I suppose this could be considered another post following on the heels of my earlier, Being C.A.R.E.-less about adopted people’s access in CA and Bastard Access- either we all go together or we don’t go at all- “Nobody gets left behind. Or forgotten.” about the “California Adoption Reform Effort‘s botched from the get go attempt at a California bill this session.

To get readers up to speed, first a little history:

Ron has done a number of posts on CARE’s crap, including his latest, in which he nails the sappy overwrought emotionalism CARE is employing:

BB Church vs CARE, Nikfa and THE Adopton Institute, with one hand tied behind my back…

Marley also has a number of posts on her California Adoption Reform Effort tag, including her latest about the content of the CA bill itself:

CALIFORNIA: I’M MAD AS HELL AND I’M NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE! BAD BILL HITS THE BOARDS!

While you’re there, be sure to note Maryanne’s comment on Marley’s piece:

maryanne said…

I am mad as hell! I am a member of the CUB Board and we were flat out lied to to get us to support CARE’s bill. We were told in an email from Jean Strauss that they were going to introduce a clean bill, with the proviso that it “might” have to be modified somewhere down the road. This clearly not what happened; CARE did not even try to introduce a clean bill, but came out with this travesty.This group deserves no support from anyone who cares about adoptee rights.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009 10:45:00 AM EST

If this is how the bill’s “supporters” are interpreting current events, I’d say CARE has a rocky road ahead of it.

The full text of CA AB 372 as introduced can be found on the California Open page.

Read it and judge for yourself, but simply put, it is not by any stretch a clean open records bill.

As Marley pointed out in her latest piece CARE felt the need to add this disclaimer of sorts to their webpage concerning the bill:

(a word about reading a bill: Legislative language, and the language of statutes, can be confusing. The language is based upon existing legal code which encompasses thousands of pages that are all interrelated. The chane that we are requesting will allow adult adoptees over the page of 18 access to their original record of birth. The text herein is written by the legislative counsel for the California Assembly and is written for lawyers, not for lay people. What’s important is that it cretes a legal right for adult adoptees to get their birth records.)

In other words, it’s a nice little condescending pat on the head, saying essentially, ‘there, there all you adoptees, it’s in legislate-ese, just TRUST US, it doesn’t mean what you thought you read, see? It’s now a “rights” bill, trust us!’

Which of course is ultimately not what it is. This is not a rights bill, this more of the usual conditional psuedo-access predicated upon desires and whims.

Again, Bastards buying that old “trust us” line, I’ve still got that old CARE bridge on the wrong coast to sell ya … .

Bastards have every reason to begin asking the hard questions when someone begins selling us the just “trust us” line in relation to legislation.

These are people’s real lives CARE is being so CARE-less with. The consequences of getting it wrong means real people left behind, screwed over, and trapped behind walls of lack of access.

In Ohio, I’m precisely that class of “left behind” Bastards. Had I been born just a few years earlier, or perhaps a few years later, my chances of actually gaining access to my authentic records would be quite different, but as it stands now, purely due to a “political compromise” I’m locked into those middle, and fucked over, years.

Messed up legislation has real world consequences to those bargained away.

And that is precisely what the CARE bill does, set up a new and damaged system going forward. If their bill were to pass Bastards would be left begging judges for scrubbed of identifying information (unless such is deemed necessary to assist in establishing a legal right) copies of their paperwork.

It says so right there in the CARE bill:

The name and address of the natural parents shall be given to the petitioner or requester only if he or she can demonstrate that the name and address, or either of them, are necessary to assist him or her in establishing a legal right. In all other cases, that information shall be redacted from all records and information provided, including a copy of an original record of birth.

CARE’s pre-emptive answer to such is of course, another pat on the head, ‘there there, you just don’t understand it, TRUST US!’

Trust people who have the unmitigated gall to write such into a bill and then try to proffer it off as a bill that “creates a legal right for adult adoptees to get their birth records”?

Like hell!

Yes, by and large I’m pointing my readers to others writings on the CARE-tastrope, in part because

• Ron himself is a California adoptee (as well as his previous work with California Open)
• and Marley in her Bastard Nation work as a “9-year member of CalOpen Partners” is also in a position to have something to say here.

Both of them not only have something to say about this monstrosity, they come from places to know of what they speak.

What I have to say is mainly in support of the good work they’re already doing.

None-the-less, being a left behind Bastard myself, who has petitioned the court for my records repeatedly, let me tell you, I at least hold out hope that if the judge were to actually sign off on allowing me my own paperwork, it would at least be complete, not routinely redacted by law.

CARE is thus taking a bad situation and ultimately making it worse, setting up NEW roadblocks. This is not merely a bad bill, it’s actively counterproductive.

Living as I do on the other end of a not altogether dissimilar process in Ohio, let me be the first to tell you, “compromises” that create new obstructions and make the already bad situation worse are no answer.

(This is one of a number of posts relating to my critique of “compromise” legislation, such as that offered up by the California Adoption Reform Effort or what I refer to in the below as the “California Disaster.” See my CARE tag to find my other posts on the subject. )

***

Disney’s “Stitch.”

