Talking to Kids When Adoption is "Breaking News"

I received the March/April 2010 e-Newsletter from Center for Adoption Support & Education (C.A.S.E.) today; it isn't on their website yet, but you should be able to find it on this list soon. One topic addressed -- not surprisingly -- was Artyom being returned, unwanted, to Russia by his adoptive mother,, and talking to kids about that "Breaking News:"

We must be aware of the implications of this "Breaking News" upon the lives of our children. We must find the language to speak with them about what they saw, what they heard, or what they may have read. One mother said to her 11 year old son, "We don't know what happened, but this mother did not ask for and get the help she needed to parent this little boy. She had other choices and what she did sounds heartless. I am sure you feel bad for Artyem, just as I do. I believe he will find a family who will know how to take care of him. It must have been hard living in orphanage and then coming to a strange country, not knowing how to speak English, not knowing anyone and missing the orphanage and the other children who lived there. He must have been really scared."

Just as my colleagues at C.A.S.E and I received countless questions this week, it is possible that your children/teens may have been or will be faced with comments and questions as well. Many of you have reached out to C.A.S.E,and embraced our WISE-Up Program for your children. Now is the time to revisit the tool that helped your children respond to difficult, intrusive questions pertaining to foster care and adoption. For those of you, who may not be familiar with this tool, please visit our website at www.adoptionsupport.org to learn more about the WISE Up Program.

While we cannot change what happened to Artyem no matter how much we would
like to, we can protect and support our children, and reassure them that they are safe, loved and guided by adults who will be there forever. In times of a tragedy, we think about what we can do. My answer is tonight, hug your sons and daughters, open lines of communication regarding this sad story and send them into the world tomorrow with the tools to handle whatever questions may come their way. And remember, you're not alone; C.A.S.E is here to help support you and your children in your journey as an adoptive family.

I like the idea of reviewing the W.I.S.E. Up book with my kids since now is a time they might get some uncomfortable comments or questions about adoption.

If Birth Mothers Can Do It, Why Can't Adoptive Mothers?

In response to this post about Artyom's adoptive mother sending him back to Russia with a note saying she no longer wished to parent him, Anonymous commented:

So if I understand this correctly, the sentiment around here is that: It's okay for the birth parents to give up their child, but not okay for adoptive parents to give up their child.

Short answer -- YES. I hear this question each time there's news of an adoption disruption, as if we were comparing apples and apples. If you are even marginally aware of the circumstances in which birth parents relinquish a child for adoption, you couldn't even pretend that this is an apt comparison.

Within the U.S., the most common reason for relinquishment for adoption is an unexpected and/or unplanned pregnancy, combined with economic limitations (including a lack of education which limits financial resources). Outside the U.S., in all the sending countries in international adoption, the number one reason for relinquishment is poverty.

Compare this to the adoptive parent who disrupts an adoption. Adoptive parents as a whole are better educated and have higher incomes than the population at large. Adoptive parents quite deliberately and intentionally become parents -- nothing unexpected or unplanned there. Adoptive parents are more likely to have jobs, accounting for that higher than average income. Adopted children are more likely to have health insurance than childre in the population at large. Adoptive parents are more likely to have taken parenting classes. Adoptive parents tend to be older at the time they enter parenting than the population at large.

Consider Torry Hansen, Artyom's adoptive mom. She's 33, she's a college graduate, she's a registered nurse. She's employed at a Veteran's Administration hospital, which means she has government health insurance for herself and her child. She has a home. She has a family support network nearby. She has enough money for an adoption, two trips to Russia for herself, and a plane ticket back for Artyom. She has internet access. She lives in America, which automatically makes her more empowered than any birth mother in any sending country in the world.

Can one seriously compare her decision to send Artyom away, alone, with a note saying she no longer wished to parent him, to the decision of an impoverished birth mother in Guatamala? To the decision of an impoverished birth mother in China, who makes her relinquishment decision in the shadow of poverty and government rules she has no control over? To the decision of a Korean birth mother who will be so stigmatized by an out-of-wedlock birth that she's likely to lose her job, be unable to get housing, be precluded from marriage in the future, and have her child stigmatized as illegitimate, too? Can you even compare her decision to that of a 17-year-old in America, whose pregnancy has not been supported by the birth father or her parents, who knows little about welfare support, who sees little assistance in raising her child on the income she can earn with a GED?

I know that not every adoptive parent or every birth parent fits the profiles I've outlined, but the vast majority do. That's why it is a false analogy to claim that what adoptive parents do when they terminate an adoption is no different from what birth parents do in relinquishing a child for adoption. It's insulting to birth parents to make the comparison.

And frankly, it's insulting to adoptive parents, too. It assumes that the intentionality with which we enter parenting means nothing. I do hold adoptive parents to a higher standard. I like what prospective adoptive parent Joanna had to say at her blog, Waiting for Two:

I expect better from adoptive families. Oh yes, I expect better, because adoptive families must go through more to be parents. You must really want it, to have your home checked, your background checked, and to go through hours of parental training. When you sign up to adopt, no one tells you it will be easy.

Yes, we should be able to expect better from adoptive families. As Zoe put it, "a promise is a promise, especially in adoption."

