This is a hard story to write, and a long one, but bare with me. My kids were put into foster care three times within about 4 years or so. I'm hoping they were young enough that it's just kind of a distant memory and didn't do them lasting harm. I know it was a nightmare that almost killed me.
The first time was in a dinky town in the NC mountains. Sgt, Hubby was 19 months into a Germany/Kosovo tour. When I tell people I didn't go to Germany I usually say it was because I had a toddler and a newborn and he would be spending most of his time in Kosovo and I did not want to try to single parent in a foreign country. That's a lie. I didn't even know he would be going to Kosovo. I didn't go to Germany because I wanted out of my marriage.
He was, at the time, a mean drunk, terribly verbally abusive, and a passive-aggressive gaslighter. His nightly habit was to come home -- usually late. Often he'd stay at work past business hours and knock back a few beers. It was his "me" time. Then once he got home he would complain about how the house wasn't clean enough. He'd refuse to eat the dinner I had made him, opting instead for a stack of ham sandwiches and knock back a few more -- average about a half case nightly. Then he'd pick a fight for no reason. Just poke at me. Poke and poke and poke until all resolve to stay calm and not let myself be provoked was worn down and I would LOSE MY SHIT on him. Then he'd call me a crazy, out of control bitch and calmly go to bed (happy now that he had succeeded in proving that *I* was the crazy one) while I would sit in the living room crying so hard it made me nauseous.
When he got orders for Germany, they fucked something up (big surprise the Army fucked something up, yeah?) and we did not receive concurrent travel orders. He had to go ahead without me and wait for housing to open up for us. So I took the boys -- the oldest just barely two and the baby only 6 weeks -- and went to my mom's in a tiny little town outside of Asheville, NC.
After about a month or so of not being constantly insulted and yelled at, I decided I kind of liked it that way and told him I wasn't following. I didn't tell him I wanted to leave altogether because I needed his paycheck to survive. I suggested he switch his status to unaccompanied to shorten to tour to two years instead of four and use that time to get his shit together.
During the 19 months between his departure and the boys' departure, life was pretty unstable. We moved several times. When I decided to stay in NC I moved out of my mom's house and into my own little apartment. I spent months doing nothing but caring for the boys and staring at walls. (This was the time period I laid in the bathtub staring down a bottle of percocet wanting so badly to swallow them all, but couldn't bring myself to it knowing there would be nobody to make breakfast for the boys in the morning.)
I knew something had to change. I went to the local social services office and got approved for childcare vouchers. I applied to the community college 45 minutes away in Asheville, did all the financial paperwork and got in-state tuition status so a Pell grant would fully fund my return to school, and registered for classes. Things were going well and I finally felt like maybe I was really a person.
Then a series of unbelievable things happened. I got evicted from that apartment because the neighbor stole my ATM card and drained my account and bounced my rent and bailed on hers -- same landlord -- so he was already pissed off. Moved back in with mom.
On my way into school one morning I slipped on some ice and hurt my knee pretty badly. I could barely walk on it but I still kept going to class. Then the baby got sick. He was croupy and running a fever so I took him to the local clinic. He had pneumonia and RSV, which in younger babies is often fatal. At the same office visit the doc offered to x-ray my knee -- I'd cracked my patella.
Then the brakes went out on my truck. Sick baby. Broken knee. No transportation. Mom guilt tripping me about leaving the boys in daycare in the first place -- I mean if you're not going to stay home and raise your kids why even have them? I quit school.
The next several months were chaotic. My mom lost HER lease so we found another place to live. She decided she needed to live with me because I needed her help. (She wasn't much help, but she was fairly financially dependant on me.) Then the people renting the house she owned (inherited from my father's parents) moved out so we all moved there and she made me pay rent, while still mostly supporting her.
During this time she was in and out quite a bit. She'd take long trips to Tennessee to see her own ailing mother. And to get away from me. She told me I was a taker -- an emotional drain -- and she couldn't handle living with me. The movie Girl, Interrupted had recently made its big splash and she decided I had borderline personality disorder. My mom loves an armchair diagnosis.
It was while she was in Tennessee that a neighbor reported me to DSS because the toddler was playing outside by himself (we had a really nice yard and it was a lovely, safe neighborhood) and my car -- which was in the shop for clutch repair -- was gone. She thought I'd left the kids alone.
So the DSS lady shows up at my door and obviously I'm there because I answer the door, so the kids hadn't been left alone. She got all motherly on me and asked me how I was really doing. Like an idiot I told her. She used all of it against me and a few days later my kids were in custody.