Instantly recognizable as a “fellow traveler” to Bastard moviegoers and adopted “abominations” everywhere.

Not only does he hail from the one and only Disney movie to prominently feature a social worker, alongside the perennial Disney themes of:

• being orphaned, and of impending potential family disruption,
• the importance of family preservation, (even when families are self- found, “little, and broken” they are nonetheless worthy of being deemed “still good.”)
• how even those deprived of their history can come to create their own intentional forms of family, and be reunited with their Ohana of origin
• and how eventually, in movies anyway, the lead always comes to rediscover their previously obscured roots, (Bastards make the best plot twists!)

but Stitch, Lilo, and Nani also have a very great deal to say about notions of leaving people behind:

“Ohana means family, family means nobody gets left behind. Or forgotten.”

Widsom so simple, children have no trouble comprehending it.

Unfortunately, out here in the non-animated world, it’s a lesson all too many adults have yet to wrap their heads around.

***

Marley/Bastardette has written what I consider one of the most important posts on the Bastard condition I’ve seen in a long time.

In light of how some in the adoption blogosphere have gotten their knickers in a collective twist over both the California disaster and the NCFA piece (which simply is not news, except in that Bill Pierce is no doubt rolling over in his grave in light of how much psuedo-“openness” the new NCFA has come to embrace,) Marley brings up what is completely obvious to Bastards, that “reformers” and industry voices such as NCFA have far more in common with one another than either do with any genuine effort which has actually opened records and improved the lives for adopted people.

CARE, the Evan B. Donaldson Institute, and NCFA all have more in common with one another than any of them have to do with us.

Each of these, despite any “openness” language they may come to employ (usually grounded firmly in a cynical pragmatism and industry survival instinct), are ultimately willing to trade away access for some. An often undetermined number or percentage are written off as expendable, or “not politically expedient.”

Bastards on the other hand, leave no one behind.

Speaking as one of those left behind in an earlier Ohio deform effort, and as a black holed Bastard, let me add my voice to Marley’s, genuine Bastard-centric efforts leave no one behind.

No number or percentage should be left back or “forgotten.” Living daily, as one myself, allow me to tell you from firsthand experience, it’s inexcusable.

We will never trade away the person standing next to us. Any notion of “we’ll come back and open those up later” is failure. (Even the briefest study of political history will teach that lesson quickly enough.) We understand, either we all go together or we don’t go at all.

None of the adoption deformers speak for us.

In any case, go, read, and learn:

SWAPMEETIN’: NCFA, REFORMISTS, AND BASTARDS

Marley’s piece from where I sit is a mandatory Bastard backgrounder and has everything to say about where we find ourselves today.

(And ’cause I’m a space geek, enjoy a Black hole picture post.)

(Photo Queerty)

Well, I was on the verge of getting part II of my current series finished up when I noted a story perhaps a bit more pressing to blog about.

Let’s take a pause from our usual ongoing cavalcade of healthy white newborn obsessed procurement industry twists and turns to look instead at one of those other meanings to the word “adoption.”

Today I want to bring readers’ attention towards Gay and Lesbian Adolescent Social Services (GLASS) out in L.A., whose board just voted to declare bankruptcy.

Pam’s House Blend– Is GLASS the first non-profit domino to fall? has a brief write up. I’ll just pull an excerpt:

Wednesday night, eight days after its 25th anniversary, the board of directors of Gay and Lesbian Adolescent Social Services (GLASS) voted 7-0 (with one abstention) to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy this afternoon. According to founder and executive director Terry DeCrescenzo, the staff is so “outraged” at the board’s decision, they plan to ask a court to intervene and accept a reorganization plan instead.

“This is a world-class disaster,” DeCrescenzo told me by phone, noting that GLASS just became the first licensed LGBT adoption agency in the country. Their primary program is providing group homes for 40 LGBT 15-17 year olds, and transitional living for 25 teens between 17-19.

Queerty’s headline puts the significance in perspective- First Licensed LGBT Adoption Agency in U.S. Declares Bankruptcy.

It’s perhaps too soon to speculate on quite what led to the decision, whether it was the collapsing economy, Californian Queer donation dollars being redirected into the “No on 8” effort, factors internal to GLASS itself, or some other as of yet unknown factor. DeCrescenzo explained the vote thusly:

DeCrescenzo says that what lead to this current fiscal crisis was nine years of flat funding, increases in Worker’s Comp, increases in liability, tremendous increases in health insurance and donor fatigue that made it hard to raise money.

But what can be said with clarity is that GLASS closing its doors could make a bad situation worse for some Queer youth.

Having come close to being a Queer streetkid myself, and certainly having been close to others down through the years, I guess you could say I know a thing or two about how important both services and stability can be for kids in these situations. Programs like this provide the only family that doesn’t hate them some of these kids will ever know.

A number of these kids age out of foster care, their connections with other Queer peers are in some cases pretty much the only anchors in their lives. The loss of programs like this will only increase their isolation.

These posts are going to try to begin to address some of my underlying assumptions about how these concepts both do and do not inter-relate with the adoption field. They are backgrounder, or basic building block concept posts that underlie a fair amount of my writing, and will probably be referred to from time to time throughout my writing. I’ve been promising to get to these for quite some time so for a number of reasons, now seems an appropriate time.

