Wow, just..... wow.
Here is the article on The Huffington Post.
I am really interested in what people think about this. Take out the obvious, sending a 7 year old alone on an airplane is wrong, wrong, wrong. Handling a challenging adoption by sending your child alone on an airplane back to his country of origin, there will never be an excuse to justify it.
But I wonder, how many levels of failure had to take place in order for a family to get to the point where they felt this was the best choice they could make after living with the boy for 6 months. We don't know what kind of help the family sought and we don't know what the quality of the help might have been. Actually we know next to nothing about the adoptive mother, though I am sure that will change quickly.
So, what do you think?
Little Wonders posted about this situation, too. It is tragic!
ReplyDeleteI think this just accentuates your post that adoption has changed and the preparation/expectations of adoptive parents has not kept pace with parenting challenging children.
ReplyDeleteWe adopted from Ukraine so I may be off base here - but isn't he an American Citizen now? This is so wrong on so many levels! Heartbreakingly Sad for everyone involved..............
ReplyDeleteVery sad. I'm trying to hold judgement. I know how I've been judged as a parent and the crazy things my kids have done. Trying not to do the same to someone else. It's not my place to do so.
ReplyDeleteHoping the kid is ok....
This is when I turn to my faith---come lord, quickly come...save us from this aweful world.
ReplyDeleteIs it fair to punish the 100's of thousands of kids living in russian orphanges by not allowing them to have families at all? They've already been abandoned, neglected, abused, victims of a poor & volatile society...All because of a few deplorable incidents? I don't know. Sad. How can Russia equip and educate it's own people so that adoption doesn't have to be an only option for these kids?
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ReplyDeleteI second Lisa, I am trying not to judge. I can only imagine based on the wango tango that we see here what went on there. I am not surprised. When adoption supports the family and the child the world will be a better place
ReplyDeleteHow heartbreaking for everyone involved.
ReplyDeleteObviously, something went very, very wrong. I doubt there are many people who adopt without thinking long and hard about what they are doing, and without OTHER PEOPLE thinking long and hard about what they are doing. I think we owe it to each other to suspend judgment until (if) we know the whole story.
ReplyDeleteEssie we are thinking alike. I have something similar to this posted today that is related to yesterday's post. I just find it very very sad.
ReplyDeletei can understand how it can happen but i don't agree with how she handled it. she probably lacked support, finances to handle extreme psychological issues, and didn't have insurance coverage for treatment. that combo will send anyone over the edge. sending the child back to the country is just stupid. DCF will take international adoptees into care if necessary. but is that any better?
ReplyDeleteoh, I've been waiting all day to comment on this. (stuck at work with no access to social networking) Not because I'm judging the mother either. I agree with most of us that we know what can happen, and that despite the training adoptive parents do receive, most of us aren't equipped at placement to deal with severe psych/attachment issues. And who knows if this child has true psych issues or severe attachment issues that weren't apparent until he was in a family setting? There is so much that we don't know and probably will never know. But I don't understand why the mother didn't turn to the homestudy agency or the placing agency if things are that desperate. One other thing. In my court hearing for Russia, the judge literally asked if I would return the child to Russia if I decided I did not want her. I wonder if the mother was asked that question and what the answer was. Perhaps in desperation, she really honestly thought it was the right choice.
ReplyDeleteWhat they did was wrong wrong wrong! But I do know of their frustration! Those of us who adopt troubled children have to be willing to commit our lives to them. This mom was probably not warned of the potential problems. If you are not a tolerant parent, then some situations become intolerable. The poor child!