They came for them just after I'd settled them down for bed. They brought cops. I screamed and cried and begged while the cops held me back. A pair of social workers carried my barely awake, crying, confused babies out to their waiting car.
It was a long summer. I really, really, REALLY wanted to die. Two things comprised my identity -- being a wife and being a mother. My marriage had failed so there was that gone. And now here was the state telling me my soul remaining reason for existing was a fail. I had no purpose, no identity. I had no job, no friends, no social support system. Because I was the only responsible adult 24/7 I had absolutely no life outside of parenting. I drove really fast without a seatbelt all summer hoping I'd crash and die. I fantasized about driving off of overpasses.
I got to visit the boys weekly. I met often with my court appointed lawyer and jumped through all of their hoops -- parenting classes, therapy, I eventually got a job a Subway just to say I had a job. I'd go to my court hearing every month and same result every time -- I am an unfit mother.
Sgt Hubby came home in August. The judge who'd been presiding over the case went against DSS recommendations and gave the kids back with the agreement that we seek help when we arrived at our next duty station. It still fucking gets me that *I* was the bad parent -- me, the victim of severe emotional abuse. They gave the kids back when the brave hero (abusive alcoholic) who'd come back to take control of the little lady who had obviously lost it.
So we go to next duty station. Fort Fucking Polk, Louisiana. I don't leave him as I'd planned because staying with him was the only way I could keep my kids. Nothing changes. He works long hours to avoid coming home. He either shuts me out or gets drunk and yells at me on a nightly basis. I find out I'm pregnant again and so sick that for a month all I can keep down is lime sherbet and Sprite. The nausea doesn't let up after the first trimester. (It didn't with the boys either. I threw up daily throughout all three pregnancies.)
Still though, I reach out for help. I have an appointment with psyche services before we are even out of temporary housing. I call the parish (Louisiana doesn't have counties and that's just weird) office for child development and try to get my oldest assessed because I know something isn't right. They say the waiting list is months long but they can put the two year old in an early intervention program that meets one morning a week. I take him when I am unsick enough to drive. The oldest is such a behavioral issue that after our first session, he isn't allowed to attend with his brother and I have to leave the baby there by himself.
It's a matter of weeks before DCWS (every state has their own acronym) gets a call -- FROM THE TEACHER AT THE EARLY INTERVENTION PROGRAM WHERE I WENT FOR HELP -- because the four year old had a black eye and a bloody nose (he used to run around with a blanket on his head pretending he was a monster and he ran into the door frame, and his nose used to bleed constantly because he'd pick it) and alleging that I had no demonstrable parenting skills because of the 4 year old's behavior.
We are instructed to take the boys in for a physical exam. I throw a fit because IT CONFLICTS WITH THE FOLLOW UP PSYCHE APPOINTMENT I'D BEEN WAITING MONTHS FOR. The doctor does not find any evidence to conclude physical abuse. Notes that the oldest has a history of nose bleeds already in his medical records. DCWS calls DSS in NC and gets THEIR side of the story.
The boys are taken from us at the hospital. Two MP's have to hold me back because I lunge across the desk at the social worker.
The DCWS lady tells the judge that I'd been told in NC to seek help and had failed to do so (the case was reported by the early intervention lady BECAUSE I ASKED FOR HELP and the lying DCWS bitch had access to the kids' medical records showing that we'd made an appointment with behavioral health before we'd even moved out of temporary housing and KNEW the physical exam conflicted with the follow up). THE FUCK PEOPLE???
We go to the adjudication hearing that's supposed to take place within 24 hours but takes a week because of system backlog. My lawyer recommends I don't take the stand in case I say something that contradicts something I say at a later hearing. (Which would be a thing if I planned on lying, which I didn't.) He knew there'd be a later hearing because, well, if the state wants your kids they'll keep them.
Our first real hearing was supposed to be 30 days but it was more like 3 months because of system backlog, again. Between the nausea from the pregnancy and the depression from having the boys gone, I was pretty much catatonic unless Sgt Hubby, during the times he was sober and caring, made me get out of the house to go for a drive or take a walk or have a picnic or something. Mostly I slept or stared at walls. We couldn't afford cable and didn't have a TV.
Again we jumped through the hoops. I went to therapy. For some reason HE wasn't required to go to therapy, just me. We went through three different parenting classes. We had weekly supervised visits with the kids. The oldest would have nothing to do with me. (He was angry that I'd abandoned him.) It was noted that I had a cold relationship with my son.
