In this site I hope you will find the resources, guidance, and the information to help you to be a better educated and knowledgable parent. You are your child's best advocate for what services and supports are needed to help him or her grow into a productive and independent member of society. I hope to be able to help you learn from my experiences, both good and bad, and help you to see there are truly honest and caring folks out there to assist you in your endeavors. It is my sincere desire to provide you with the most up to date and effective resources and aids available today. My information will be as simple and as straight-forward as I can make it to facilitate the use by novices and pros alike. Some of us may not be as computer literate as others, I will endeavor to make this site as user friendly as is possible. I will be happy to answer any and all questions you may have, e-mail me at any time to discuss the issues familyadvocate@yahoo.com. I have added links to my favorite sites that were most helpful when I was just a newbie at all this. Even the veterans of the net may find something here that you haven't seen before. Feel free to copy and distribute or forward the information presented here to anyone you feel may be able to use it. I don't copyright any of my work and it's free to all who choose to use it to help them and others better understand our children. I hope you will visit this site again as I plan to continually update with new information and links to those sites containing the latest developments and aids for our little ones. Please sign my guestbook and send me an e-mail if you wish. You input and comments will assist me in refining my site and helping all of us in the long run.
This web site is dedicated to my two sons, Christopher and Ryan. Both my boys have been very neglected by the system that is supposed to help us as parents to help our children. You are about to read an un-abridged version of our history as it is today. The information presented here is factual. I don't believe in hiding the truth to protect the guilty, and I call it as it is and as it happened.
Christopher had some problems in the first grade, but I didn't put too much into it. You see, I didn't know then there was much to this ADD stuff. I simply passed it off as my son wasn't challenged enough by his teacher. I knew he was quite bright and felt that his classwork was just not much of a challenge to him. His teacher seemed more interested in just keeping the kids quiet rather than to educate them. I was soon to learn more than I ever expected at this stage in my life.
The marriage to his mother ended in June of 1996 when he and his two other siblings and myself were deserted by the mother without warning. I went seeking advice and help for us and was advised by my attorney to seek professional counseling since the children were exibiting no signs of loss at the disappearance of their mother. Before I could get them into counseling, the in-laws got involved and decided to make "momma" fight me for the kids. She had other ideas and plans, so the result was her family conspired to have me arrested on false and malicious charges so that they might get them and leave town. Within three weeks I was arrested at gunpoint in the presence of my children and we were all carted off to the county jail. The children were placed into the custody of the Child Protective Service in our town, and I sat in jail for three days. After the customary investigations and home studies by Protective Services, the children were returned to my custody. I got them enrolled in school and we got on with the process of re-building our lives. Through interactions with parents and the staff at the school, I learned that both my boys were having behavioral problems and difficulties in class. I also met another parent who was later to become my new wife and step-mother to the children. We had been through counseling with both the boys and were told that everything was fine, just two "normal" growing boys. The teachers had a different perspective though, as did we as parents, and we decided to talk with the pediatrician. This led to diagnosis of both boys as Attention Deficit Disorder, Hyperactive Type. During summer vacation from school, I was offered a job in another state, and we moved.
Shortly after moving, the problems increased, and we were forced to seek more entensive services from the psychiatric community. Both boys were admitted to Mountainview Psychiatric Hospital in Gadsden, Al. for evaluation. Again, we ran into more of the same, "they're fine, it's you folks who are the problem" kind of thing. Knowing in my heart this was just not sufficient, we sought out help from other sources. I was later to learn just how much trouble can be caused by a manipulative and high IQ'ed child when sufficiently provoked. Chris was sent to Big Oak Boys Ranch, a facility that specializes in helping troubled boys. The staff there had indicated to us they could and would help us help him. Ryan went to a private setting for further evaluation based on the instincts of one of the professionals at the hospital.
Christopher's stay at Big Oak lasted three weeks. He was kicked out for the severity of his behavioral problems, and for the risk he posed to the facility as a whole. We were advised that he was in need of some serious help. That led to his admission into another psychiatric hospital, Hillcrest Behavioral Institute in Birmingham. The staff there also indicated a high degree of knowledge and willingness to assist us. They told us he would be evaluated and sent on to a treatment center. That didn't happen. Again, he was labeled as "fine" and we were labeled as "dysfunctional" because we couldn't make an eight year old child mind. (Any of this beginning to sound familiar?)He was discharged back home with a recommendation for outpatient therapy.
