She idealizes lovers, builds unstable relationships with them, then her attitude towards them shifts suddenly and dramatically, like the time that she took off without David and the girls. She says she's in love with this couple for whom she's a surrogate, but how long until her mood sours on them, too? She hasn't spoken about any displays of inordinate anger on her blog, but who would? It's not sparkly...

[Blahblah]

Sparkles only gives us a very blinkered view of herself. A very self serving one at that.

Although "Abigail" was similar in style to Sparkles, as "Abigail" she showed a very different side referring to herself at one stage as having had too much to drink and liaising with a "fuckbuddy". Pretty sure neither of those things make it into her sparkly blogs.

[lilith]

Sparkles only gives us a very blinkered view of herself. A very self serving one at that.

Although "Abigail" was similar in style to Sparkles, as "Abigail" she showed a very different side referring to herself at one stage as having had too much to drink and liaising with a "fuckbuddy". Pretty sure neither of those things make it into her sparkly blogs.

She didn't have to try to placate the conservative Christian mummy set on Global Gayby. She still has a few of them following her on Sparkling Adventures.

[Arete]

Her "parenting philosophy" has to always have a certain amount of elasticity depending on who she is targeting for a particular grift. Make no mistake, Lauren is a grifter on the level of Jim Bob Duggar and Gil Bates. I suspect she is one who enjoys taking on different personas, as opposed to staying with just one.

How she interacts with her children has nothing to do with any parenting philosophy. Whether she presents as a turbo Christian or Happy Hippie, without those girls, donations would dry up. The kids are props in whatever scam she runs in the moment, or she would have ditched them already. :(