An Adoptee Speaks About His Two Disrupted Adoptions

Finally! The New York Times brings us the voice of an adopted person in all this discussion of disruption (I've mentioned before my frustration that the NYT doesn't include adoptees in their debates about adoption):

And, finally, this morning on my parenting segment on PRI’s radio show “The Takeaway,” I had a chance to talk to Orlando Modeno, who left a comment here on
Motherlode last week describing his life after his adoptive parents “gave him back.” He was 10 years old when he was taken to Woodstock, N.Y., from Colombia, to be the son of parents who spoke no Spanish, when he spoke no English. Four years later, they terminated their rights and he went to live with another family, who eventually “returned” him as well.

In an e-mail to me, he agreed to share his story further:

I think it’s important to educate people about how traumatic it is for an international adoptee to be uprooted from his/her homeland. My objective is to raise awareness among potential adoptive parents so they really understand what adoption really is from an adoptee’s point of view and how it will affect an adoptee.

For me, it was a rupture that split me apart, a fragmentation of my identity (both culturally and psychologically), it stymied my emotional and psychological growth, it affected my ability to trust people (and myself), and to develop healthy emotional attachments with anyone. I felt destroyed in every sense of the word.

Included is a link to the radio show.

Some Statistics on Disruption

Some interesting, though a bit dated, statistics on adoption disruption in this LiveScience article, The Dark Side of Adoptions: Why Parents & Kids Don't Bond:

While bonding may be slow, most adoptions work out. According to a review of American adoptions in the book Clinical and Practice Issues in Adoption (Greenwood Publishing Group, 1998), 80 percent of placements make it to legalization. After the paperwork is in, the success rate was 98 percent.

But in extreme cases, the adoption "disrupts," and the child is sent back to the agency or foster home. This process is rarely as dramatic as Artyom's unaccompanied flight from Washington, D.C., to Moscow, but the case matches previous research in other ways. The risk of adoption disruption increases with age, from less than 1 percent in infants to up to 26 percent for kids adopted after age 15, according two 1988 studies.

The second of those studies, published in the journal Social Work, found a disruption rate of 10 percent for children adopted between the ages of 6 and 8. Artyom was 7 when he came to America.

I think we would all see inuitively how disruption rates would rise with the age of the child when adopted, but it's interesting to see that research backs up that intuition. I would not, however, have thought the rates as high as those quoted in the article.

Disruption rates are hard to come by, since they usually happen under the radar, and look just like any old adoption. Add to that the fact that any record-keeping that happens is in each individual state, it's really hard to get a complete picture. That's why I'm happy any time I run across statistics about disruption, no matter how dated.

Talking About Artyom With My Kids

Since Artyom’s story has come out I’ve been hyper-vigilant about the girls catching wind of it. I haven’t had the news on at all while they’re awake, and I’ve been careful about leaving the blog up where they may see it. I’ve been grateful for the tendency of restaurants to have their TVs tuned to sports channels. I’ve thought that I need to ask my dad not to have the TV on a news channel when we visit. I’ve wanted to keep them completely away from news that an adoptive parent would give away her child. Me, the grand proponent of speaking openly and honestly with my kids about the hard issues in adoption.

But how can I tell them about adoption disruption? About adoptive families that kick out their adoptive kid when biological kids come along? About adoptive families who give it less than 6 months before deciding it’s all too much? About adoptive families where the other children watch Sponge Bob while their adopted brother is “re-homed?” About adoptive families who make promises and don’t keep them?

Reminded in this post from John Raible of the ubiquity of the news about Artyom and the chances of someone else telling my children, and the effect of hearing about it out of the blue, I decided we needed to talk about it.

I started by telling them that I had seen a story about adoption on TV that made me mad and sad. “A lady adopted a 7-year-old boy from Russia, then she decided she did not want to parent him, so she put him on an airplane all by himself and sent him back to Russia.”

Zoe’s immediate and shocked response: “But she promised when she adopted him that she would love him and take care of him forever!”

“I know,” I replied, “that’s why I’m so mad and sad.”


We talked for quite a while about how Artyom must have felt on the airplane – alone, scared, confused, sad -- say the girls. And they think he must still feel that way, plus really mad at his adoptive mom. That's Maya's picture of Artyom as sad and mad (notice his hands are fisted in the "mad" drawing).

The girls wanted to know what was going to happen to Artyom, whether he’d go back to the orphanage or find another family. You can see Zoe’s note to God, hoping Artyom would find the perfect family who would never give him away.

I told the girls that a lot of people were really mad about what the mom did to Artyom. In fact, I said, Russia is so mad it wants to stop all adoptions to the U.S. Even as I said this, Zoe was shaking her head. What about the people who want to adopt from Russia? Interesting that she would think first about prospective adoptive parents, and not about kids not being adopted. She's obviously clued into the fact that adoptive parents are the actors and adopted kids are objects acted upon. (And this might be an area where Zoe and I will have to disagree – I don’t think a suspension of adoptions right now is a bad idea.)

The girls also wanted to know what would happen to the mom. They both think she should go to jail, my punitive little darlings! (I didn’t explain the difficulties of criminal charges in Tennessee, or I’m sure I would have put them right to sleep.)


We talked about how they felt about hearing the story, and true to the theme of the discussion, they both said they were sad and mad – sad for Artyom, and mad at the mom. After all, Zoe said emphatically, “A promise is a promise, especially in adoption.” I asked them if hearing about what happened to Artyom made them feel worried that the same thing would happen to them. They both said no, and I said, “I think it’s pretty normal for adopted kids to worry that they might do something bad and be sent away. Do you ever feel that way?” Again, the answer was no. Maya said, "You promised to love us and take care of us forever, and you don't break promises." Yes!

