Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Being In Foster Care
A national survey in 2007 revealed that 45% of the American population thinks children are in foster care due to their own delinquency (AdopTalk, Fall, 2009).
So let’s set the record straight.
It not the fault of the children that their parents and care-givers are too lost in their own dysfunction to care for them. It is not their fault that there is no food, no heat, and no one to take them to school. It’s not their fault when their parents don’t come home at night.
It’s not the fault of older siblings that they are left to raise the babies. It’s not their fault that they have been beaten, pinched, kicked, burned and used.
Having their innocence stripped away from them before they lose their baby teeth is not their fault.
The children are not to blame that family holidays become nightmares of substance abuse and that violence is a daily occurence.
Hello out there – They are children!
It is not their fault.
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Kristi’s Untitled Poem
I recently posted a blog about how the past continues to live with us in the present. I think Kristi’s poem expresses that reality in the profound observations of a teenage girl. She wrote it for a school assignment, folded it and gave it to her mom in an off-handed way following a particularly difficult time between them.
I am from adoption
I am from camping, fishing and mountains
I am from my Mom and Dad
Who rescued me when I was a baby
I am from cornflakes and frozen blueberries
I am from ragdolls and stuffed animals
I am from a neighborhood with a fishing hole
I am from five pound fish that we all catch
I am from six dogs playing in the yard
I am from cleaning up their messes
I am from a school that teaches me what I want to learn
I am from brothers and sisters that drive me crazy, but I still love them
I am from the “I love you’s” that my mom always says
I am from the soul of the Lord, and the whistling of the wind
I am from something bad and something good.
Kristi’s past is with her in the beginning of her poem, and it is still there at the end. It will always be part of her.
Nancy Ng wrote, “The miracle of adoption is not cure; it is commitment.” Among the resources available through her support organization, FAIR is a recently released DVD titled Sorta Happy, Sorta Sad.
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
The Past is Part of the Present
She is a lovely, down to earth young woman. So I was a little surprised by what she said.
Ellen got married a few months ago, and she doesn’t like her in-laws. “Well, I didn’t marry them. I married Dave,” she said, dismissively.
Oh, oh! I wonder how long it is going to take her to catch on that she married his family, too. The clinging mother, the spoiled sister, the favored brother and the emotionally unavailable father. She gets the whole in-law package. Not just the bow on top.
Sometimes when people think about adopting, they think of the day the child comes into their family as a brand new start. And in a way it is.
But the past walks in the door right along with the child. She brings her memories and attachments to healthy and not-so-healthy relationships. She brings her losses and fears and disappointments. She brings her nightmares and her adaptive behaviors.
You might say that the adoptive family merges with the ghosts of their child’s birth and prior foster families.
That’s why adoption caseworkers insist that families participate in preparation classes. And that’s why friends, family, knowledgeable therapists and community supports are so important.
Nancy Ng, adoptive mother and psychotherapist, wrote “…as real, as indispensable, as vital as love is, it cannot alter reality…The miracle of parental love is not that it makes everything better, but that it allows for all possibility.”
Because we know this life long journey brings the unexpected, along with the usual challenges of parenthood, The Adoption Exchange offers a wide range of post-adoption training and support services.
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Justin Shouldn’t Have To Worry
Justin was a little worried when I saw him at our annual summer adoption matching party in Colorado. For some reason our staff didn’t know he would be coming to the party, and so his photograph didn’t get included in the little booklet made up for the event.
Volunteers at the party took a Polaroid photograph of every child in attendance (including Justin) and posted them on a bulletin board to help parents find the child(ren) they wanted to meet. So he wasn’t overlooked.
But he needed a little extra attention.
So Justin and I found his photograph in our big picture book, too. We put a marker there – just to make sure that no one at the party would miss him.
Can you imagine being nine years old at a party and thinking no one will find you and become your parent? Justin shouldn’t have to worry about such a thing. No child should.
A few minutes later a prospective mom and dad stopped to visit with me. They were waiting to hear about their quest to adopt a sibling group from Missouri, and the wait was hard to endure. So they came to the party to be around some of the children and get encouragement from our staff.
Of course – as if doing the job he’d delegated to me – I showed them Justin’s picture. They chocked up as they looked at his photograph and others in the picture book of waiting children.
