to wonder why these parents did this?

[mummycake]

I have recently heard about a case in America where a lady who had adopted a child from Russia sent him back due to her not being able to cope with his special needs and behavioural issues and the fact that apparently she was misinformed about his issues.
This has led me to think of a child who was once at a special school I worked at who was adopted at the age of 9 weeks and brought up by two loving parents.
At the age of 5/6 he displayed quite severe behavioural problems and due to the parents inability to cope they ended the adoption and put him back into care.
I often wonder what happened to the little lad and although I was not in their position and have friends who have adopted children who were later found to have behavioural issues and the whirlwind of emotions that they have gone through I often wonder if they would have put him up for care if he was their biological child.
I appreciate this is a controversial subject and I dont wont to be personally insulted as I am not doing this to cause controversy but would just like to share this story. I am sympathic to people who adopt children and obviously the children themselves as I do have some personal experience of it.
Do you think the parents needed a lot more support? Do you think on the limited amount of information givn here that they acted in their or the child's best interests?
Plese be kind to me

The thing that stand out with me is, HOW ON EARTH DID HE GO ON THE PLANE UNADDENDED

Their is laws and policies about underage travel. confused.com anyone?

it's a v complex subject, and one where it's hard to see how thing scan be done differently without resorting to a 'case by case' scenario.

i have known instances where the adoptive parents make quite naive (even selfish) decisions, e.g. take on 2 older siblings, and assuming that life will continue - no career break, no mat. leave taken, just pick up the child & fit them into your routine. i ahve also seen people who are considering adoption being 'paired' with incredibly unlikely children by ss, e.g. one of two siblings, miles from where they've lived before, info on med./behavioural issues given AFTER the child arrives in the house.

it is heart breaking, and, of course, with every 'failure' that child suffers more. when adoption works it can be hugely beneficial, but the people involved are as complex and varied as the people involved in biological child-rearing.

thankfully, i know of more 'successful' adoptions than otherwise, ones where it's worked so well that it's a non-issue.

She probably paid a huge surcharge for him to travel as an unaccompanied minor. The stewards would have seated him in reserved seating and taken care of him according to airline protocols. As a US citizen (this happens upon adoption before anyone can take a child back to the US with them), he would have needed a visa to go to Russia, even though he was born there, and I don't know how he got past passport control without one.

She paid for someone (stranger from the internet) to meet him in Moscow.

Another thing that strikes me about the matter is that for a violent child with arsonist tendencies, nothing has been reported from the plane about any violent outbursts or trouble on board.

Thanks. Blimey.

Maybe I've been working with behaviorally disturbed children too long, but upon reading the article I thought, spitting, hiting? I was expecting an attempted poisoning or an actual arson or something!

I do know of a Russian boy whose adoption was disrupted here in Minnesota. I think it was a farming family that had adopted him, and he stabbed some cows to death w/a pitchfork and then threatened and/or actually tried to do the same to their other child. I cannot say what I would do in that situation, but I know that if I feared for my other child's life I would not allow the disturbed DC to remain in our home at the time. Was there nowhere that this woman could have sent him,though? There are therapeutic group homes all over the US, and she still could have remained his parent while he was helped. I do feel that what she did was abandonment and obviously reprehensible. But I also feel that the Russian government needs to delve into their adoption/orphanage program. They are justifiably upset by this woman's actions, but what are they doing to insure that the other children in need of homes are getting the help they need? I worked at a group home for six months and remember saw 5 children w/severe emotional detachment and other problems. They were all Russian adoptees.

Maryz, I'm so sorry you're not getting the support you need. I remember you posting about that awhile ago; I'm sorry to hear things have not improved. I know there's next to no chance I could do anything to help, but please do let me know if you think of anything, all right?

Oops, just remember. For some reason there's an extra saw floating around up there.

I think in the UK we tend not to favour international adoption and don't have really have links with other countries to make it easy for adoptive families. It seems as if in the US there are a lot of adoptions from Russia and judging from those Discovery Health programmes it appears to be an easier process than here. Admittedly, appearances can be deceptive. Adoption from abroad should be as hard as domestic adoption, maybe harder, to ensure adoptive families know what they are taking on.

It is sad though if Russia is halting all US adoption because I bet there are lots of American families who would provide wonderful, loving families and these children will now miss out because of what this woman did

I keep reading what the nearly-adopted Russian boy supposedly did... and it doesn't sound that bad what does that say about our family well, I can't help but think he sounds pretty much as expected given his background. In a bad moment my kids (very biological, sadly no excuses there, who don't have diagnosable problems like FAS) would kick off horribly about being denied toys/video games, or might threaten to damage the house. Tory-Ann H. was obviously very naive about lots of things, and not well-versed about FAS and attachment disorders, in spite of whatever medical training she had.

I heard about a family who raised a boy they thought was their own, to about age 5 -- when a mix-up was discovered, he was swapped with someone else's baby at the hospital where they were born. The very night the family found out they kicked him out and wanted nothing more to do with the lad. .

mathanxiety - its quite possible that Russia is like Kaz and the children retian their russian/Kaz passports until they are 18.

If DS ever trvels to Kazakhstan he leaves the UK on a UK passport, enters and leaves Kaz using his Kaz passort then re-enters the UK using his UK passport. He doesn't need a visa for either. I'm not sure of Russia but quite possible its the same.

Unless you have adopted yourself it is difficult to understand the difficulties involved in integrating a child into your family.

We went into adoption with our eyes open, discussed what we could/couldn't cope with, read loads of books, spoke to people etc etc. Eventually we decided to adopt a slightly older child rather than a baby/toddler as we felt their future development would be more evident at this age

We were matched with a seven year old girl-who we didn't get to meet at any time until she was told that we were her new parents.

Fortunately she was delightful and we immediately took to her. She was coping well at school and bright.

Once she was home I cannot tell you how difficult it was to bond with her. I used to lock myself in the bathroom and cry because I thought we had ruined our lives. My husband was a great support as I think his expectations were lower than mine and we decided we would make the best of things and that she deserved a lovely home.

She is now 14, I love her dearly and she is a wonderful girl.[with the usual teenage stroppiness thrown in]

Had she had major behavioural difficulties that we were not aware of or if we simply hadn't taken to her I'm not sure we would have kept going in the first few months and I can understand the American mother's feelings although not the way it was done.
It is so difficult and stressful that it is hard to think rationally.

I do not understand how you could send a child back into care after 5 years.

I do think with older child adoptions they would be more successful if there was some way of meeting the child informally before matching-there are some people that you just don't take to and continuing with an adoption in those circumstances is impossible in my opinion.

Sorry that was long and if some of it was irrelevant!

There was a case in Ireland a few years ago.Irish couple living in Phillipines-I think-adopted little boy from there.They thought they couldn't have biological children.Then wife falls pregnant,I think after they had litle boy for 2 years,which made him 4years old.They decided TO GIVE BACK first little boy! Story came out,people were shocked and disgusted.The parents were taken to court in the little boys name by some organisation in Ireland,and the boy one! He is entitled to his "inheritance"when he turns 18,and is to be provided for until then.He lives with his biological mum,who took him back as soon as they didn't require him any more.Taught them a very good lesson on respnsibility I thought! Twats!

Fouen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tristan_Dowsend link.

Found link.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tristan_Dowse

Em, not very good with links! His name was Tristan Dowse,you can google nim.

yeswell being an adoptive parent doesn't prevent you from being a twat, Woops. I'm sure you could fill many many threads with the twattish things that birth parents have done. Thankfully such twatishness is relatively rare.