I wanted to emphasize that there was no way they could ever do anything that would make me give them away, so I said, “Think of the worst ever thing you could do, okay?” Maya says, “Kicking Zoe.” I said, “Maya, that’s a bad thing, and I wouldn’t like it if you did that, but if you kicked Zoe I would still love you and you would still be my daughter and I would still keep you forever.” Zoe then says, “Kill Maya?” Without blinking (that took some doing!), I said, “Zoe, that’s a bad thing, and I wouldn’t like what you did, but if you killed Maya I would still love you and you would still be my daughter and I would still keep you forever.” (And I really mean that, by the way. In fact, I recently said to another adoptive mom when we were talking about disruptions, “I promised forever, and I meant it. If that means holding my child’s hand in the death chamber when she’s executed for murder, then so be it.” I know it's easy to say when you haven't experienced it, but it is something I think about as a criminal law nerd.)


The conversations turned to promises between the girls that they would never kick or kill each other, and then off in a completely different direction.

Zoe said another interesting thing – I can’t remember what prompted it or when in the midst of this conversation she said it. She said, “It’s like he has two birth mothers now.” I couldn’t get her to elaborate on it, but I thought it showed how she has internalized her birth family’s actions as abandonment, even as we talk about the reasons they couldn’t parent her. The definition of "birth mother" doesn't rely on biological relationship in this formula; instead, birth mother = abandonment.

We’ll talk more about the birth mother issue later, because of course there are some differences between a poor, disempowered woman in China (or Russia) and an educated, employed woman in Tennessee who quite deliberately set out to parent. Zoe may know that in her head, but it certainly hasn’t made it to her heart. I also explained that Artyom’s birth mother was sick, that she couldn’t take care of him because she drank too much alcohol. Zoe said, “Why doesn’t she just quit?! Then she could take care of him.” (Hard to explain alcoholism and addiction to a 9-year-old and a 6-year-old – by the end of my explanation, Zoe was worried about drinking the communion wine! I'm thinking I'll definitely need a "do-over" on this one.)


I’m so glad we had this conversation. I got the chance to explain that woman’s actions before my kids heard another version on TV or, worse, from some kid in their class who’d probably suggest that I would put them on a plane back to China. I can’t believe it took me so long to remember the importance of inoculating my kids against wrong-headed views of adoption, of making a pre-emptive strike. How about you? Have you talked to your kids about Artyom, about adoption disruption?

Must Read John Raible

John Raible is always a must-read, but his last three posts have been phenomenal. He writes passionately as an adopted person and an adoptive parent, in the wake of the story of Artyom's abandonment:

Learning from Artyom's plight

The first thing I thought of when I learned the news about little Artyom was, “How rejected the poor kid must feel.” As an adopted person myself, I carry with me an undying, lifelong sense of rejection that I trace back to my relinquishment as a baby. The very next thing I thought of was how scared of further rejection other adopted children of all backgrounds must be feeling. Whether from Russia, China, Korea, and other nations abroad or whether adopted from foster care or through private measures with no agency involvement, young adopted children must be wondering, even if they don’t verbalize it, “Will my parent send me away like Artyom? Will they get tired of parenting me, too?” The third thing I wondered was, “What is the other child in the Tennessee family’s home feeling and thinking? Who is checking in with him about his emotional state?”

O.K. parents, ENOUGH ALREADY

I tried really hard in my previous post to warn people of the coming troubles confronting adopted kids, thanks to the media hype over Artyom the Russian reject. But guess what? I’m extremely ANGRY that more adoptive parents–of which I am one, don’t forget–are not outwardly condemning the Tennessee woman who washed her hands of her maternal responsibilities by sticking her adopted son, Artyom, on a 10-hour flight across the ocean BY HIMSELF. With that infamous, horrific letter: “I no longer wish to parent this child.”

* * *

Give me a freaking break. Are no other parents outraged? Are no other parents shouting down the growing chorus of “let’s not judge her until we’ve walked in her shoes” bull crap being thrown out there in the online adoption community?

Sticking with a wounded child

With my recent posts, I have expressed my utter disappointment at the flawed state of international adoption. I have ranted about my disgust with wavering and uncommitted adoptive parents who bail on the kids they willingly set out to adopt. Now that I found a slightly calmer mood of reflection, I will do something I don’t normally do. I will disclose personal family information about my boys, the older children I adopted from foster care when they were 6 and 13 respectively.

* * *

So I do not tell parents to “hang in there” lightly. Seeing your out-of-control child sinking deeper into the court system and moving closer and closer to the prison system is nothing short of terrifying. The feeling of being treated like a criminal myself whenever I go to visit my incarcerated child is something I would not wish on even my worst enemy. But I always try to remember this: there are plenty of sons in jail who were born into their families, and others locked up who went through foster care and/or were adopted. Sons (and daughters) who break the law, who terrify the neighbors, and who wreak havoc and cause irreparable harm exist in all kinds of families. I would guess that it is hard for most parents of imprisoned kids to
admit that their children have become victimizers and criminals. Yet even so, as
parents, we continue to love them, pray for them, and hold onto hope for their
recovery and a brighter future.