“These are lives!” they exclaimed. “These aren’t just pieces of paper in this book. . . . these are children who need moms and dads.”
I couldn’t have said it better.
And what about Justin? He has a family now.
But there is another nine year old boy who is waiting to be found. Meet Ramon
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Join Dixie in the Count Up to 6,000 Adoption Placements!
Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Growing up is a big job. There are lots of challenges along the way. Fortunately most young people have parents to help them through the tough spots.
But data released by the U.S. government in 2009 tells us:
That seems to be the way it is in America. Young people need parents for a long time after they reach legal adulthood.
So here is my question: If every year 29,000 young people emancipate from foster care at age 18 without parents, how are they going to get through? What are they going to do?
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Dixie’s Adoption Blog
What Is Your New Year’s Resolution?
As 2009 comes to a close, it’s time to look forward. Statistics suggest that there are some things we should be concerned about. If nothing changes in the United States between now and 2020:
That’s not good enough for our children.
Numbers like that are staggering. It would be easy to be overwhelmed and give up. But what if each one of us were to focus on just one thing?
I am going to focus my energy on the 261,000 who are at risk of growing up in foster care – those young people who might never have families.
I am going to work hard to lower that number.
What are you going to do?
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Some Numbers
The latest statistics from the federal government are that 123,000 children in the USA are waiting for adoption (down from 129,000 the prior year) and that 55,000 children moved from foster care into adoption in federal fiscal year 2008 (up from 51,000 in fiscal 2007).
I’m cheering for each of those. The children don’t really need for me to do that because they now have their very own families who are cheering for their progress.
But the families need for us to cheer them along and support them in their roles as they raise the children. That’s why the Board of Directors of The Adoption Exchange supports post-adoption programs in many of our states.
Okay, so the number of waiting children has dropped. On the surface that sounds good. But the same report from the government has another number in it that I don’t like at all.
In fiscal 2008 there were 29,516 children who emancipated from foster care. That number is up by about 18%. This figure has been steadily climbing for the past several years.
The government report doesn’t project into the future. But it’s clear to me that if nothing changes, the coming decade will see 295,160 young adults discharged from foster care – to what?
These numbers tell me that I need to focus on the teenagers – the youth who are hardly children anymore. I need to focus on the young people who are about to be thrust into adulthood before they are ready and without the typical supports that families provide.
It’s past time to get alarmed. But it certainly isn’t too late to act.
There is a teenager who needs you. I hope you’ll think about it and click here to meet Matthew.
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Us and Them
Have you noticed that people often think in terms of us and them? We are good at what we do, and they aren’t so very competent. We are open-minded, and they aren’t.
There were some early professional lessons that I had to unlearn. The us vs them frame of mind was something my colleagues started teaching me on my first job. That was a long time ago, but the lesson is still being taught in offices every work day.
When I began in the juvenile court system attorneys were the identified enemy. Maybe today there is a different enemy. But human nature being what it is, I’m pretty sure for corrections officers there is still a them.
In adoption work I’ve discovered that they are likely to be the bureaucrats or the legislators or sometimes workers or judges in another agency or another state. They are slow, their work is not thorough. And so on.
As a probation officer, I had lots of authority but absolutely no access to money. That (and a judge who told me to buy donuts and invite agency representatives for coffee) taught me to collaborate. It’s difficult to assign someone the classification of they after you’ve eaten donuts and drunk coffee together. And if you need to do a job and have no money to do it, you’re smart to learn to work with them.
At The Adoption Exchange we don’t do anything alone. We believe the children belong to all of us. And we each have a role to play if we’re going to give the children opportunities to grow up in permanent families.
I would like to invite you to share in a special celebration as we Count Up to the collaborative success of helping to connect 6,000 children with adoptive families.
Each adoption placement is the result of a collaborative team of social workers, adoption professionals, adoptive families, staff, volunteers, advocates and supporters. Learn more about this special milestone.
There really isn’t any them. It’s just us.
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Okay, Oklahoma!
Last year The Adoption Exchange worked with the state of Oklahoma to find adoptive families for 43 children from the foster care system.
Forty-three is a small percent of the state’s total adoptions. But these are the children who have been passed over and require extra efforts from all of us if they are to have a family in their future.
And I am beginning to think that there isn’t anything the adoption staff in Oklahoma wouldn’t do to give every child a family.
