Or Maybe It's Not That

I was just thinking about my last post.

Maybe it isn't that we aren't about protecting children. Maybe it's that protecting children becomes so important that everything else is too far down the list. For example (and this is purely hypothetical) maybe there is a family who is committed to adopting a child and they just aren't great housekeepers. Their home is safe, and not dangerously dirty, but there is definitely clutter.

A social worker goes into the home and says, "Oh my goodness. This house is cluttered." And, using "Child Protection" ideas, they determine that they should look for a family that has a neater home. So, they remove the child and look for a cleaner, tidier home.

Problem is, then there is a disruption written in the file, a broken attachment for the child, and the chances of success in the next placement are greatly reduced. ANd the chance that

I could list so many reasons why families are not chosen or placements are disrupted under the guise of "the best interest of the child" or "child protection issues" when the families are committed to adopting.

I'm not saying that every single committed family should be allowed to adopt, but I wish there was a study done that would track back every kid that ages out of foster care who was legally free. I wonder how many homestudies were rejected or how many adoptive placements were disrupted when the parents were still committed. It would be interesting to see how many times aging out could have been prevented if everyone would have had permanency as their #1 goal.

Finally, kids are often allowed by their social workers to disrupt their own placement. The goal of almost every older kid placed is to get out of there and to make it fast. Attachment, commitment, etc. feels too weird, so they fight against it. If everyone is not committed to making the placement happen, the kid can disrupt it with ease. (And there are kids still attempting to disrupt adoptions that have long been finalized and they will manipulate every professional able to be manipulated).

I realize I'm wrambling. But maybe we are all about child protection -- but not about adult protection. Sure we can do our very best to keep kids safe as teens, but how safe will they be as adults if they have no safety net that a family can best provide?