Not a joking matter

An adoptive father, incensed after watching a CBS Early Show segment of comedians taking on the week's news, blogs about it:

After a few jokes about Sarah Palin, the comedians decided to tackle a topic that surprised me: The decision made by a mother this week to send her adopted son back to Russia with nothing more than a note in his backpack explaining that she didn't want him anymore.

* * *

Honestly, there's nothing funny about the situation at all, so I was surprised to see it in the CBS clip. My surprise turned dark when comedienne Maureen Langan made a joke that went a little something like this:

"This could be a good thing. It could lead to an increase in domestic adoptions. After all, sending a child back on Jet Blue is a lot cheaper than sending a child back on Air Kremlin."

* * *

Had Ms. Langan stopped there, maybe it would be easy to excuse her for pushing the envelope just a bit too far. The problem is she didn't stop. In fact, her next joke was even worse. When speaking about the future of the abandoned boy involved in this case, Ms. Langan said something that went a little like this:

"Now that he's back with his drinking buddies, he'll be fine."

Are you kidding me?

You're going to poke fun at a child who has lost his family twice during the course of his first decade on earth? Don't you think that's a bit harsh? Shouldn't we feel regret that there are children in the world who are stuck in conditions we wouldn't wish on
anyone? Is it really funny to laugh about a life ruined?

* * *

Nope. Not in my mind.

Mine, either.

Preventing adoption disasters

The New York Times Room for Debate blog addresses how to prevent adoption disasters, featuring the usual suspects (they pull out the same cast of characters for each debate about adoption, and as usual no one participating in the debate is an adoptee):

David Smolin, Cumberland Law School
Peter C. Winkler, social worker
Diane B. Kunz, Center for Adoption Policy
Elizabeth Bartholet, Harvard Law School

Pretty much all four posts are summarized in this quote from David Smolin:

Unfortunately, the adoption myth in the United States sends the message that the love and care found in any normal American home is enough to heal any child. This myth leads to numerous inadequacies: inadequate evaluation of children prior to adoption; inadequate preparation, training and selection of prospective adoptive families; and inadequate post-placement services.

If any good comes out of this awful episode with Artyom's return to Russia by Torry Hansen, it will be the increased discussion of the difficult issues in adoption that are generally ignored by the media, prospective adoptive parents, and adoptive parents.

It's Official: Russia Suspends Adoptions

From the New York Times:

Russia formally announced on Thursday that it would suspend all adoptions of Russian children by Americans, responding to the case of a 7-year-old boy who was sent back to Moscow alone last week by his adoptive mother in Tennessee. The case of the boy, who was named Artyom in Russia before he was adopted last year, has caused widespread anger here, and Russian officials said new regulations had to be put in place before adoptions by Americans could proceed.

* * *

More than 200 American families are in the process of adopting Russian children, and those cases will not be allowed to conclude until the new rules are approved, Russian officials said.

P.S. 4:20 p.m. Maybe not so final after all, as Elizabeth notes in the comments. The New York Times hasn't withdrawn its story, but the Washington Post, under a headline still reading, "Russia suspends all adoptions to U.S. families, " writes that the status of Russian adoption is unknown right now, after a Foreign Ministry spokesman announced that all adoptions were suspended:

But the Russia Education and Science Ministry, which oversees international adoptions, said it had no knowledge of an official freeze. A spokeswoman for the Kremlin's children's rights ombudsman said that organization also knew nothing of a suspension.

And in Washington, the U.S. State Department said the administration had gotten conflicting information when it sought clarification from Russian officials about the status of adoptions. Spokesman P.J. Crowley said the U.S. was continuing to seek clarification. "Right now, to be honest, we've received conflicting information," he said.

I wouldn't be surprised if the confusion continues for a while -- Russia may not be interested in clarifying things until after the meeting between them and the State Department delegation coming to talk about a bilateral agreement on adoption.

But who knows. . . .

Un.Believable

Torry Hansen, who sent Artyom back to Russia, is looking to adopt again.

Adoptive parents defend Torry Hansen.

Buddha Baby?!

People Magazine sent fruit basket to Torry Hansen.

Getting weirder and weirder . . . .

I Did Not Love My Adopted Child

An interesting article in Slate, with an adoptive mom (China) exploring Artyom's story and comparing it to her own struggles to love her adopted child. Among the many interesting points made:

The stories adoption agencies include in their material, the books, the blogs—even the very signatures of the parents on adoption forums ("mom to DD Mei Mei, joyfully home since 2007") all speak of an experience that's supposed to be wonderful. Your child is "home," his or her orphaned life has ended, your respective travels are over, and you have been united into one big forever-family. Even the politically correct terminology surrounding adoption insists that once it's legal, it's a done deal—your child "was" adopted (not "is"), and now you are its mother, amen. We do not want adoption to be a process; we want it to be a destination—and that makes us even angrier when it doesn't work out that way. Torry Hansen betrayed her son, and she betrayed our belief system. We were willing to accept him as her son, and she wasn't, which makes her the villain.

This is not really anyone's fault. Humans seem to have an overwhelming need for a tidy narrative, which in adoption almost always butts up against the uglier reality. The law understands that, which is why, however wrong Hansen's actions seem to us, putting her adopted son on a plane back to Russia does not appear to have been illegal. Rash, yes, and ugly, but not against the law—because the law still recognizes that adoptive parenting of older children is different than parenting from birth. What's next is for the rest of us—jaded but experienced adoptive parents and the adoptive professionals who surround us (often adoptive parents themselves) to stop relying on adoption education and social workers to convey the darker realities of attachment disorders, institutional delays, and post-adoption depression and start talking about them ourselves.