A few years ago I spent a little time in Oklahoma with colleagues from the National Military Family Association and VIDA (a New York based adoption placement agency). We’d been invited to encourage the state adoption staff to reach out to families in the military. *
That’s all it took – since then the state of Oklahoma has placed two dozen children with military families all over the globe.
Recently one of the Oklahoma staff members made an unusual personal visit to one of our “profile parties” in Colorado. These are events where the youth who wait for adoption are featured through video tapes and attractive posters. At the party the caseworkers spend time talking with prospective families, whose children are entertained by volunteers. And of course there is food – what is a party without food, right?
I walked past an information table that was clearly representing Oklahoma. There were photographs and profile descriptions of waiting children on display at the table….and a cell phone.
Well, when I reported to one of our staff that someone had left a cell phone, she smiled and said, “Oh no, that’s the caseworker from Oklahoma. She couldn’t travel to Colorado today, so she is on the phone right now and available to talk to any parent who picks up the cell phone to visit with her.”
I like that. I like knowing that the children in Oklahoma are served by a team of caseworkers, supervisors and administrators who don’t want to miss a chance to find a family for one of the waiting children. To view photographs of children who are the focus of their efforts right now, click here.
Hats off to Deborah, Linda, Robin, Andrea and all of our Oklahoma colleagues!
Learn more about The Adoption Exchange’s Programs in Oklahoma.
* View Military Families Family Life resource information here.
View a guidebook for adoption caseworkers, supervisors and administrators here.
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Dr. Dixie van de Flier Davis
Mothers and Daughters
A Lesson from Diane and Michelle
It seems like adoptive moms bear the brunt of their daughters’ emotionally conflicted attachments. Over and over again our staff at The Adoption Exchange hears from daughters that their dads are heroes.
Talking about their moms is more complicated.
Psychologically girls have complex attachment/separation process with their mothers. Add the layers of multiple mothers to the emotional landscape, and it gets pretty complicated.
The journey to individuation is filled with fears of rejection and suffocation. The emotional push and pull is heart breaking for mothers. And it’s incredibly painful and confusing for their daughters.
I’m waiting for someone to take Nancy Friday’s theories and observations (My Mother My Self, Dell Publishing Co., Inc., 1977) to the next level to help guide adoptive moms and daughters through these waters. I think it would be reassuring to know that the challenges are predictably more complex than in the usual mother-daughter relationship. And it would be even more helpful to have them examined and explained.
Until then mothers and daughters find their ways – sometimes with the help of psychotherapy, and sometimes alone.
Several years ago I heard Diane sing at a baby shower for the first born of her adopted daughter, Michelle. With unabashed love in her face, Diane’s voice caressed us in the first lullaby to her grandson.
Over the years Diane shared stories with me, knowing that I’d repeat them to inspire others along their own paths. She fiercely loved all of her children and her grandchildren. And now — a few days before her death – she spoke again about the emotional growth of mothers and daughters through the journey of adoption.
Chatting with her husband, Tim, Diane commented on what a challenge it is for children from foster care to find their way to emotional individuation.
That Tuesday afternoon they described their daughter’s solitary search and subsequent reunion with her birth family and her recent return home with her children. Diane was pleased that she could give Michelle a chance to bring some closure to a conflict ridden mother-lost-new-mother-discovered-first-mother-found-again relationship.
Friday says, “Spontaneous and honest love admits errors, hesitations, and human failings; it can be tested and repaired.” Now Michelle was about to lose her second mother to cancer and the two needed – and had – a good talk. A chance to voice apologies and to hear “I love you” one more time.
At Diane’s wake Michelle stood before a church filled with friends, colleagues and family to say, “My mom did stuff that drove me crazy sometimes. And I did stuff that drove her crazy. I learned a lot from her. Like being organized….I tell people, ‘I learned that from my mom.’ I love her.”
The next day Diane’s choral group, Safonia, sang You’ve Got To Walk That Lonesome Journey with a candle standing in Diane’s vacated place among them.
I remembered Diane’s comments just days before, “Now there is another story for you.”
Diane and Tim Carabello helped start The Adoption Exchange, each serving terms on our Board of Directors. Diane was a life long colleague; she was mentor to our early development staff and continued to be a reliable volunteer and valued supporter throughout her life. Tim currently serves on the Long Range Planning and Implementation Committee.
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