I’m not trying to do an end all be all of posts on these topics though. These are merely what I’m calling “early notes.” I want to discuss some aspects related to these topics, but these “notes” are by no means going to be comprehensive nor a complete overview.

That said, before I can even get to the concepts themselves, I’ve come to the (somewhat unfortunate) conclusion that in order to explain my approach I first must explain part of my own story of how I got here. Hence, this part one, “Introduction” portion.

***

As some of my regular readers are aware, I’ve spent much of my adult life in the field of reproductive autonomy related work, specifically writing about and working on increasing access to abortion services.

I approach both my reproductive autonomy work, and somewhat separately, my adoption/Bastard related work from a radical (or “to the root”) feminist standpoint. Much of my analysis hinges upon womyn’s roles relating to reproduction and child rearing, ways in which womyn’s autonomy is both expressed and intentionally restrained.

Unlike some in the adoption field (on both sides of the abortion deep divide), I make great effort to not falsely conflate aspects of the abortion field into adoption related work. The two are altogether chronologically separate portions the first relating to the reproductive process, then the second portion relating to the day to day child-rearing process. I have graphed this all out on paper, explaining the differences visually, at various points in explaining the basis of it to others, but for the purposes of the web and blogging, I do not have those notes and visual graphics available, (yet anyway.) That’s another “building block” sort of a post for another day.

I’ve often spoken about how blogging forms a kind of ‘coming in in the middle’ and then having to back up and explain the concepts taken as underlying assumptions to those conclusions. These posts about privacy and consent are on the one hand building block concepts, yet ultimately, they too, in turn also rely upon other sets of assumptions that I have yet to spell out for the purposes of blogging. As always, I am starting in the middle, these posts are a form of compromise in that sense.

For the sake of this series, though, I’ll simply refer to abortion as chronologically a portion of the pregnancy or lack thereof portion of the reproductive process, and adoption as chronologically a portion of the day to day child rearing, or lack thereof portion of the process, what I have termed at times the “parenting” process.

That said, I work with the underlying assumption that any womyn who has given birth regardless of whether or not she is able to do the day to day child-rearing certainly qualifies as a parent. This is one of those places where the English language fails. These womyn are most certainly parents, yet many are either self removed from, or deprived of day in and day out child-rearing responsibilities and the legal status of “parent” in the broader culture.

Men of course, are also in here. For me birth is clearly the dividing line. Prior to birth there is no child. Post birth there is. Post birth you have male parents/fathers with their own sets of rights, as well as the rights of the child him or herself.

In the reproductive process a womyn only has two paths that are in any form even potentially “under her control;” bearing to term or aborting. While miscarriages are common, perhaps occurring in as many as 1 in 4 pregnancies prior to the six week mark, miscarriage is not a process usually considered under a womyn’s personal control.

In the chronologically separate period, post birth, who will who have day to day custody of the child and who will in effect raise the child is determined.

I do not consider these “choices” as for many womyn, as these “decisions” are not “choices” they are enabled or allowed to make. Whether the pressures be economic, access of lack thereof, or court ordered, for some number of womyn, their reproductive processes and eventual post birth child-rearing “choices” are perhaps more aptly characterized by a distinct lack of options and lack of “choices.” Back in 1999 I wrote an early draft of some of my thinking on the consumerist marketing term “choice” and some of the reasons I dismiss it as a strategy.

While it is difficult to write about both abortion and adoption in language that does not intrinsically assume womyn’s free agency, (womyn having choices or decisions in these matters) the reality is some number of womyn genuinely do not enjoy the assumption of autonomy required to place these outcomes into the realm of “choices.” Womyn are forced into both carrying to term and abortions by lack of financial alternatives. “Parental rights” (by which I really mean day to day decisions and legal authority in child-rearing) are routinely stripped from parents deemed for one reason or another unworthy of their “parenthood,” be that with cause (such as abuse) or merely because they are impoverished.

To then assume that all outcomes are grounded firmly in autonomously made “choices” then merely hides the realities many womyn face. End results cannot be assumed to be the result of a consensual process grounded in “choices”, “decisions” or other means by which womyn express their own authentic desires.

First and foremost among those reasons to reject the language of “choice” must be that it hides the authentic voices and experiences of womyn.

“It was your (reproductive) choice” has been used repeatedly to cover over and silence the experiences of womyn who non-consensually lost their children to adoption. (Note the conflation, of pre-birth pregnancy/reproductive period and the post birth child-rearing period inherent to such.)

Likewise, it also covers over the experiences of womyn who wanted access to abortion but were unable to gain access. Thus children, by the mere evidence of their existence, are then at times falsely assumed to have been “wanted” or a product of a “choice.” This has led to Compulsory Pregnancy Advocates’ slogans that assume a child was “chosen” merely based upon existence of said child, such as “chose life your mother did.” Such slogans are actively used to hide information, such as cases wherein one’s mother may have wanted an abortion, but may have lacked access at the time to carry through on her desired course of action. As these are things often not conveyed to said resultant unintended or undesired children after the fact, the realities of the situation remain hidden, and via the mere evidence of a one time child’s existence, consent to the pregnancy is then assumed.

