Adoptive Parents of Children From The System?

Question

I have someone listenting to me about the struggles we face in post-adoption supports and services.... This contact may offer us a public plateform to speak out about what the realities are when dealing with:

1) Mental Health Services

2) Education Services

Both #1 and #2 are those things we are told will Always be provided under Medicaid and via Public School "No child left behind"

3) Adoption Support Subsidy--the funds to use for services not covered by #1 or #2 including the access to qualified Respite Providers, supplemtal social supports and all the other things the money is supposed to be used for--if we can find someone to pay?

Your input about what your family has experienced with the "Delevery" of the services you were promised would be there after the Adoption Might HELP us make a difference!

Please share the road-blocks and even the "good" things you have discovered....

Answer 1

We haven't finalized yet, but the adoption subsidy held us up for several months.  I have friends who adopted their child from out of state.  They didn't have residential treatment (RTC) written into their subsidy and their state does not provide it.  She's had her daughter for less than a year and is already $40,000 in debt from residential treatment, property damage the child has done and other expenses.  She's a single parent and has no paid respite services - her child has Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD) and Oppositional Defiant Disorder(ODD).  

We are also adopting from out of state (same state as our friend).  We were able to get residential treatment written into our subsidy.  We will have NO post adoption services beyond Medicaid (which is NOT good in TX) and the residential treatment.  Our sibling pair are 12 and 14, they have RAD, ODD, PTSD, ADHD, bipolar disorder, learning disabilities, etc.  Our 14 year old son was in an RTC for 6 months and has only been out for 2.  He attends a special school for emotionally disturbed youth.  We pay for his sister to attend a small private school because she can't handle public school.  We are actually used to not having services already (our agency is unable to handle therapeutic level children and offers no supports).  

Mary -mom to bio kids T(9) and K(11) and adopting C(12) and D(14)

If "that which does not kill us makes us stronger..." just call me Superwoman!

Answer 2

You have asked a very pertinent question.  I think that these services vary from state to state, and it is my firm belief that there is a great deal of room for much improvement.  We have 2 adopted children whom we fostered before adopting. We knew they would need counseling when we chose to adopt them.  We did not know the full extent of the help they would need.  It has been very costly, and we would do it all over again, because we love them.  They are our children.  However, because these children (and so many like them) have come from painful, dark places none of us want to even think about, they do need help in healing.  We are trying to find some financial assistance from our state to help us continue to give them the quality of help they deserve to find healing and health.  I hope that you are able to reach those who can make changes that will enable these children to get the help they need.

Answer 3

For us, I think the thing that we have the most problem with is our medical assistance.  Our son has a rare disorder.  Most of the doctors available through medical assistance know nothing about the disorder.  We cannot use any of our son's medical assistance (unless he is hospitalized) for the specialists, etc., because he needs referrals from a medical assistance doctor.  We can't use a medical assistance doctor because they don't know about his disorder and we haven't been able to find anyone who is willing to learn about it that takes medical assistance.  So for our son, it's either follow what the state recommends and use a doctor that could put him in jeopardy because they don't understand his medical condition OR not use the services he is entitled to.

Answer 4

My situation is a wee bit different ...I am trying to get ahold of my childrens half brother.....

How would i go about doing this????

Any help??

Answer 5

don't worry bout a thin cause every little thing gonna be alright.

Answer 6

I would say pre and post adoption support has been lacking in our experience.

It is a constant struggle to get our social workers to follow through with filling paper work,  answers to our questions or following up at all.

I have asked for information about services available on countless occasions and still haven't received any.

We look up our questions on line instead.

I found out about Medicaid until 18 when I was casually speaking to another parent. She mentioned she wanted to work from home but had her job for the insurance. I said I couldn't imagine the cost of insurance for all her kids. She said no only her insurance. That is when she told me that Medicaid was available after finalization also.

When it comes to the delivery of services I'm still waiting to receive payment for respite I provided in 2005 and permanency plus payments from Jan 2006. I don't plan on ever getting them

I was never told of respite being available for our children.

I asked about reimbursement for baby sitters when I was transporting one to visits at a prison 2hours away. No follow up as usual.

A grandparent is suing us for falling in the snow last year during a visit. I was told we should be covered under there insurance and they would find out for sure still waiting on that one too..

Our son is eligeble for a support subsidy and found out last Thurs when the worker was turning in the adoption paper work that we needed to write a letter requesting it.

She said to e-mail it she would read it and let me know if it needed any thing else she wasn't to sure of the e-mail adress and said call if it dosn't go threw.

I don't want to hold anything up so e-mail one that day asking for comformation that she got it.

No responce Thur, Fri, or Mon Left message Tue no return call all week I called back today and finaly got through. She said she got the e-mail but hadn't had a second to read it.

Well in our experince the delevery of service only happens with repeted calls to the workers and then a call to the superviser. My husband swears they have a big book of excuses they go through before calling you back. Our worker is on chapter 15 section 3 now!!

Sorry I'm boring and rambling.

To answer your question road blocks would be social workers not following through.

Good things would be our children of course