The Driver Speaks

Remember that Artyom's mom (actually, it seems the grandmother was in charge of this, too) surfed the web to find a driver to pick up Artyom at the Moscow airport? Here's the website she found: Moscow-Driver.com. The driver, Arthur Lookyanov, has a very full account of his email correspondence with the grandmother, meeting Artyom at the airport and driving him into the city, and the reaction when he delivered him to the Ministry of Education and Science. The driver stayed with Artyom through all the rigamarole that followed. It's a fascinating and disturbing account. You can see the picture Artyom drew for Arthur during the drive from the airport and leave a comment at Arthur's website by clicking here.

Criminal Liability For Sending Artyom Back?

Whether it was immoral to send Artyom -- alone -- back to Russia is a pretty easy question. It is.

But was it criminal? Is Sheriff Boyce of Shelbyville, Tennessee right when he says,"This is a touchy deal and I'm not sure if anything illegal has been done or not"? And does the question turn on whether Artyom is a U.S. citizen, as Bob Tuke, a Nashville attorney and member of the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys, opines? And does it matter whether the adoption was final?

OK, before I try to answer those questions, a few caveats: I am not licensed to practice law in Tennessee. Or in Washington, D.C. Or in Russia. Nothing I say here is intended as legal advice that anyone should act on. Please consult your own attorney before taking any action. Any opinion offered here is, as always, solely my own, and not that of my employer. My conclusions are based only on the facts as have been reported by the media. There. That should do it.

Oh, and maybe one other warning is called for -- I've really let my real law geek run free on this post!

Let's do the low-hanging fruit first. The citizenship thing -- does it matter? Artyom is very likely an American citizen. A child adopted internationally by an American citizen parent (by both parents if a married couple is adopting), where the adoption is finalized in country, becomes a U.S. citizen automatically upon crossing through immigration at the point of entry into the United States because of the Child Citizenship Act of 2000. But it is apparently possible to simply gain legal custody in a Russian court, rather than finalize the adoption in Russia,and have to finalize the adoption in the U.S. If this is what happened here, then Artyom is not a U.S. citizen.

But does it matter? Think about this for a minute -- do you really think this would be OK if the child wasn't a U.S. citizen? If my nephew from France visited me for the summer, could I abuse, neglect, or abandon him and say, "It's OK, he's not a U.S. citizen!" Ridiculous! Whether Artyom is a U.S. citizen is irrelevant when it comes to legal charges in the U.S.

Suppose the adoption wasn't final? Would that make a difference here? NO! If a child is in your custody and care, you cannot abuse, neglect or abandon the child, even if you do not have legal custody or are not the legal parents. The Tennessee statute below makes it a crime for "any person" to abuse or neglect a child in subsections (a) & (b); only the endangerment subsection (c) applies to a parent or custodian, defined as "the biological or adoptive parent or any person who has legal custody of the child." Seems clear that the mother here is either an adoptive parent, having finalized the adoption in Russia, or has legal custody of the child under a Russian court decree. So even subsection (c) would apply.

If the abuse/neglect/abandonment is an act of ommission -- the failure to do something -- instead of commission -- affirmatively doing something -- the mother might try to argue that she does not have any duty to act on the grounds that the adoption isn't final. In the U.S., there is no general duty to care for other people; the typical law school example is that a stranger can watch a child drown in a shallow pond and do nothing, and won't incur criminal liability. In the U.S., we only have a legal duty if there is a special relationship (ex: parent/child) or a contract (ex: lifeguard) or a statute giving rise to a duty (ex: injury to the elderly).

But a duty of care can also arise from taking on the care of someone else, even if no special relationship/contract/statute created a duty. Even if there is no final adoption or legal custody order, and nothing giving the mother an obligation to care for Artyom through contract or statute, she has assumed that duty anyway, and the law would recognize the existence of a duty of care. So, again, whether the adoption is final is irrelevant to criminal liability.

Those were, believe it or not, the easy issues here! But Sheriff Boyce has a point; it's a complicated deal.

One big issue will be where the wrong occurred, because that will tell us which jurisdiction's law applies. Say, for example, that it qualifies as abandonment, abuse and/or neglect to put a child alone on an international flight with no expectation that the child will return. Did that happen in Tennessee or Washington, D.C.? Or did the abandonment, abuse and/or neglect happen in Russia? These aren't insurmountable problems -- generally when a crime occurs partly in one U.S. jurisdiction and partly in another U.S. jurisdiction, both jurisdictions can bring charges. But it's possible that the crime here, if any, occurred only in one jurisdiction, and it might not be Tennessee. And when it comes to prosecuting U.S. citizens for crimes committed wholly abroad, we presume that "extraterritorality" was not intended unless a statute expressly says so. There isn't a statute that expressly criminalizes child abandonment, abuse and/or neglect committed in a foreign country by a U.S. citizen.