Realities tend to be far more complex, but usually remain hidden or silenced. After all, most womyn do not feel they have the ability to speak candidly with their offspring about what they may or may not have wanted at the time.

Nor is adoption any portion of a reproductive process. Some will attempt to conflate adoption into the reproductive period, be that from an abortion supportive perspective or from a compulsory pregnancy centered perspective, but such conflations rely upon the central lie of equating a pregnancy to a born child. Pushing womyn towards an eventual expected adoption while they are still in pregnancy is to make determinations on the eventual disposition of a (for some) hoped for outcome, not yet a reality.

Much of what I will be discussing in parts II and III relies upon my own grounding in and background in the womyn’s health movement or (WHM.) The Womyn’s Health Movement has been a blend of both a Feminist pro-active continuation of womyn’s ongoing roles in health care provision, and a direct response to the inadequacies, gaps, and at times outright misogyny in the provision of medical care.

Many of my underlying assumptions pertaining to the field relate to the historical rise of the originally exclusionary of womyn male based professionalized and certified health establishment. Imperfect as it may be, works such as Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English’s “Witches, Midwives and Nurses: A History of Women Healers” (along with their other similar writings) provides a brief overview of of the rise of “professionalized” medicine and what it meant to the pre-existing class of womyn healers.

I should also mention before we begin that I approach the reproductive autonomy and abortion work not as a “pro-choice” advocate, but as from a radical (“to the root”) feminist abortion law repeal stance.

I’ve written a fair amount through the years about where I come out on all of this from my pro-abortion stance to my pro-repeal work. Without going into all that here, I’ll simply point readers across towards two materials that have helped shape my ‘bedrock assumptions:’

Firstly, “Abortion without Apology: A Radical History for the 1990s” by Ninia Baehr.

Secondly, Lucinda (Cindy) Cisler’s vitally important essay, “Abortion law repeal (sort of): a warning to women,” which fortunately a version of can be found online.

Taken together, the two of these sum up much of my stance in less than 100 pages.

As we move on into parts II and III, these are some of the materials that under-gird my thinking. Written materials, though are only a portion of my approach. Much of how I approach privacy, consent, abortion and adoption has far more to do with the practical applications out in the real world.

My understandings of a subset of privacy, “patient confidentiality” cannot help but be formed through having spent enough Saturday mornings across this country documenting compulsory pregnancy advocates (CPAs) for example logging every license plate entering a Florida clinic’s parking lot over the course of years, or CPAs standing on ladders to videotape womyn over womyn’s health center fences so they could put the womyn’s pictures online in an effort to shame them.

I’ve spent the majority of my adult life enmeshed in the finer points of what these words mean in real life practice.

This is also very likely why I have not written on them before now, and why I fully recognize these posts are going to be mere sketches, of the concepts, far from complete.

For me, there is no conflation betwixt the realms of abortion and adoption and how terms like privacy and consent both at times do and do not apply within each. Unfortunately, however, individuals such as Bill Pierce, the former head of the National Council for Adoption (an institutionalized voice of the adoption industry just outside DC) made a career of building intentional conflations. Far too many people who should know better have been suckered in by the conflationary rhetoric down through the years, so for that reason alone, it is long past time to begin to try to pull apart these false memes.

If you believe the California Adoption Reform Effort, (or C.A.R.E.”) is going to gain full Bastard access to records in CA I’ve got a bridge to sell ya… .

In C.A.R.E.’s case, apparently the Brooklyn Bridge, as they for a time, could not be bothered to even find a picture of a California landmark bridge, instead they pitched their California effort with a picture of the famous bridge from New York!

But hey, good news, they’ve finally updated their page with a spankin’ new picture of the Golden Gate Bridge. (Welcome to California, C.A.R.E.)

Suffice it to say, reading through the C.A.R.E. materials and the public face of the effort to date, I am monumentally unimpressed.

Both Ron and Marley have been carefully deconstructing the materials as well.

For the moment, rather than reinventing the wheel, I urge my readers to carefully go through their takes on this latest CA non-grassroots (by their own admission) effort.

There’s plenty of writing that certainly could be done, tackling any given piece of it, such as the nonsensical notion of a “triad” in relation to such. Allow me to quote Ron here for but a moment (this is from his post If You’re a California Adoptee, C.A.R.E. Has Plans For YOU!)

Next is the Join page. After your name you may enter your “triad” position; “Adoptee”, “Birth Parent”, “Adoptive Parent”, “Birth Sibling”, “Support Person/Spouse”, and then six categories of adoption professionals. Six. If you wanted to see a graphic of why the “triad” is a trick on the natives, just let your gaze linger on that for a while… But then go to the meat, the “ask” as we like to say in polite politesse. To become a member you’ve got to pony up 85 clams. 40 if you’re a senior. Considering the times and the following-trend that are our unemployment figures they might want to consider a donor category for hobos… Agencies and the like are expected to give 200… This isn’t an “ask” designed to generate a lot a support, only the serious donors will feel welcome. Well, not that serious, if they were serious they’d have a category for $10K and over… I suppose at this point it’s fair to inquire if C.A.R.E cares about the support of California’s adoptees… They don’t have a portal for information gathering other than the Join page, for those uncounted unwashed masses who have time or energy to donate in-kind, so what C.A.R.E. really wants is cash.

