Lately I have been struggling over the RTC/Group Home cycle of many kids in care. I know that it is out of necessity, but this is the way that it usually goes.
A child gets to the point where he/she can’t live at home. Either they won’t stay home, the rest of the family isn’t safe, they won’t comply with medications, or whatever the case may be. So they enter the facility and the carrot at the end is that if you complete the program you can go back home -- assuming of course, that coming back home somehow means that the treatment center has “fixed them” and they will then be OK.
So, the child complies (or sometimes doesn’t comply) with the program and does VERY WELL in a structured environment. They have nursing staff who are willing to give them medication in a small room where there is no where to go to spit it out or hide it. They have big burly guys who can restrain them if they get too angry to control themselves. They don’t have access to many of the things that tempt them when they are on the outside. They have a structured school setting. And if they are lucky they still get contact with their family members.
So, they do great and their reward is another “try” at home. They come back home and can hold it together for a while, but then, in our experience, they just can’t do it. For whatever reason, the old patterns return and we are right back where we started. And then we feel like failures and so do they.
But there is always the promise “do good here and you’ll get out.” But what if they can’t do good somewhere else? What if that kind of structure is the only place they can function?
I am arriving at a conclusion that I never thought I would. Maybe some kids just can’t live in a family setting. Now, please realize that I did not say that maybe some kids don’t need families. But sometimes the kind of family they need is the one that will call them, visit them when they earn the privilege and possibly have them home on holidays and weekends.
I casually mentioned in an email to Pat O’Brien, director of You Gotta Believe, that I wanted to pick his brain someday about this cycle and about RTCs and group homes in general. I have his permission to quote his response. I was going to edit it, but there’s a lot of interesting stuff there so I’ll leave it as is:
Pat says:
“I don't have a lot of sophisticated stuff to say about residential treatment centers or group homes. I consider them and hospitals and juvenile "correctional" facilities long term respite for kids whose behavior is out of control. I believe there are two primary formula's for keeping families of alphabet kids (FAS/RAD/ODD/ADD/PHD/ETC) going --- the family's commitment and time. Kids need time to grow up. If they can spent two or three years in treatment while their parents are very involved from the outside looking in, time takes care of the rest. You see, right now, you have no grown kids. They are all still babies in gigantic bodies. So don't think of either the RTC or detention center as the programs that are going to teach your boys how to live with you in your family and in your household while they are still kids. Look at them as facilities that will lead to perhaps the next facility that will allow the time your boys need to grow up, have their brains develop some more, and hit their early 20's where they will then actually be able to appreciate the significant role you play in their lives, whether or not they ever come home to live with you full time or not.
You have the double whammy of taking in all your kids at latency age and younger. They have a load of anger toward their abandoning mothers and fathers, and foster mothers and fathers, but they take it out on the current parents. All your kids are currently angry, or will be angry, and it will be taken out on you --- the person who is actually loving them. And they will very much appreciate this someday in the not-so-distance future, but you still have to wait until they grow up. This means when they get out of hand as children, you have to get the behavior treated. Hopefully, you won't need any out-of-home care. But out-of-home care is focused on treating the kids' issues with the family's help --- or so they should be. But even when they are not, you got respite from that kid where he or she is not being allowed to manipulated another family. You are the family, if they can't live with you, they have to learn that they must, and a treatment program in this context is far better than another family because you are role modeling what families do.
The work you are doing now with your two boys and other kids right now will give them a real chance to go out on their own, start their own family, and these very kids will rely on you to advise them on how to raise their own children. They will also talk to you about issues with their spouses. You are not parenting for joy in this round of parenting but for the next generation. You and Bart will be the guru to your kids once they start having their own kids and relationship problems with their significant others. Group care in the now just helps you buy time so that the years pass so they can grow up already.
So don't get so pre-occupied with "failure". There is no such thing as "failure." Every experience your kids have now is better than them having those experiences later. It is the kids who gets no attention from their parents who are "failing" well into their 30's and 40's. Your kids have a great chance to success at much younger ages (think 22,23, 24) because you are paying attention to their problems now while they are still children or near children. You can't fail and neither can your kid. You must walk them through life without judging anything they do as a "failure." And remember my favorite definition of a family (which you can pull down from our website): Family: Is often a place, but always a safety net with at least one parent, that provides a youth and/or young adult with the opportunity to NOT succeed (or perhaps even fail) until he or she can succeed."
Parenting really sucks. But the world would be a far more miserable place if it didn't have folks like you and Bart willing to do it.“
Thanks to Pat for the advice and permission to blog it. For those of you who have had kids in this setting, I’d be interested in your thoughts.
