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A Mother's Mettle Exposes The Needs Of Adoptive Families

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 26, 2007

It took courage for Pinellas School Board member Nancy Bostock to go public with the heartbreak faced by adoptive families who struggle to raise children damaged by abuse or neglect.

No one likes to admit defeat, or that they gave up a child for his own good.

Like a lot of mothers, Bostock believed her love would overcome the damage her adoptive son suffered in being born to an addicted mother. But love does not conquer all, and to get him the help he needed, she was forced to give her son back to the state. For that, she faces some criticism.

Better to criticize Florida's safety net for adoptive families, which is full of holes. Many families cannot afford the psychiatric or behavioral therapy their new children need. Florida should mend its fabric.

Children with behavioral challenges need counseling - sometimes, residential treatment - to keep from hurting themselves, their parents or other children.

Just this week, the Department of Children and Families reached a $10 million settlement with a Boynton Beach couple not fully informed of the emotional damage suffered by their three adopted boys. The boys - who were victims of horrific sexual abuse as preschoolers, a fact concealed from their adoptive parents - began molesting other children and terrorizing their adoptive family.

With refreshing candor, DCF Secretary Bob Butterworth acknowledges the state bears some responsibility for helping families overcome the behavioral challenges posed by adopted children with therapeutic problems. The department and state lawmakers should craft a plan that identifies - and funds - the needs of children who need intensive therapy.

After all, it's better to treat troubled children in loving homes than to fund more group homes or treatment facilities.

Besides, uprooting children who lack stability in life can further impair their self-esteem.

As it stands, the state offers limited support. Adoptive children receive Medicaid coverage, and families receive a small stipend - less than $12 a day, a rate that has not changed in two years. But mental health treatment or residential services can run tens of thousands of dollars a year.

Those who are critical of Bostock say she should have better understood what she was getting into. The boy was 4 when he was adopted and 9 when she began telling the state that he posed a danger to her family.

An unsympathetic public attitude fails to recognize that children exposed to drugs and alcohol in the womb or abused or neglected as babies may not act out until they are much older, which is also when they're bigger and more dangerous.
Adoptive families deserve community support, not criticism, for admitting their love alone was not enough to overcome the damage done to abused children.

Bostock - and other families like hers - should be heard and helped, not scorned.

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