I’ve certainly written and taught about how there is no triad, there is an adoption pentagon, or what Ron likewise has termed a “Five-legged Stool” but few things make the reality of such clearer than looking over an effort such as C.A.R.E..

Events in CA have gotten bad enough to pull BB Church/Ron back from his retirement into some bastard blogging, (damn good thing, too, his analysis is well worth the read!)

From BB Church’s FunHouse–

If You’re a California Adoptee, C.A.R.E. Has Plans For YOU! ( Friday, February 06, 2009)

The plot thickens: CARE’s email to its supporters… (Monday, February 09, 2009)

Does CARE care? Nope… (Monday, February 09, 2009)

Marley/Bastardette is also right on it having written a two-part post. See her analysis on the Daily Bastardette–

WE’VE SCREWED UP YOUR STATE, NOW WE’RE COMING TO SCREW UP YOURS: CALIFORNIA ADOPTION REFORM EFFORT– THE LETTER

WE’VE SCREWED UP YOUR STATE, NOW WE’RE COMING TO SCREW UP YOURS: CALIFORNIA ADOPTION REFORM EFFORT–COMMENTS

Undoubtedly we’ll be hearing more about this mess in the months to come.

Let’s just say there are plenty of darn good reasons the California Adoption Reform Effort (CARE) is NOT being linked in my right hand sidebar under the “Work for adoptee rights- State by State” heading, BUT California Open is.

Gee maybe it has something to do with the “No Compromise” sign on California Open’s myspace page… ya think?

Or perhaps the California Open promise-

OUR PROMISE TO YOU

WE LEAVE NO ONE BEHIND!

NO SELL-OUT!

NO RESTRICTION!

NO COMPROMISE!

Well, ok, all that and the California Open myspace page has such a nice picture of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Yeah been a bit since I’ve blogged, let’s pick up where I left off- “Attachment” related bullshit.

Wayward Radish, the blogger behind A Search for Survivors has written a number of posts this week pertaining to Ronald S. Federici and the disabling of Pound Pup Legacy (PPL).

Feb 2-

AT Quack Ronald Federici attempts to shut down website of PPL (group that opposes child abuse and offers assistance to adoptees and foster kids)

Feb 3-

“The Emperor” strikes back: Pound Pup Legacy shut down over information about Ronald Federici

Feb 4-

“Authoritarian Turnip” Ronald Federici Is Now Attempting to Silence Survivors of Child Torture

and today, Feb 6-

Ronald Federici Tries (and Fails) to Shut Down “A Search For Survivors” in its Entirety

Much as Federici would often prefer to wrap what he does up in the pretty bow of words like “Neuropsychological and Family Therapy” he is has still been very much a part of the “attachment” crowd not the least of which being the whole Texas Christian University/Hope Connection (camp) nest. (See this Inside Dateline personal note (PDF) backgrounder to the promo puff piece Dateline ran back in 2006 on Federici and Karyn Puvis.) Federici was involved in evaluating many of the “camp kids” according to the account.

His own webpage about page utilizes the conflationary term “attachment-related disorders” as an area of treatment. (Conflationary, in that “Reactive Attachment Disorder” or RAD is recognized by the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or DSM, whereas the more general heading of quack psuedo “therapies” generally referred to as “attachment therapy” are not. By utilizing the term “attachment-related disorders”, Federici is intentionally building in a form of deniability for himself.)

Neuropsychological and Family Therapy Associates is committed to providing the most comprehensive evaluation and state-of-the-art treatment services for children having the “full range” of Developmental and Psychiatric Disorders. Conditions such as autistic spectrum disorders; complex learning and attentional disorders; minimal brain dysfunction conditions; severe disruptive and behavioral disorders; chronic psychiatric disorders ; attachment-related disorders; post-traumatic stress disorders (following abuse and neglect from early childhood experiences); and chronic stress affecting family functioning.

If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, and holds children down while yelling at them…

Bastards need to get up to speed on what the quackery passed off as “attachment therapy” means in practice.

To my shame and frustration, I have not written even a single full basic post on it to date, not for lack of desire to do so, but for lack of the words.

I’ve mentioned AT, and my contempt for it repeatedly, but simply cannot begin to find the words for how I feel about this atrocity being aimed at adopted people as a class and marketed (at times by the adoption industry itself) towards adopters, preying on their fears and insecurities relating to wanting to be a “good parent.”

Unfortunately this evening’s post is still not going to be that introductory post about what AT is, and isn’t, why it matters, how it’s aimed at Bastards and their adopters, how the adoption industry is embracing these hideous practices, or anything more depth about it.

I’m STILL not there yet. It’s too big, too ugly, too soul crushingly infuriating.

Instead, I’m going to do one of the small things I can do. This post is but a small step along that process of only beginning to scream from the rooftops about what is being done to Bastards, doubly so those deemed recalcitrant or intractable.