ReplyDeleteLindsey Petersen
I skimmed this article but I'm assuming there are no other kids in the family. When there are other children in danger I believe there is a huge difference. I've lived the fear of my child hurting me because she did hurt my children, physically, sexually. Does it take a parent getting killed for the system to change and help to be readily available? If we had not adopted domestically I don't think the help would be there. And 6 years after our daughter went into a group home for sexually abused children , many things have changed in the system, and not for the better. I know that we were lied to and information withheld from birth family and social workers. If you're not presented the truth, how can you prepare? I pity the woman in this situation because she will live with the guilt for the rest of her life. 10 years ago when we adopted this community of bloggers didn't exist. I am thankful that there is always hope.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I've read, she was in fear for her life. The child had drawn pictures of and had threatened to burn the house down with her in it. What gets me (outside of the fact that I cannot imagine sending my son back to Ukraine EVER or allowing any child, much less a mentally ill child to fly anywhere alone.......) is that according to their own statistics, Russian adoptive families have "returned" thousands of children to the orphanages. The government outrage makes it sound like only Americans abuse, neglect or abandon adopted children.
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering if she turned to her agency (which I understand has been slapped with a hold on any adoptions from Russia for now) for help and if she got the standard, too bad,so sad...you're on your own.
This is sad all the way around....sad for the background and surroundings this child has lived in there, sad for this woman who obviously wanted a child, sad for families and mostly kids waiting for their forever families that will be impacted by this. Just sad.
question...does anyone know if a child with a severe attachment disorder can feel abandoned? Does an FA kid feel inner sadness and loss? I believe this story is truly tragic all around, I just want to stop feeling so... I can't even explain it...I feel terrible for the parents and then I think about the child.
ReplyDeleteas an adoptive parent that went into adoption completely blind about the severity of an abused child's issues and how intensely it would affect my life, I think I can understand this mother's fear and anguish.
ReplyDeleteI maintain my comment to your post about the change in adoptions over the past two decades - without adequate knowledge and support for adopting families of damaged children, adoptions will cease because the word will be out that it's too darn hard to raise these kids.
I'm in it because I'm in it. I'm an all or nothing gal and I have Christ who gives me strength every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year ...
Heck, why not? No one wants to judge her? I'LL judge the mother! Posting now.
ReplyDeleteMy first thought when reading about this was "How could this even happen? How could a kid get on an international flight alone?" But, I guess that's been answered in subsequent news stories.
ReplyDeleteSo many other thoughts on this. Wow. Just wow, is right.
As the adoptive mom of 3 and long time employee of the "system" i do not think the majority of parents really know what they are getting in to. I meet far too many stary eyed prospective parents who think love is all these children need along with a nice bedroom, cute comforters and lots of toys. The older the child and the more placements they've been in the higher the failure rate. I truly believe that information is also withheld in foreign adoptions and at times adoptions in our own country. It happens. I have a friend who adopted a little boy from Bulgaria with a known genetic disorder affecting his bones which they knew they could handle. What they didn't know until he got here was that he also had Fragile x syndrome AND was autistic. They have done a wonderful job parenting him but what a shock it must have been. I feel for the adopted family and for the boy who was sent back to Russia. No one wins.
ReplyDeletemy thoughts are it was a criminal act. adoptied or not you can't just send a 7yr old child on a plane alone and "return" him like that. He's not something they bought in a toy store.
ReplyDeleteMy son came home from Russia in 2003 and at that time Russia allowed multiple citizenships. So my son is a US Citizen but in Russian law he is first a Russian citizen and is supposed to travel with his Russian passport. According to US law no other citizenship counts. I am thinking that these facts will make this situation different than if this child had been sent back to a birth country that no longer recognized him as a citizen of that country. NOT that this was the correct choice for his mother to make. I am interested in the details of what if any help she sought in dealing with this child's issues prior to doing what she did.
ReplyDeleteIt is sad how one person's irresponsible actions can jeopardize the adoptions of other waiting children and their prospective adoptive parents.
Aggh I can't belive that amazing this family may have been at the end of their teather with this kid but come on, seriously how can anyone justify doing that. It makes me mad.
ReplyDeleteWe can all probably imagine what kinds of things this mother was dealing with in this kid. And, as I know from experience, it is hard (a total shock) when you have not been prepared for it, as we were not. What I can't see is how she could possibly have exhausted all domestically available supports or options for legal disruption, and possibly transitions that could hopefully have been less damaging to her son. If the problems only just started in January, and it's only early April, I just don't see how she could have run through all her options over here yet.
ReplyDeleteMy overwhelming feeling about this is profound sadness.