If we say that the crime happened in Tennessee, we might have a problem. Tennessee does not have a statute that criminalizes child abandonment. Child abandonment can lead to the involuntary termination of parental rights in Tennessee, but the definition of abandonment for that purpose wouldn't cover the conduct here (kind of funny that despite what she did, she's still the child's mother in Tennessee!). Tennessee defines abandonment to mean failing to visit and/or support a child for four consecutive months, and further states, “'abandonment' and 'abandonment of an infant' do not have any other definition except that which is set forth in this section, it being the intent of the general assembly to establish the only grounds for abandonment by statutory definition."

We'd have to try to bring charges under the basic child abuse and neglect statute (section 39-15-401) which reads:

(a) Any person who knowingly, other than by accidental means, treats a child under eighteen (18) years of age in such a manner as to inflict injury commits a Class A misdemeanor; provided, however, that, if the abused child is eight (8) years of age or less, the penalty is a Class D felony.

(b) Any person who knowingly abuses or neglects a child under eighteen (18) years of age, so as to adversely affect the child's health and welfare, commits a Class A misdemeanor; provided, that, if the abused or neglected child is eight (8) years of age or less, the penalty is a Class E felony.

(c) (1) A parent or custodian of a child eight (8) years of age or younger commits child endangerment who knowingly exposes the child to or knowingly fails to protect
the child from abuse or neglect resulting in physical injury to the child.

(2) For purposes of subdivision (c)(1):

(A) “Knowingly” means the person knew, or should have known upon a reasonable inquiry, that abuse to or neglect of the child would occur that would result in physical injury to the child. The risk must be of such a nature and degree that the failure to perceive it constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care that an ordinary
parent or legal custodian of a child eight (8) years of age or younger would exercise under all the circumstances as viewed from the defendant's standpoint; and

(B) “Parent or custodian” means the biological or adoptive parent or any person who has legal custody of the child.

(3) A violation of this subsection (c) is a Class A misdemeanor.

I think we'd have problems under subsection (a), unless we can show that Artyom suffered an actual physical injury from the conduct. Although “injury” is not defined by statute, Tennessee courts have said that the definition of “bodily injury” in another statute is instructive. Bodily injury is defined there as follows: "a cut, abrasion, bruise, burn or disfigurement; physical pain or temporary illness or impairment of the function of a bodily member, organ, or mental faculty.” Going on "mental faculty" is a possibility, but a harder sell than physical injury for a number of reasons, including proof, possible pre-existing mental disability, etc. Still, seeing the photos of that obviously exhausted, befuddled boy after that long flight might persuade a jury of injury. But is sending a child alone on a long flight treating him in such a manner as to inflict injury? A lot of parents who send a child alone on an airplane to meet a noncustodial parent or relatives would say no. Of course, this mom sent the boy to be met by a total stranger -- if that stranger had abused the boy, that might be different. But luckily for the boy, the person turned out to be trustworthy. One thing that makes this case different is that the mother never expected the return of the child, which would make a difference in an abandonment case, but probably not in an abuse and/or neglect case.

And according to case law interpreting this statute, a conviction under subsection (b) can't be sustained unless there is an actual, deleterious effect or harm to the child's health and welfare -- the mere risk of harm is insufficient to support a conviction. Part of what's so shocking here is what could have gone wrong in sending the boy to a total stranger alone on an airplane -- he could have been abused by a stranger, he could have become lost, he could have been kidnapped. But those things didn't happen, and risking the child's health and welfare doesn't count as abuse under this statute. So the argument would have to be that sending the child alone on an international flight adversely affected the child's health and welfare.

Subsection (c), with the focus on child endangerment, seems on the surface to be the best possibility -- knowingly exposing the child to or failing to protect the child from abuse or neglect resulting in physical injury to the child. But again, this subsection requires a showing of actual injury, not just a risk of injury.

Sooooo, charges against the mother in Tennessee based on putting the child, alone, on an international flight, to be picked up by a stranger, and with the expectation that the child would not return to her custody, would be difficult. I can't say it's impossible, but it will depend quite a bit on how the prosecutor and the judge interprets the law, and whether there's evidence of physical injury.

An adoptive mother said this in a blog post at the Daily Beast:

There are more than 2 million adopted children 18 and under in the U.S., 13 percent of them foreign born. These children are no less a part of their families than children who were conceived naturally, or through in-vitro fertilization, or born using surrogate mothers. Their parents should be treated, legally and otherwise, just like any parent. So I hope the Hansens are charged with abandonment. But most of all, I hope that Artyom, and all children everywhere, end up in families that believe with all their heart that the kids are really theirs.

I think we can all agree with this. But unfortunately, treating ALL parents the same in Tennessee includes the possibility that the Hansens committed no crime.

She Just HAD to Be Single

In case you've missed it in all the coverage of the adoptive mother who returned her son, Artyom, to Russia alone on a plane, is single. Or as this article says, "a 33-year-old, unmarried nurse." (Is it just me, or is there a difference between being a "single mom" and being an "unmarried mom?" Looks to me like they are signaling the stigmatizing "unwed mother.")

Great, just what we need, a poster child for why singles shouldn't be allowed to adopt. And yes, people are going there. A quick read of the first 100 or so comments to the article above revealed the following comments from 5 separate commenters:

Adoption by a single parent is not really a good idea.

What is the story on the adoptive mother, was she a single mom? Not a good idea for her to adopt in the first place.

in first instance he should not be adopted by a single mother this is unbelievable!

Single mother adopting - that says something about the silly twit right there.

A single mother adopted him? Who was in charge of THAT for God's sake?