During his stay at Hillcrest, I and his step-mother had been on the phone trying to locate resources for him and us as a family. Every one of the places we contacted told us they were not equipped to deal with a child with his degree and severity of problems, except one. The only facility who was willing to accept him required a Department of Human Resources referral. That led us our fateful contact with the state of Alabama.
Alabama DHR passed us off to the county Mental Health office, who passed us back to DHR, both agencies claiming it was the other one's responsibility. Finally, after being repeatedly lied to and about, I demanded action on the part of the Human Resources Office. I was allowed to place my son in their care under a "Voluntary Boarding Home Agreement", ostensibly, while the paperwork was prepared to gain his admission into the Daniel House facility. A short time later I was served papers by the Sheriff's Office ordering me to appear in Court. I was being sued for custody of my child on the grounds he was dependent. In case you aren't familiar with this legalistic term, it means the child has no home, or anyone who wants to provide a home for him. The state had begun its attack. I got a court appointed attorney and filled her in on the circumstances surrounding this issue. It was made appearant to me that we were going to fight the state and get the help I was seeking for my child. That was not to be the case at all.
On the day of the hearing, I was advised by my attorney to allow the state to prevail in order to get what I was seeking for my child. In effect, I was to agree my child was "dependent" and I was a bad parent. Against my better judgement, I went along with her advice. Biggest mistake I ever made. Not only has my son NOT received any meaningful help, but my family has really been through the ringer.
Here we are now, over a year later, and we are still fighting. My son's behavior has been left un-treated and his condition has worsened as a result. It has resulted in my having to fire the attorney and go it on my own. In doing so, I have learned a great deal about just how far the Child Protection Industry will go to achieve their ends. By representing myself, they have had to turn over all the documents and the case records to me personally. Otherwise, I would never have had a clue just how bad things really are. The case file documents from the first day of his residing in their shelter home the need for psychiatric help for him, and the severity of his problems. DHR neglected to do anything about those records and requests for help. The caseworker has consistently and vehemently denied that there was anything out of the ordinary about my son's actions and behaviors. The houseparents were telling me a different story during my visits with him. Who was I to believe? The caseworker was telling me it was all "my" fault, and that my son was "fine" in their care. I was a dysfunctional parent, and so was my family. The houseparents were telling me about all the fights, the stealing, the lying, the open defiance of rules and common sense, etc. What was going on here? I had talked to my attorney and asked for assistance and advice and was told that I couldn't control the actions of the Alabama Dept. of Human Resources, and I had better just play by their rules if I ever wanted to see my son again. Something about this equation didn't set right, so I started digging.
After much effort and countless hours spent behind the computer, I began to get an education. I was beginning to learn and understand what I was dealing with. My son was in fact having some REAL problems, and, it WASN'T my fault. Nothing I did or failed to do had any effect what ever on the outcome of this current state of affairs. My son had a serious neurological and behavioral disorder that wasn't going to get any better until he received competent and knowledgable help. Key word here, competent. Everyone I had been dealing with so far had managed to pass the buck and make me believe it was me with the problem all along, or my wife. No one was willing to call my son into account for his actions and hold him responsible. I was told "That's too much to put on an eight year old child" by one of the caseworkers. The child we are dealing with here has an IQ of 121. He knows what he's doing, he just can't stop it alone. He needs help.
The case file also goes on to document the extent DHR has gone to villify me and my family. I now have a criminal record that I was previously un-aware of. Yes folks, I was arrested and convicted of a criminal offence; in another state; and never knew about it until I got those records delivered into my hands. I have also been made out to be the most vile and atrocious person one could imagine all because I refused to tell them where my other son was. In doing so, that makes me guilty of trying to hide some deep dark secret about me and my family. DHR went behind my back and interviewed the other children's teachers at school and attempted to get the teachers to "convict" us of something. We were forced to move out of the state in order to escape these tactics. The child protective service will stop at nothing to achieve their chosen course of action. Facts mean nothing to them. They know everything and see everything. You are a criminal and there's something wrong with you if you come to them for help. You don't deserve your child and are incapable of providing for them. They must come in and take them from you. The disturbed children of the world must not be held back by ignorant parents.
Parents, your best avenue of approach is to educate yourselves. By not telling Alabama DHR where my other son was, and acting out of my insticts, I was able to get a definitive diagnosis of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome for him. Now, I knew I was on the right course. Had I given away his location, they would have taken him as well. Now, I can do something for this child. He is in a special education class, is doing very well, and has an outstanding chance for success in the future. Ryan is lucky. His degree of FAS isn't as severe as it could have been. He does have behavioral problems, but that is being managed by medications and other interventions. His brother Chris is still in trouble. He is still in the custody of the State of Alabama, and his behavioral problems have worsened to the point he has had to be moved to another home.
