Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Special Need's Children and NH DCYF

As many of you may, or may not know, the month of September included special education week, for all the special needs children out there. This includes the many children without issues until DCYF/CPS got their clutches into them and these same children are now considered special needs kids. Many of whom are now being fed psychotropic medication for their newfound behaviors resulting from DCYF involvement.
There are also many children out there whom DCYF denies as having problems and there are reports of DCYF accepting social security check's for these children, while still claiming that the child/children are normal. And my story today mentions one of those children!
I am aware of an adopted child who tried several times to harm and kill his adoptive family and tried to burn their house down. The adoptive mother already could see that the child had special needs as he had difficulty learning colors, difficulty with buttons, zippers, getting dressed, task follow through, etc, and with behaviors. This same child also reported experiencing hallucinations which called him and his family members and told him to hurt others. The mother took him to outpatient providers who stated that the child had RAD and PTSD and other diagnoses and although he received outpatient help, he continued to show aggressive behaviors. The outpatient providers advised her to take him to a local emergency room when he reported the hallucinations. The mother brought her child to a local emergency room where the child was admitted to a NH state child psychiatric hospital, who kept this child inpatient for 4 months, while stating that the child was perfectly normal (what's interesting is that this hospital is supposed to be a short stay only hospital). The mother was concerned that the child was behaving aggressively to his family during phonecalls and visits and the hospital allowed the 5 yr old child to refuse visits and phonecalls. The child continued to talk about making fires and drew pictures on his tee-shirts of a person's head on fire. The hospital said that all of this was just normal behavior. The child reported that he was allowed to room with teenage children and have later bedtimes during this hospital stay. The mother knew her child needed psychiatric help, and this mother wrote a letter stating that there should be a safe discharge plan, as the outpatient providers had recommended a placement outside of the home until the child could learn to behave safely at home and the hospital was in process of sending the child home despite the recommendations of the outpatient providers. The mother did write the letter stating that a safe discharge plan was needed and the result was that NH DCYF took the child into custody from the hospital, via an ex-parte hearing on the day of his hospital discharge. NH DCYF stated to the court that there was nothing wrong with this child, although he had a repeated history of agressive behavior, including trying to strangle his sibling and attempting to jump out of their car enroute to trips/errands.
DCYF took the mother to court and claimed that her child was perfectly normal, and they placed him in a foster home and filed for the Social Security benefits for the child (these social security benefits had begun during the child's inpatient hospital stay, as the government declared that this child was mentally disabled/mentally ill.) DCYF stated to social security that the mother nor any family member's wanted this child, which wasn't true and NH DCYF didn't contact immediate family to even ask if the child could stay with them. DCYF and the foster families collected and cashed the child's social security check's for months, still claiming there was nothing wrong with the child. The mother was alleged of having Munchausen's, which was very quickly proven false. The child's hospital records from the state run child psychiatric hospital showed that the child sexually assaulted another child at the hospital among other incidences of aggressive behavior, but God only know's if this child's parent's were ever told. The psychiatric hospital didn't tell the offender's mother. She only found out about this incident after she was able to read the hospital files, approximately a year later. And DCYF also claimed that the child was at or above grade level and not in need of an IEP. When the mother went to the state run psychiatric hospital to obtain this child's hospital school records a few months after his hospital discharge, she was informed that his school files were destroyed, but she was informed by the hospital staff that the child got all 100's on his school work. And the child harmed the foster family because his aggressive behaviors continued.
The mother fought DCYF for a year and finally won. The neglect charges were dropped and her son was returned, but he had not received the medical help he needed for the past year and his behaviors had become even worse. And even when her child was returned, our own court system refused to recognize this child as a child in need of services. Instead he was denied services and was referred to as a juvenile delinquent!
The mother moved out of state, after losing everything due to DCYF's unwanted involvement. Her child was placed in a facility in the state she now resided in. The facility did testing on the child, something NH DCYF failed to do. The child was found to have RAD, PTSD and FAS amongst several other mental issues, and was also found to be educationally handicapped which resulted in him receiving the title 1 reading, title 1 math, one on one help with schoolwork and smaller group settings that he needed all along, and there has been no time when this child got all 100's, even with all of the help he's received. And the child has been recognized as a mentally ill child and a child in need of services! The mother was told that since the child could not display safe behaviors, he should not go home.
So this is the life of a child from NH, who was not given the psychiatric help his mother pleaded for, which could have made a big difference in the life of this child, had he gotten the treatment he needed year's earlier. He is not the only special needs child in NH being denied his constitutional rights by the state to receive the care he needed to live a normal life. There are many others like this child. There are also many other parents like the parent I've told you about. Parents should be in charge of the wellbeing, health, medical and education of the child instead of the state of NH being in charge. With the state being in charge of our kids' health/wellbeing/education instead of the parents, the parents may be charged with neglect if they fight for the rights of their children. Then there are normal children, illegally taken from their families, who end up severely traumatized and medicated because DCYF doesn't have a clue as to the needs of a child. They medicate them instead, because they don't know how to a handle a child that they've torn from their families, illegally. If they don't understand the mind of a child, they shouldn't be drugging them to calm them down. But then how would they be reeling in so much federal money if they didn't incapacitate normal, sometimes hyperactive children?
ALL children are special gifts from God and should all be treated equally and they shouldn't be denied their rights because they have been taken into "the NH DCYF system". Their lives are just as important as anyone else's and they deserve to have an education, and prompt medical treatment. And of course, they have the right to be with their families and shouldn't lose that right because of NH DCYF or anyone else!

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