Sigh. Yes, I know that's only 5% of commenters. And two commenters called foul on blaming this on single parenthood. And this is just anecdotal, not an accurate gauge of public opinion. But somehow it doesn't make me feel better. . . .

Russia Furious over Returned Boy

Ya think?! So furious they are threatening to suspend adoptions to the U.S., and so furious they've suspended the license of the adoption agency, WACAP (which has a fairly good reputation, btw, though they certainly missed something here). And more details are coming out about the situation, including what the boy's "crimes" were that merited being returned, how he made it through security, and what might happen next to the adoptive mother:

Russia threatened to suspend all child adoptions by U.S. families Friday after a 7 -year-old boy adopted by a woman from Tennessee was sent alone on a one-way flight back to Moscow with a note saying he was violent and had severe psychological problems.

The boy, Artyom Savelyev, was put on a plane by his adopted grandmother, Nancy Hansen of Shelbyville.

"He drew a picture of our house burning down and he'll tell anybody that he's going to burn our house down with us in it," she told The Associated Press in a telephone
interview. "It got to be where you feared for your safety. It was terrible."

The boy arrived unaccompanied in Moscow on a United Airlines flight on Thursday from Washington. Social workers sent him to a Moscow hospital for a health checkup and criticized his adoptive mother for abandoning him.

The Kremlin children's rights office said the boy was carrying a letter from his adoptive mother saying she was returning him due to severe psychological problems.

"This child is mentally unstable. He is violent and has severe psychopathic issues," the letter said. "I was lied to and misled by the Russian Orphanage workers and director regarding his mental stability and other issues. ...

"After giving my best to this child, I am sorry to say that for the safety of my family, friends, and myself, I no longer wish to parent this child."

"Giving my best?" A whole 6 months?! Wow, she beat Anita Tedaldi's record. And in January, they told the social worker doing a post-placement follow-up that everything was just fine. And less than 3 months later they send him back. Ugh.

Nancy Hansen, the grandmother, told The Associated Press that she and the boy flew to Washington and she put the child on the plane with the note from her daughter. She vehemently rejected assertions of child abandonment by Russian
authorities, saying he was watched over by a United Airlines stewardess and the family paid a man $200 to pick the boy up at the Moscow airport and take him to
the Russian Education and Science Ministry.

Well, that explains getting through security, doesn't it? The boy went through security with the grandmother, and wouldn't have had to go through it again at the Washington airport. Sheesh.

And how about this part?

"The Russian orphanage officials completely lied to her because they wanted to get rid of him," Nancy Hansen said.

She said the boy was very skinny when they picked him up, and he told them he had been beaten with a broom handle at the orphanage.

Knowing he'd been starved and abused, they were willing to send him back to that. Not an ounce of feeling for this child. Utter selfishness.

And it looks like not just Russia is furious -- here's the quote from the American Ambassador to Russia:

The U.S. ambassador to Russia, John Beyrle, said he was "deeply shocked by the news" and "very angry that any family would act so callously toward a child that they had legally adopted."

I'll ditto that.

Though the grandmother vehemently denies that they "abandoned" the boy, the law might see it differently:

Bedford County Sheriff Randall Boyce also said Torry Hansen was under investigation and expected to interview her Friday afternoon.

The article also mentions the ULTIMATE adoption disruption -- the recent deaths of several adopted Russian children at the hands of their adoptive parents -- including one just last month.

I know that biological families abandon, abuse, and kill their children, too. Is it "worse" when adoptive families do it? YES. Adoptive families as a group have more money, more education, and more access to help. I expect more of them. Adoptive families enter into parenting intentionally, so I expect more of them. I'm an adoptive parent, so I expect more of them.

P.S. The Daily Mail (UK) has photos of the mother, the boy, and the letter. And reports that the adoptive mother DID NOT TELL the boy she was returning him, simply that he was going on "an excursion to Moscow."

Disruption News: I Can't Keep Up

Thanks to a Facebook posting by Harlow's Monkey, this article about an 8th grade boy who brought a gun to school in Minnesota, and turns out to have been adopted from Russia at age 3 and disrupted at age 10:

"His needs far exceeded what the normal or even the super-family -- the two-parent home that we had and the love we had to give -- his needs far exceeded what we could do," his mom said. "We exhausted all of our resources -- financially, emotionally, spiritually -- I mean, all of the resources we had."

After years of trying to find proper treatment, the couple said, they came to a heart-breaking, guilt-filled conclusion that still brings tears: When it comes to serious mental illness, sometimes love -- even sacrificial, unconditional love -- isn't enough. They gave up their parental rights in August.

"We still think of him as our son. He will always be a part of us," said the mom. "... We pray for him daily. We remember him."

"But yet, we're afraid of him," said the dad.

An undoubtedly hard situation -- a child bringing a gun to school and threatening students obviously has issues. But has disruption made it better for anyone? And why are his former parents speaking so freely to the media about this poor child? I'm reminded of Anita Tedaldi's self-serving confessional tour concerning a child no longer hers. And in criminal defense terms, this isn't perhaps the best kind of media report for him. . . .

More on Artyom

. . . and Another

Add one more to the disruption list -- Artyom:

An 8-year old boy arrived at a Moscow airport from the United States on Saturday morning. “I refuse him”, read the note the boy carried with him.

The Russian internet daily Gazeta.ru quoted the Russian representative on children’s rights, Pavel Astakhov, as saying the child had been earlier adopted in Russia by an American couple. The boy was adopted six months ago.

