Permanency Tip of the Week: Reporting Suspected Abuse – But What About the Permanency?
Many of us are mandated reporters of suspected child abuse due to our professional work with children. When we exercise this legal obligation, it has the potential to significantly impact the path of a child’s journey towards Permanency. Even if we have invested significant time, energy, and resources into a potential Permanent Connection, we must never allow this to impact our decision to file the suspected child abuse report. Sometimes the child and/or the adult may try to bargain with us to not file the report for a variety of reasons. This too should never impact our decision process. In the end, our children need to be physically, emotionally, and behaviorally safe with their Permanent Connections.
Permanency Success Story of the Week: Dad to Receive Kidney from Daughter He Adopted 27 Year Ago
Good Morning America – A woman from North Carolina is about to give the gift of life to the man who adopted her when she was an infant. DeLauren McKnight will soon donate her kidney to her dad, Billy Houze, after tests revealed she was a match for the procedure. “She told me, ‘Daddy, you thought you were saving my life pulling me from foster care but in actuality, you were saving my life so I could save yours later,'” Houze, 64, told “Good Morning America.” “I am extremely proud of her.”
Houze, a pastor and father of five, said his kidneys began shutting down in 2016 after he underwent gall bladder surgery. Doctors informed him that he wouldn’t live past five years if he didn’t receive a kidney transplant…”I call him my Superman,” she said. “Without him and my mom, I wouldn’t have known where I’d be. There’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t give him so he can enjoy life and be right there beside me.”
Permanency Related Articles:
April Is National Child Abuse Prevention Month
Children’s Bureau Express – Every April, the Children’s Bureau observes National Child Abuse Prevention Month to raise public awareness of child abuse and neglect, recommit efforts and resources aimed at protecting children and strengthening families, and promote community involvement through activities that support the cause. The theme of this year’s National Child Abuse Prevention Month initiative mirrors the theme of the 21st National Conference on Child Abuse and Neglect, “Strong and Thriving Families,” and focuses on helping individuals and organizations in every community strengthen families and prevent child abuse and neglect.
This year’s initiative also highlights 2019 Prevention Resource Guide: Strong and Thriving Families, which is intended to support child welfare service providers in their work with parents, caregivers, and children to strengthen families and prevent child maltreatment. It was developed through a partnership between the Office on Child Abuse and Neglect within the Children’s Bureau, Child Welfare Information Gateway, and the FRIENDS National Center for Community-Based Child Abuse Prevention (CBCAP).
Connection & Safety is the Treatment
Robyn Gobbel, LCSW – When we are with our people- our children, our clients, without judgment and without agenda, we are offering them a space within which their neurobiology could take a step toward integration. To be so present with someone that we can be patiently curious about what is going to arise in the next moment is the essence of the therapeutic experience. The moment I experience a sense that what I need to have happen…whether that be because I’m following a protocol, or I’m feeling the desperation of a parent for me to fix their child, or I’m having a very normal moment of therapist vulnerability and I need my client to prove my worth, or any number of other reasons why I leave the present moment of curiosity and move into one with agenda and judgment….is the moment my client is once again left alone with their pain, sadness, and loneliness.
Runaway and Homeless Youth, Mental Health, and Trauma-Informed Care
Runaway Homeless Youth Clearinghouse – Young people run away or become homeless for a variety of reasons, many of which can be linked to psychological and emotional trauma. Whether it’s abuse, the consequences of living in poverty, a lack of empathy and support for their self-identity, or some combination of the three, runaway and homeless youth (RHY) often experience significant challenges to their happiness and well-being. Many confront this situation even before they encounter the perils of setting off on their own. Once they run away, they are susceptible to a host of additional dangers and health risks, many of which can exact additional tolls on their mental health…
The Psychological Birth of the Adoptive Mother
PsychCentral – See-Saw Parenting by Ellen Toronto, PhD – In our book A Womb of Her Own (Routledge, 2017) author JoAnn Ponder writes as follows: For prospective parents unable to conceive a child, the adopted child becomes a replacement for the biological child who previously existed only in hopes and fantasies. There are similarities between biological and adoptive motherhood, but also some significant differences and special challenges for the adoptive mother. Under the best of circumstances, the adoption does not result in an instantaneous identity and fulfillment as a parent, which involves a more gradual process of coming into being. The available literature offers few insights into this process, in that it focuses more on the adopted child than the adoptive mother. I have chosen to term the mother’s journey as a “psychological birth” in order to denote a process such as The Psychological Birth of the Human Infant (Mahler, Pine, and Bergman, 1975)…
Free Creative Expression Based Grief Resources for Kids
ACES Connection – Art with Heart has some really exciting news about work they’ve just completed! We’ve just launched a complete portfolio of free grief resources created with grief community experts and artists on our learning center with generous funding from the Safe Crossings Foundation. Our Learn page focuses on kids, practitioners, and caregivers looking for different resources, art activities, and education to help support kids, or expand a professional toolkit. The free grief resources available provide a breadth of tools and create a crosswalk of powerful support for kids.
Visit artwithheart.org/learn to see them in all their interactive goodness, they are the first section on the page. Please email chelsey@artwithheart.org, Art with Heart’s Community Engagement and Impact Manager if you have any questions or feedback, she would love to hear them. We hope these are a valuable resource for your work and the communities and kids you serve. Please share them if you can.
- Please forward this blog, via email and/or social media, to other Permanency Champions and those that could use a healthy dose of Permanency.
- If this Blog has been forwarded to you, please sign up to receive it directly by going to my website or emailing me: drgregmanning@gmail.com.
- If you are interested in my keynote speaking, professional training or consulting services, please contact me through my website, call me: 949-683-0753 or email: drgregmanning@gmail.com
- Take care and keep up the Permanency work – Our children, youth, young adults, families, and communities are depending on it!
Sincerely,
Dr. Greg Manning