We got the kids back -- again against the recommendation of DCWS -- at the first real hearing because the judge said he didn't see that there was any more help that we could get. But we stayed under their supervision the entire four years we were there. We kept trying to get help through military psyche services. Both boys were diagnosed with garden variety ADHD and put on medication that set them on a daily cycle of zombie/monster -- zombie when it kicked in and monster when it wore off.
We had trouble with the school the entire time. Both boys had behavior issues and were repeatedly disciplined. The state of Lousisana as late as 2006 still condoned corporal punishment. I don't know if they still do or not. I begged to have the boys reassessed but all they would do was affirm a combination of ADHD and bad parenting.
In July of we got news that in September we were moving to Georgia. In the midst of outprocessing, the younger boy had a really bad day. He lost his flipflops (which he was told not to take off) in the car on the way to the outprocessing center. He wass not allowed to go with daddy into the outprocessing center because he had no shoes. I stayed in the car with him. He screamed and raged and kicked. He was not allowed to go with daddy into our next stop -- the bank -- because he was in the middle of a rage fit, causing further rage fit.
Daddy drops us off at home and goes back to work, leaving me with this raging monster -- 99th percentile for height and weight at 5 years old, (he is 6'6" now at 18 with size 18 feet), strong as an ox and wanting to fight.
I do everything I can think of. I try to sit him in a timeout. Nope. I send him to his room for a nap. He throws furniture. (I'm telling you, this was a STRONG child). My very last resort is to spank him. I've run out of options. I get daddy's belt because I'm afraid I will miss or hit too hard or somehow lose control of my hands. I try to hold him down to get a good swat at his butt but he twists just so the belt hits his neck and leaves a big fucking welt.
I call our caseworker immediately to report what happened. I'm in tears. He comes over and assesses things. Helps me calm the kid down and tells me it's gonna be okay. (Not all social workers are evil.)
Of course his teacher reports the mark and the same lying bitch that took them the first time gets the case. Our caseworker begs her not to take them. Tries to explain the situation. She's not having it.
Even though it was just the one who had the mark and the physical exam concluded no evidence of any other physical abuse, all three kids are removed. I don't fight this time. I know there's no point. I double over, sobbing, aching, empty as hell, sick to my stomach.
We get in the car and drive so far we end up miles into Texas. We drive until after midnight. We find an open Dairy Queen, get ice cream cones, and head back home.
It's another week until our 24 hour hearing. I spend the entire week crying and don't get out of bed. This time I don't follow the advice of THE SAME DAMN COURT APPOINTED LAWYER and insist I take the stand. We leave court with the kids. The judge -- the same judge as before -- was an old southern boy who knew about being taken behind the woodshed and he believed my story.
So we move to Georgia. To the big city. I mean, they have a Target and ethnic food and an actual downtown and multiple grocery stores that aren't WalMart. Both boys are noted as behavioral problems within the first days of starting their new school. The school psychologist, who hasn't actually met the child, thinks my 2nd grader fits the profile for Autism.
We immediately seek out civilian psyche services. The psychiatrist arranges comprehensive testing. We find out just weeks before his 9th birthday that he is way up on the spectrum. Eventually all three kids end up with a diagnosis. The oldest, Autism. The other two severe ADHD and Intermittent Explosive Disorder. (The 5 year old who threw that fit ended up breaking my knee during another violent tantrum when he was 15.)
DFAS (more acronyms) is involved on and off for most of the next 8 years.
I found out later that ASD families are almost always involved with child services at some point and having undiagnosed kids put in custody isn't uncommon. If your family doesn't look right -- if your kids don't act right -- something must be wrong, and if you don't have that doctor's note, you MUST be what's wrong.
So, I know what it feels like to be separated from my kids. I know what it feels like to be separated from my kids while I am doing everything I can to advocate for them and give them the best life possible. Which is what these parents seeking asylum are doing -- they're coming here to find safety and give their kids a shot at life.
I got to see my kids. I knew they were safe. I knew I would get them back. I still wanted to die. It was often a hard fight not to give in. I can only imagine how much worse it is for these parents having their kids ripped away at the border, not knowing where they are, or if they're safe, or if they will ever even see them again. And my heart is breaking for them.
I know this was a long, hard read. Thank you for sticking with it. And fight like hell to stop this atrocity. Families belong together.