This junk psudeosceince is little more than a control mechanism, well that, and perhaps a means for certain adults to get their jollies forcing kids to do as they command.

I urge my readers to take some time with this important post and the connected video, Attachment Therapist Neil Feinberg Terrorizes 10-Year Old Adopted Boy.

Further I urge you, explore the full site, which I’ve linked to before, A Search for Survivors. The blog serves several purposes, one of which being to bring those who endured these “treatments” into contact with others like themselves. The other of which being primarily to tell their stories, and fight back against the attachment marketing infrastructure.

Being an older Bastard I was fortunate to get through my growing up-hood without being subjected to this particular plague, though had I been younger, perhaps similar quackery would have become part of my own adoption experience, what with having a happily “misspent” youth of my own.

Eventually, I hope I will find the damn words, for now all I can say and do is support those with firsthand experiences of such “treatments,” listen, and learn, and be an ally in speaking out against these at times deadly junk “therapies,” rage, and mourn.

Pound Pup Legacy has also created a section on the so called “attachment therapy.”

So folks, go do your homework, start looking, start reading, get up to speed.

The comment thread on my blog post here is where I’ve written some of how I came to learn about adoption and AT.

Kids are being made to endure this shit, being minors, there’s very little they can do about their circumstances at the time.

As they grow old enough to speak about their experiences we need to listen. Not merely because it could have been us, but because what is being done in these sessions are violations.

This is the latest post in a series I have done around the Adam Herrman/Irvin Groeninger III case. I urge readers to explore my earlier work to gain familiarity with the case and my interpretation of it. See my Irvin Groeninger III tag for more. My most recent post will always appear first on the tag.

***

I’ve been advising readers to use KWCH’s chart profiling Adam Herrman’s Family to help keep track of the variety of voices in this story.

By way of a second tool, I’d also like to point readers towards the Wichita Eagle’s A timeline for the Adam Herrman case. It too, is very useful in keeping track of the all the dates in this story.

***

On a personal note, yeah I haven’t been blogging as much as I’d like to over the past week, not for lack of material, but for lack of time.

On Saturday, The Wichita Eagle published the first public comments about the case from from the Butler County Chief Prosecutor, in the comments the boy’s adoptive parents were for the first time (to my knowledge) described as “the suspects.” See Prosecutor: parents are suspects in Adam Herrman case:

Butler County’s chief prosecutor said Friday that the adoptive parents of 11-year-old Adam Herrman are suspects in his 1999 disappearance and that the investigation could result in murder charges.

Referring to Doug and Valerie Herrman, Butler County Attorney Jan Satterfield said, “They are the suspects in this case.”

In her first public comments about the case during an interview with The Eagle, Satterfield said that although searches have not found any human remains, there is potential for charges of first-degree felony murder, with the underlying crime being child abuse.

Despite the wave of publicity, to date there has been “no indication that he exists out there:”

Although investigators have not ruled out the possibility that Adam is alive, detectives have found “no indication that he exists out there,” Satterfield said.

No charges have been filed against the Herrmans. Valerie Herrman’s attorney, Warner Eisenbise of Wichita, has also said that she denies harming Adam.

In another subtle shift in the case, we also see Warner Eisenbise now quoted as Valerie Herman’s attorney. Doug Herrman has retained a separate attorney of his own:

Wichita lawyer Dan Monnat said Friday that his law firm is now representing Doug Herrman. Monnat declined further comment.

As the Herrman’s son, Justin has previous said his mother was the one who abused Irvin / Adam, and his father had stepped in to stop it, I am not altogether surprised to see separate attorneys representing their respecting interests, see Relatives say missing Butler County boy was abused:

Justin Herrman, 29, who is the biological son of Valerie and Doug Herrman, said he never saw his father abuse Adam.

“He’s actually stopped it many times,” said Justin Herrman, who was about 7 years older than Adam.

Over the years, at different homes around the Wichita area, his mother “would start hitting him or beating him with a belt,” Justin said.

His father “would stop her and say, ‘That’s enough, Valerie,’ ” he said.

Clearly though, both adopters failed to report him missing, and assumedly both were part of the financial fraud, claiming the boy time and again after he was long gone. (Which I hope to detail further in a separate post as there’s news on that front as well.)

One of the other major issues with the case has become when various records will come to be released.

As I first reported back on January 15th, (see this article, SRS to review contacts with Adam Herrman, for the quote below) the Wichita Eagle, (potentially among other media sources,) along with Kansas State Senator Jean Schodorf (see Kan. lawmaker seeks audit for case of missing boy) are seeking records of the State’s interaction with the Herrman family.

The Eagle has filed a request with SRS under the state’s open-records law for information about Adam.

Chief Prosecutor Jan Satterfield is urging such be delayed so as not in interfere with the development of building the case:

Satterfield’s comments Friday came during a telephone interview about her attempt to keep the state child-protection agency from releasing to the media any records about Adam. Those records would include any allegations of him being abused.

Satterfield said that public disclosure would reveal witnesses and interfere with the investigation into Adam’s disappearance.