Can you still say, "Adoption is Forever," without the words sticking in your throat?

Another and Another and Another . . .

Another adoption disruption story, brought to light by An-Ya blog and O Solo Mamma. A little girl adopted internationally at age 4, and is now 13, and her parents feel she "never bonded."

From An-Ya:

Ok – we are not talking about a violent child, a sexually aggressive child, a child that is urinating and defecating the walls or destroying property or animals. We are not even talking about a child who is stealing or lying or running away.

This is a teenager who isn’t fun to be around. Mom says that child is RAD but I see absolutely nothing in her post to suggest that anything this child is doing warrants a new home after being there for 9 years.

From O Solo Mamma:

Whatever you do, don’t come here and tell me I haven’t walked in these parents’ shoes. I thought the big headline around town was how forever adoptive family was. The only shoes that count are the ones worn by the kids. Sore feet, bloody feet. It isn’t comfortable.

* * *

I will never let you go. I will never let you down. I will never abandon you.

Truth be told, I promised that the day I adopted.

Jade. Tristan. Toni. Sweetpea. Matteo. Two unnamed boys. Jennifer. Angry Boy. Now this young teen. Just the ones I've heard about that are documented. How many more are there?

According to this 2004 article at the Child Welfare Information Gateway, the numbers are small:

Festinger (2002) found that 4 years after adoption, about 3.3 percent of children adopted from public and voluntary agencies in New York City in 1996 were or had been in foster care since adoption. In most of these situations the adoptive parent reported an expectation that the child would return to their home again.

A study of children adopted in Kansas City showed that 3 percent of adopted children were not living with their adoptive parents 18 to 24 months after adoption (McDonald, Propp, & Murphy, 2001).

In a longitudinal study of families in Iowa who were receiving adoption subsidies, Groze (1996) found that 8 percent of the children were placed out of the home after 4 years. However, in all cases the families did not dissolve the adoption and were considered to be connected to and invested in the adopted child.

A study of public agency adoptions in Illinois reported that adoptions dissolved at a rate of 6.6 percent between 1976 and 1987 (Goerge et al., 1997).

The GAO reported that about 1 percent of the public agency adoptions finalized in fiscal years 1999 and 2000 later were legally dissolved. The report cautioned that the 1 percent figure represents only adoptions that failed relatively soon after being finalized, so the number of dissolutions could have increased with time (U.S. GAO, 2003).

The numbers don't seem small when you hear the stories of these youngsters. Jade. Tristan. Toni. Sweetpea. Matteo. Two unnamed boys. Jennifer. Angry Boy. This young teen. And the numbers are growing -- this UK article reports that disruptions have doubled in the past five years.

I've been blogging about adoption for less than two years, and this 13-year-old is unlucky 13. There are are now 13 posts under the "disruption" label. I wonder how many more there will be two years from now. . . .

Anita Tedaldi Goes Global

Lovely. Anita Tedaldi, who disrupted the adoption of her son, and publicized it on the New York Times Motherlode blog and the Today Show, has now publicized it in the Guardian, a UK paper.

It's the same as published in the New York Times, except that Matteo/D. is now Dan, and he's still from South America rather than Ethiopia. One positive -- the Guardian tries to put disruption in some context, offering some information and statistics about disruption:

The British Association of Adoption and Fostering (BAAF) estimates that one in five adoptions break down, although children who are "handed back" are usually older. The younger the child, the lower the chance of the placement breaking down. A study by the Maudsley Hospital in London found a breakdown rate of 8% after one year and 29% six years later. On average, adoptions that broke down did so 34 months after placement.

Despite the negative publicity that overseas adoption has attracted in recent years, there is no evidence that they are more likely to break down than domestic placements. Many studies have concluded that international adoption has, for the most part, been very successful, including for children who have spent their early years in institutions.

Children placed in stable, loving families, show a great capacity for catch-up – although a great deal depends on support from the wider family and adoption specialists, and the extent to which the adopters mix with other people from the country they adopted from.

The sad fact is that in many states of America, where Dan was adopted, this combination is less likely to be recognised as essential, despite the fact that overseas adoption tends to be far easier than it is here. Also undoubtedly contributing to Dan's adoption breakdown is the fact that for a minority of the most deprived children, major problems – especially in the area of attachment – do not go away, regardless of how much help, support, stability and indeed love, is provided.

Is the British paper right? Is the required support "less likely to be recognised as essential" in America? Do the Brits do it better?

As a follow-up, Tedaldi writes about the reaction to her writing about the disruption, and offers the same reason for why she wrote about the disruption:

This account first appeared on a blog several months ago. Since then my family has come under intense public scrutiny in the US, where we live. I knew there would be a lot of criticism, but my intention was to share a very personal experience. I don't mind the criticism, but I have been surprised by the degree of hatred displayed towards me and my family. Some readers have made fun of my children's looks.

There have been many positive comments, too, and I'm thankful to the many families who shared their own painful stories with me.

I do not regret writing about Dan. I shared this experience because when I saw my own shortcomings, I was humbled. We all struggle with our weaknesses, too often alone.

For what it's worth, my problem isn't that she wrote about disruption -- it's how she wrote about it. And, for what it's worth, I've never made fun of her kids, just of the fact that Tedaldi is writing a parenting manual!