I dont think we should judge the situation wthout knowing all of the facts.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.watchingthewaters.com/2010/04/i-know-what-you-want.html
ReplyDeleteThere has been a lot more information put out today, the grandmother I think, is talking about all the problems the kid had. And it sounds like he is a very damaged little boy, and he has done some awful, violent things. They aren't talking yet about what the Mom might have tried to help him. The agency also isn't talking!
ReplyDeleteThis just floored me...I too am wondering what steps they took to help him. I mean, the last resort, I think would be RTC, but send him back? The way they went about the whole thing seems so cold. Of course, like you said, we dont know everything. But..I just cant see any justification for it all.
ReplyDeleteEven my perfect, delightful, happy, well-balanced Sergei was pretty dysregulated a few times in his first six months. That is a lot of loss (and, frankly, when parents change an older child's name, that is a bit of a red flag to me that sensitivity to the child's inner being might not be paramount)....
ReplyDeleteFrom what I heard the worst thing the grandmother could initially come up with was his drawing a picture of a fire burning their house down...as I mentioned in my own blog, I'd probably get some satisfaction out of doing that drawing myself about now. Plus, it has got to be remembered that it is in these people's best interests at this point to make him sound as crazy and unmanageable as they can - and he is not exactly in a position to refute it.
The key point to keep in mind is not even how terrible the child was....but the absolute cluelessness of two adults. Would we really expect that adults who did something like this to a child were capable of making that child feel safe and loved?
According to the article I read, the boy only began acting out in January. So a little more than two months later they put him on a plane and send him back. Is that really enough time to have sought help? Is it enough time to even identify exactly what the issues are? I don't think so. Do I believe the child had some serious issues? Absolutely!
ReplyDeleteIs what they did right? No way! Disrupting is sometimes needed and can be the best thing for a child and family. But this was barbaric! This wasn't a loving new placement for a troubled child. This was criminal. Brutal, brutal abandonment of a child.
So tragic and wrong on so many levels! I also feel bad for the people who are in process right now. I hope it does not affect their ability to bring home their children. The comments that were left after this article about adoption really made me sick! I had to stop reading.
ReplyDeleteI don't know enough to really say, but 6 months? That just doesn't seem like they gave him much of a chance. I mean, maybe they didn't have access to help for the boy, and if the orphanage lied to her, well, I don't really see what choice she had except to give him back, especially if he had violent tendencies. I guess I am just having a hard time understanding how 6 months was enough time to figure out anything. I don't know.
ReplyDeleteI'm trying not to be too judgmental. I feel sorry for everyone involved. I know that I would never put my 7 year old on a plane alone. I don't even send him to public restrooms alone.
ReplyDeleteSuch a sad story. I don't judge the mother for her decision to disrupt the adoption. But just from what I've read (and I know there is a lot we don't know), it doesn't seem like her level of commitment to the child was very high. I read blogs like yours, and many others, where families with RAD kiddos struggle every day, and through it all continue to love and try everything they can to help their kids. I'm not seeing anything close to that in this story. Sending this poor child on an airplane half way around the world by himself? Crazy. And it shows a lot of hostility on the mother's part toward both the child and the orphanage.
ReplyDeleteI think the other thing to keep in mind is that nearly ALL kids act out a bit at first. She didn't give him time to adjust (though I still contend that given the common sense and problem-solving skills of that mother it might have been a difficult home to adjust to!)
ReplyDeleteWell, she brought the boy home in September and he didn't start acting out until February and then it sounds like he got really severe quickly. I did read that he was initially removed from his mothers care in Russia over alcoholism when he was 6 so you know that had to be bad. I agree though, that problem solving in the adoptive mom is not good and I think it is coming to light that she made a few feeble attempts to get help then sent the boy back.
ReplyDeleteThat poor kid!
I wouldn't wonder that something she did or started to do in January/February was a trigger. So sad that she didn't work to figure it out.
ReplyDeleteWonder if she bought a nice bottle of vodka to place in the cupboard? Sensible, well-behaved Ilya's wild-eyed response to my having a beer was really an eye-opener.