On Thursday, a judge in Butler County granted a temporary order prohibiting the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services from releasing records about Adam that “touch upon alleged acts of neglect or child abuse directed towards Adam Herrman.” A hearing on whether the prohibition will continue has been set for March 1.

Allow me to quote this portion of the Wichita Eagle article at length:

Blocking the records

The Eagle has sought SRS records on Adam under an exception in the law that allows the information to be disclosed when a child dies or nearly dies and it is related to abuse or neglect.

SRS spokeswoman Michelle Ponce said the agency had been prepared to release information about Adam based on the Butler County Sheriff’s Office treating his disappearance as a homicide investigation.

But Satterfield said: “I think it’s prudent for law enforcement and my office to review the records that are proposed to be released and identify potential witnesses and take statements before they’re disseminated to the general public because we are looking at potential child abuse charges” and potential felony murder charges. Such charges can come, she said, when there is evidence of a murder committed in the process of an “inherently dangerous felony” such as child abuse.

Blocking the release of SRS records is “not in an effort for the public not to know,” Satterfield said.

“We just don’t want that investigation compromised in any way.”

In another document filed Thursday in Butler County District Court, the Wichita Clinic objected to any release of Adam’s SRS file, saying it contains records with “personal health information protected by the physician-patient privilege” and federal law.

The clinic said it has “not received proof, notice, or the suggestion of death of Adam Herrman from law enforcement.”

Satterfield said the purpose of the investigation is “to search for Adam and at the same time to determine if Adam is dead, or any facts that might lead us to potential homicide charges.”

Also last Thursday the article continues, an “interesting tip” came in:

Also Friday, Butler County Sheriff Craig Murphy said detectives received an interesting tip Thursday, but he wouldn’t elaborate.

Murphy described it as “an interesting tip that has created some questions for us that have got to be answered.”

He said detectives don’t plan any searches for Adam’s remains in the near future but are continuing to investigate and seek tips.

Finally, I also want to pull several quotes from this KSN piece originally posted Saturday the 17th and then updated on the 18th, DA: Herrmans are suspects in Adam’s disappearance:

Butler County’s top prosecutor says the adoptive parents of an 11 year old boy who vanished ten years ago are suspects in his disappearance and could face murder charges even if police never find his remains.

“There’s been no record of him for ten years,” said District Attorney Jan Satterfield. “That means something in my mind. It’s not as if he’s been a short period.”

No one has seen Adam Herrman alive since 1999.

Also note:

Satterfield said even if no body is ever found it is still possible for the Herrman’s to be prosecuted on murder charges.

“Yes, it’s rare,” said Satterfield. “Understand he hasn’t been seen in 10 years. It hasn’t been 2 weeks or 2 years.”

While public pressure has been mounting to move the case forward and hold someone accountable, Satterfield said police and prosecutors will take their time building a case. She said if and when charges are brought against the Herrmans her office will present its entire case at once.

Records show Valerie and Doug Herrman continued to collect money from the state for their foster care of Adam for years after he disappeared. Satterfield said her office will hold off on theft or fraud charges until the investigation is complete because of concerns about double jeopardy and constitutional due process laws.

Satterfield said if her office convicts the Herrmans of child abuse it may make it difficult to charge them with murder charges related to the abuse because of double jeopardy.

“We’re not going to respond to the public pressure,” said Satterfield. “We’re going to do the right thing and these things take time.”

This is the latest post in a series I have done around the Adam Herrman/Irvin Groeninger III case. I urge readers to explore my earlier work to gain familiarity with the case and my interpretation of it. See my Irvin Groeninger III tag for more. My most recent post will always appear first on the tag.

***

I’ve been advising readers to use KWCH’s chart profiling Adam Herrman’s Family to help keep track of the variety of voices in this story.

By way of a second tool, I’d also like to begin pointing readers towards the Wichita Eagle’s A timeline for the Adam Herrman case. It too, is a very useful tool in keeping track of the all the dates in this story.

***

So by way of a midweek update, firstly, earlier this week (Kansas) State Senator Jean Schodorf, the Senate assistant majority leader called for an audit of the State’s interactions with the Herrmans. See this January 11th AP story Kan. lawmaker seeks audit for case of missing boy:

State Sen. Jean Schodorf, the Senate assistant majority leader, said Friday she had asked Don Jordan, secretary of the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services, to look for any signs that authorities had needed to take Adam out of the home and whether the state played a part in his disappearance by not acting on them.

“We need to … find out if indeed the state or the system lost this child somewhere,” said Schodorf. “It is just a mystery. Maybe everything was done correctly.”

A review was already underway:

Michelle Ponce, spokeswoman for the social services department, said it already was conducting a “very thorough review” and would cooperate with any criminal investigation.

The department and Derby police said they investigated at least two reports of suspected abuse of Adam in 1996 and 1998.

Adam was in protective custody for two days following the 1996 report, but was returned to adoptive parents Valerie and Doug Herrman after authorities determined the report was unsubstantiated, Ponce said.

The article also elaborates on the state’s homeschool requirements, which are at best, pathetic, not even requiring ongoing evidence that the child is being educated let alone ever completed their education:

State law requires operators of home schools to provide a name and address but doesn’t require records of students who are home-schooled, said Ed Libber, general counsel for the Kansas Department of Education. State records listed a Herrman School with a Derby address as a non-accredited private school in January 1998.