The Dept. of Human Resources is now clamoring for placements for him due to the risk he now poses to them. He has been allowed to wallow in his problems without help for so long now, that he has gotten nearly un-controllable. He was moved to protect another child from being harmed any more by him. All this time I was being told my son was fine and I and the rest of the family were to blame. From what I can gather from recent conversations with the caseworker, Alabama DHR is now worried that he may seriously harm another child and place an unwanted risk of liability on them. That didn't seem to matter when it was me and my family at risk. Had his behavior at home degenerated to this point and he hurt one of the other children, or a classmate in school, the liability risk would have been on my shoulders. That would have resulted in the removal of all the children from the home for my negligence in having a known dangerous child in my home. Catch 22. You can't get help for your child, so you keep him at home. He hurts someone, you are at fault for having him in your home. You try to get help, and you loose your child, and risk loosing any other children as well. How? Well, they've already taken one due to "dependence" why should you be allowed to keep the rest?
That's what I've been dealing with for the past year folks. That's why I have designed this web site. To help you educate yourself and avoid the pitfalls of the Social Services Agencies and the "Child Protectors". These people act before they gather the facts. Then, if the facts don't square with the case as written up, they change the facts to suit themselves and cover up for their failures. Children and families are destroyed in the process, and the "system" goes on. It's self-perpetuating. Until it becomes a national disaster of "newsworthy" proportions, nothing is ever going to be done about it. The "child protectors" have been found guilty of devising all sorts of "facts" about families and parents. Especially vulnerable are the single parents, most assuredly, single fathers with custody of their children. In the minds of the "protectors", the only reason a "father" would want custody of his children is because he is a sexual predator and a child molestor. Doubt what I say? Look it up on the net. You will find any number of references to false accusations that have been perpetrated by the "protectors" in the name of protecting the children. In fact, the charge of molestation has become the favorite tactic of divorce lawyers and Social Service agents.
How do you protect yourself and get the help you are so desperately seeking for your child? EDUCATION. You have to decide if your child is worth your time and effort to gain an education about his or her disorder. If so, then you have made a very important and wise decision. The life you save just may be your own, not to mention that of your child. We read nearly every day now of this or that child who has murdered or caused some kind of serious bodily harm to family members and others. Why has this happened? Because another family or child was allowed to fall through the cracks. How does this happen? Either out of ignorance of the facts, or just plain arrogance on the part of the professionals. If you are lucky, you may find one psycologist who will admit when they are in over their skills and abilities and will refer you to someone else. Most likely, you won't. I haven't seen it happen to me yet. For instance, the most recent psycologist I made an appointment with for my fetal alcohol son assured me she knew all about that area of practice, and that she was more than competent to guide my child. Well, that wasn't true. I soon found out she didn't have a clue about fetal alcohol children. She couldn't grasp the widely known fact that these children just don't understand and comprehend cause and effect relationships. What's that? If you say, "Don't play in the street, you may get hit with a car", the FAS child hears you, but it doesn't "click". He goes into the street anyway. If he gets hit, it's your fault because you weren't attentive and were negligent. Never mind the fact you took your eyes off him for the moment to take dinner out of the oven. This particular psycologist just couldn't understand that. When you try to educate them, your information doesn't count because you aren't "degreed" as they are. Fire this person as fast as you can and find someone else.
ALWAYS remember, you are the single most reliable and best educated person there is about your individual child's needs and difficulties. Just because he or she "doesn't exibit that kind of behavior in our setting", doesn't minimize it or make it go away. Find another professional to work with. You wouldn't take your car back to the same mechanic time after time for the same problem would you? I didn't think so. It's the same with a "mechanic" for your child. Learn to see through all the smoke and mirrors, and know when you are being tricked or lied to. Learn to speak their language, and don't allow yourself to be overly impressed with their "credentials" or their mastery of the psycobabble they use. If you don't fully and completely understand what someone just said, ask them to put it in a language you CAN understand. Could you understand everything I have written on this web site if it was in a foreign language? My point exactly. It isn't that hard to learn what you need to know from the internet. That's how I have learned to help my kids. Go to the library and check out some books on child health issues. Read up on it and educate yourself. As a parent, you have already learned that you never stop learning, and your child teaches you something new today you didn't know yesterday. So, teach yourself how to help your child in the way that they need your help.
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