A child gets to the point where he/she can’t live at home. Either they won’t stay home, the rest of the family isn’t safe, they won’t comply with medications, or whatever the case may be. So they enter the facility and the carrot at the end is that if you complete the program you can go back home -- assuming of course, that coming back home somehow means that the treatment center has “fixed them” and they will then be OK.
So, the child complies (or sometimes doesn’t comply) with the program and does VERY WELL in a structured environment. They have nursing staff who are willing to give them medication in a small room where there is no where to go to spit it out or hide it. They have big burly guys who can restrain them if they get too angry to control themselves. They don’t have access to many of the things that tempt them when they are on the outside. They have a structured school setting. And if they are lucky they still get contact with their family members.
So, they do great and their reward is another “try” at home. They come back home and can hold it together for a while, but then, in our experience, they just can’t do it. For whatever reason, the old patterns return and we are right back where we started. And then we feel like failures and so do they.
But there is always the promise “do good here and you’ll get out.” But what if they can’t do good somewhere else? What if that kind of structure is the only place they can function?
I am arriving at a conclusion that I never thought I would. Maybe some kids just can’t live in a family setting. Now, please realize that I did not say that maybe some kids don’t need families. But sometimes the kind of family they need is the one that will call them, visit them when they earn the privilege and possibly have them home on holidays and weekends.
I casually mentioned in an email to Pat O’Brien, director of You Gotta Believe, that I wanted to pick his brain someday about this cycle and about RTCs and group homes in general. I have his permission to quote his response. I was going to edit it, but there’s a lot of interesting stuff there so I’ll leave it as is:
Pat says:
“I don't have a lot of sophisticated stuff to say about residential treatment centers or group homes. I consider them and hospitals and juvenile "correctional" facilities long term respite for kids whose behavior is out of control. I believe there are two primary formula's for keeping families of alphabet kids (FAS/RAD/ODD/ADD/PHD/ETC) going --- the family's commitment and time. Kids need time to grow up. If they can spent two or three years in treatment while their parents are very involved from the outside looking in, time takes care of the rest. You see, right now, you have no grown kids. They are all still babies in gigantic bodies. So don't think of either the RTC or detention center as the programs that are going to teach your boys how to live with you in your family and in your household while they are still kids. Look at them as facilities that will lead to perhaps the next facility that will allow the time your boys need to grow up, have their brains develop some more, and hit their early 20's where they will then actually be able to appreciate the significant role you play in their lives, whether or not they ever come home to live with you full time or not.
You have the double whammy of taking in all your kids at latency age and younger. They have a load of anger toward their abandoning mothers and fathers, and foster mothers and fathers, but they take it out on the current parents. All your kids are currently angry, or will be angry, and it will be taken out on you --- the person who is actually loving them. And they will very much appreciate this someday in the not-so-distance future, but you still have to wait until they grow up. This means when they get out of hand as children, you have to get the behavior treated. Hopefully, you won't need any out-of-home care. But out-of-home care is focused on treating the kids' issues with the family's help --- or so they should be. But even when they are not, you got respite from that kid where he or she is not being allowed to manipulated another family. You are the family, if they can't live with you, they have to learn that they must, and a treatment program in this context is far better than another family because you are role modeling what families do.
The work you are doing now with your two boys and other kids right now will give them a real chance to go out on their own, start their own family, and these very kids will rely on you to advise them on how to raise their own children. They will also talk to you about issues with their spouses. You are not parenting for joy in this round of parenting but for the next generation. You and Bart will be the guru to your kids once they start having their own kids and relationship problems with their significant others. Group care in the now just helps you buy time so that the years pass so they can grow up already.
So don't get so pre-occupied with "failure". There is no such thing as "failure." Every experience your kids have now is better than them having those experiences later. It is the kids who gets no attention from their parents who are "failing" well into their 30's and 40's. Your kids have a great chance to success at much younger ages (think 22,23, 24) because you are paying attention to their problems now while they are still children or near children. You can't fail and neither can your kid. You must walk them through life without judging anything they do as a "failure." And remember my favorite definition of a family (which you can pull down from our website): Family: Is often a place, but always a safety net with at least one parent, that provides a youth and/or young adult with the opportunity to NOT succeed (or perhaps even fail) until he or she can succeed."
Parenting really sucks. But the world would be a far more miserable place if it didn't have folks like you and Bart willing to do it.“
Thanks to Pat for the advice and permission to blog it. For those of you who have had kids in this setting, I’d be interested in your thoughts.
No comments:
Post a Comment