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"Between a Monster and a Horrible Dragon"

AGBF

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When a friend of mine was finishing her MSW (master's degree in social work) her second year internship was at DCF (The Department of Children and Families), child protective services, here in Connecticut. We often discussed the impossible dilemmas that social workers faced when attempting to place children safely. There was no money. There were no safe homes. There were no laws to protect the children. And most of all there were no social workers to go out and actually work with any of the impossible, totally impossible, situations because each one had about 60 impossible cases assigned to her. No one wanted to pay extra taxes to help poor children here, believe me. My friend once said she felt she had to choose between placing a child with a monster or a horrible dragon.

Tomorrow my daughter is attending the funeral of a friend's one year-old son. She was in special education with the child's mother in high school. The mother lost custody of the child not too long after he was born and the child was taken by DCF. He died in foster care on December 3. No one knows how. I will attach links of the news story.

News12...http://connecticut.news12.com/news/police-probe-death-of-1-year-old-boy-in-foster-care-1.12701864
The Hartford Courant...http://www.courant.com/breaking-news/hc-baby-death-bridgeport-police-20161203-story.html

AGBF
 

Tacori E-ring

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I could never work with children. It is too heartbreaking. Social workers are overworked and underpaid. It can be a thankless job.
 

redwood66

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Deb I am sorry for your daughter's friend. Death of a child is something that I cannot even imagine especially in these circumstances.
 

House Cat

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Oh Deb, I am so sorry. Please give your daughter extra hugs for me. I'm sure she is hurting for her friend. Big hugs to you too. Please keep us posted. This is just awful. This poor mother, to first be hurt by a drunk driver, then to have her baby taken from her, then this! It's too much for one little soul to bear!

I am going to pray for her.
 

Scandinavian

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Deb, I'm so sorry. I hate how the world can be sometimes. It is an important reminder of all the things that we should be thankful for going into this holiday season.
Hugs.
 

missy

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I am so sorry Deb. People can be so terrible and capable of being monsters. :cry: :cry: :cry:
 

arkieb1

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AGBF

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rainydaze

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AGBF|1481719312|4107124 said:
arkieb1|1481713374|4107114 said:

Oh my God. This broke my heart. How many Stephens have I met? How many adults have I met who were Stephens when they were children? It is at times like this that I question God's plan for us. Thank you for posting, arkie.

Deb

This article just broke my heart into a million pieces.
 

arkieb1

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The Australian 60 Mins report was a "big" thing in the media here, it's an insight on how your system is broken for older and dysfunctional children in particular and how so many of them can end up in abusive homes and targeted by pedophiles and forced to parade in line ups like animals in front of these people on show or on offer because no one else will take them in. It's well worth joining the site just to watch it, horrific but something all Americans should be aware of. If you can't find it via the link google inside the US phenomenon of "rehoming" unwanted children/parades/America's underground trade in children no one wants 60 mins Australia.
 

NOYFB

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I'm an LCSW and spent my undergrad internship and my first year of grad school working for child welfare agencies. I just couldn't do it. It's so heartbreaking. Not to mention the fact that I had to go to really awful crime-ridden neighborhoods to pick up/drop off the children and knowing how terrified I was I can just imagine how the children felt. :(sad Now I work in healthcare and I deal with the homeless, the drug addicts, the paralyzed, etc. It's just as sad. Social workers are grossly underpaid for what we do.

I'm so sorry for your daughter's friend. That's a terrible thing to have happen to an innocent child.
 

lyra

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This is my daughter's line of work. I can't go into much detail here. She works with foster parents and foster kids. I've asked her how she does it, because most of these kids have horrific backgrounds. She has over 30 kids on her caseload. She was granted a full time contract which means a guaranteed salary with NO benefits. She does the exact same job as others in her office who are straight full time WITH benefits. She hopes to maybe be granted benefits/real full time next year, but they could just as easily bump her back down to part time which is 40 hours a week, no benefits, and lower pay. It's a wonder how anyone can handle these conditions in the field. She enjoys helping kids though, and they all seem to love her. This is a hard job, and I'm grateful and proud of anyone in this field.
 

Tekate

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Social workers: underpaid, overworked, it's a very very hard job..

There is no respect either for social workers, seen as bleeding hearts..

Kids suffer by underfunding..

So sorry about your daughter's child.. such a tragedy for all of us.
 

azstonie

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Lil Misfit|1481844859|4107600 said:
I'm an LCSW and spent my undergrad internship and my first year of grad school working for child welfare agencies. I just couldn't do it. It's so heartbreaking. Not to mention the fact that I had to go to really awful crime-ridden neighborhoods to pick up/drop off the children and knowing how terrified I was I can just imagine how the children felt. :(sad Now I work in healthcare and I deal with the homeless, the drug addicts, the paralyzed, etc. It's just as sad. Social workers are grossly underpaid for what we do.

I'm so sorry for your daughter's friend. That's a terrible thing to have happen to an innocent child.

An LCSW saved my life when I was in my mid-20s. The best therapy I've had all my life including the prestigious names, PhDs, MDs, etc.
 

Tekate

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Sorry AGBF I meant your daughter's friends child.
 

distracts

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My condolences on the loss. A horrible sequence of events leading to a horrible outcome.

My state has had a heck of a time with CPS and social workers - so overloaded with cases and such low pay that they have something like 30-40% turnover every year and barely have anyone with any experience left. The legislature keeps saying "oh, it's such a problem, we need to fix it" but they aren't willing to put more money toward it. But you really can't expect people to do such heartbreaking, difficult work for only $30k/year, or whatever. For that money, or better, they could go be an administrative assistant and not have to deal with having their hearts ripped out (and given the turnover, many seem to realize that!). And recently they changed things so that CPS workers went out alone on calls at night, which caused another round of people to quit, because it's really not safe to send people (let's be real - mainly women) alone to the houses of known abusers at night. It's really sad. I'm sure if the right support and pay was there, and they could hire more workers so people weren't overloaded, the system would be much better.

lyra|1481899809|4107737 said:
part time which is 40 hours a week

ah, an excellent example of the problem.
 
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