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Parents Abandoning Their Children


Lil Red

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Safe haven laws are laws that allow parents to abandon thier child at a certain place.
They are designed to help desperate mothers, like teen mothers especially, to be able to leave thier newborns at safe places, like hospitals and police departments, where they will be take in and put up for adoption, no questions asked.

The laws are put in place to try and help women who wold otherwise just abandon thier child in a dumpster on prom night... that kind of thing. The laws are there to try and protect innocent babies from being abandoned to die by desperate or ill prepared mothers.

IN most of these laws there is a an age limit specfied: most of the time it is within days or weeks or being born. However in this law neglected to specify only stating "the child".
Legally that means any child up to age 18, the age when you are considered an adult in the eyes of the law, can be abandoned.

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you have to understand that to understand the law with this detail these parents MUST understand the implications that their actions bring.

The children that were reported to be out of control. How do you fix a child going down the wrong path? Love, attention, therepy and lots of it. What happens when you just have love? A poor mother or father who cannot give the attention becuase they are working and certainly cannot give the therepy because they can't afford it. A child who's suffering from drug problems or mentally illness could belong in a RTC a residential therpy home....a place where they can get away from drgs, have constant therepy, and have a chance to heal. A poor parent (or even a middle class one) has almost no chance in the world to help their child recover.

However, a child that is a ward of the state can recieve all these benefits for free. But a parent can't just sign their child over to the state so the state will help them. That is neglect and a parent wold go to jail. Unfortunately, there are cases where a parent allowed neglect charges to be filed against them simply so social services would be forced to place the child in the facility they needed.

Even in not-despriate cases, getting a child therepy is near impossible. The children who lost their mother needed therepy, help, hope, love and attention. Something that a greiving father with an infant and young children to worry about couldn't give all of his nine...or perhaps any of his nine...children. I'm more disgusted that society would let this family fall so far that this would be an option. And while the children now have an additonal huge wound they will probably get the help they needed in the first place.

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The man that abandoned the 9 children apparently has 10 children. He kept the oldest, an 18 year old
His wife died after the 10th child was born. Has has been unable to find work for some time as I understand. Still there must have been something he could have done outside of just abandoning them.

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Don John of Austria

[quote name='zabbazooey' post='1664805' date='Sep 26 2008, 11:54 PM']Very interesting views! I'm still in school but I mainly subscribe to the (whispers) Constructivist theories :)[/quote]


I am at a Constructivist school..... I have presented Anti-constructivist workshops. It is hard.

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:sadder: There are so many parents who can't cope. Life is really hard for single parents, but it's harder for abandoned kids and separated siblings. :sadder:

Last weekend my hubby brought a 17 year old boy home. He'd been sleeping outside the shops in our n'hood. Turns out I know his Mum from church. She had kicked him out hoping 'social services' would take him in, but they don't want to know. She's a single Mum with 4 other younger kids; his behavioural problems were taking too much of her time and she risked losing her job. I can see that all she needs is a break, and someone like a male role model to talk to her son. But when people are that upset, they can't see any other way out than to abandon their child. :sadder: We've grown to love this kid this past week and we're praying that he can get some support to make his own way.
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There was a politician in the Tampa Bay area that had adopted a troubled child. He became more and more disturbed, and when he hit teen years, he got violent. When he began threatening the other kids in the house, she tried getting him help. They couldn't afford the good help, so they went through all the cheap/free help, and it wasn't enough. She finally made the decision to return him to the state. As a ward of the state, he could get the long term help he needed. She was torn apart in the press because of it. I guess she was allowed to return him without facing charges because he had been adopted, not sure. I heard of couples being forced to divorce so that they could qualify for medicaid to get help for a troubled or sick child. It's just so sad.

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[quote name='Selah' post='1666245' date='Sep 29 2008, 12:31 PM']Sick.

Bottom line, peeps: If you aren't ready for kids, don't have them.[/quote]

I don't think these are necessarly people who shouldn't have kids. as mentioned above these are desprate parents trying to do what they can when the system dosn't believe in helping them. These are single parents who need help, but there isn't help out there. A 13yo who's probably drinking, sexin' and druggin who needs help, yet when insurance runs up (if it exists) thats it. no more help. The guy just lost his wife and has 10 kids to take care of. People probably forgot about him and his crisis a couple months after the tragedy. I'm betting that he was a very good father and he was ready for kids. Just not ready to handle 10 children all alone. Its the parents who think they know everything and don't need any help that worry me more than those that do something like this.

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[quote name='Autumn Dusk' post='1666280' date='Sep 29 2008, 12:45 PM']I don't think these are necessarly people who shouldn't have kids. as mentioned above these are desprate parents trying to do what they can when the system dosn't believe in helping them. These are single parents who need help, but there isn't help out there. A 13yo who's probably drinking, sexin' and druggin who needs help, yet when insurance runs up (if it exists) thats it. no more help. The guy just lost his wife and has 10 kids to take care of. People probably forgot about him and his crisis a couple months after the tragedy. I'm betting that he was a very good father and he was ready for kids. Just not ready to handle 10 children all alone. Its the parents who think they know everything and don't need any help that worry me more than those that do something like this.[/quote]

agreed. There needs to be more community resources with easy access for these families.

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