Schodorf said she wasn’t pushing for changing the laws to increase scrutiny when children are withdrawn from school.

“I think we’ve got to piece together this boy’s life and then decide if the state needs to change their regulations,” she said. “And it’s probably too hard to tell now.”

As I have said time and again in these homeschool/kid gone missing cases, the lack of follow up means the default assumption is that the kid is still there, but it’s never anyone’s job description to verify that.

If there is any one lesson to be learned from these cases it’s that disappearing a kid off into “homeschooling” and never so much as checking to see if the kid is still there is a recipe for disaster. See my homeschool tag for other examples of cases where such has been a factor.

In any case, for more on the SRS review also see this Wichita Eagle article, SRS to review contacts with Adam Herrman, which while essentially the same as the above, also points out this important detail:

The Eagle has filed a request with SRS under the state’s open-records law for information about Adam.

Then there has been today’s news, the search in the Towanda trailer park. I’ve pulled a bunch of articles and some video about the search, read any one to get the overview I’m going to try to highlight the portions of the different articles that bring forth interesting details.

Start with this, Mobile Home Park Searched for Remains and the related videos in the upper left hand corner box.

Then see The Science Behind the Search and the video the accompanies it.

As both stories point out what prompted the search at the trailer park, unlike the earlier search near the river was a tip:

An out of state tip takes Butler County Sheriff’s investigators back to the shed near the family’s old mobile home Wednesday.

Of the search:

Wednesday Sheriff Craig Murphy would only say they found ‘trash’ that shouldn’t be underneath a shed.

The shed was apparently erected during roughly the same time frame as Irvin/Adam’s disappearance.

Next see this AP piece, Updated: Deputies dig at boy’s former home:

Investigators found no human remains while digging at the mobile home park where a Kansas boy whose disappearance went unreported for a decade once lived, the local sheriff said today.

But Butler County Sheriff Craig Murphy said searchers have found something connected to the investigation, although he wouldn’t elaborate. The dig also brought up trash and other things that investigators were examining, he said.

More about the tip and the shed:

Investigators — acting on an out-of-state tip about some “unusual activity” in the area at the time of Adam’s disappearance — removed a shed and concrete pad today that was installed in the summer of 1999 at the mobile home lot where Adam and his adoptive parents, Doug and Valerie Herrman, lived.

This is the second time the investigation has probed the area:

Authorities searching the lot last month had drilled holes into the concrete slab and probed the ground.

The Herrmans, who managed the park, moved their mobile home from Towanda to Sedgwick County after Adam disappeared.

This article also importantly also contains new details about the Herrmans’ claims that Irvin/Adam was a frequent runaway and their interactions with the local police department:

The family’s attorney, Warner Eisenbise, has said his clients didn’t have anything to do with the boy’s disappearance. He has said Adam ran away frequently, and every other time police were called or the boy wandered back. The last time, the parents c, he said.

But Towanda Police Chief Erik King said today that he has searched police records from September 1998 through January 2000 and has been unable to find any runaway or abuse reports dealing with the Herrmans.

The only contact police had with the Herrmans was in their capacity as managers of the mobile home park, he said.

(emphasis added)

In short, based on the article the notion that the police were called about Irvin/Adam running away has no paper trail to substantiate it.

That said how does this relate to the 1998 timeline entry?

Jan. 14, 1998: Adam runs away, according to Derby police.

He “returned on his own within two hours of the report and no further action was taken,” Brant said.

Also note that his claim that the Herrmans “didn’t try to find him” contradicts the earlier claims of having gone looking for him.

Their lawyer’s claim is pretty remarkable in and of itself, the kid disappears and they “didn’t try to find him”?!?

What parent, adoptive or otherwise, would show such indifference to an eleven year old?

Finally, see the Wichita Eagle’s No human remains found beneath Towanda storage shed:

“We’re done here,” Butler County Sheriff Craig Murphy said shortly after 1:30 p.m. at the Pine Ridge Trailer Park on the south edge of Towanda.

The missing boy lived with his adoptive parents in a home next to the storage shed when he was last seen in 1999. His adoptive mother was manager of the trailer park at the time.

Despite dismissive articles from earlier on in the week such as Monday’s AP piece Search for missing Kansas boy growing cold, according to the Wichita Eagle piece, the investigation is still “very active”:

“From here, we’re going to be moving on, evaluating the case,” Murphy said.

Murphy adamantly denied the case has grown cold.

“It is not cold,” he said. “It’s very active. It’s going to stay active, and it’s going to come to a conclusion sooner or later.”

Murphy said investigators have found “some things” in the course of today’s dig, but he wouldn’t elaborate.

Apparently the two searches of the site have a common thread for investigators:

Today is not the first visit authorities have made to the storage shed site, Murphy said. Investigators had holes drilled into the storage shed pad and probed for evidence on New Year’s Eve.

Murphy has said that investigators found an “answer” during the earlier search, but he still won’t say what that answer was.

Today’s search is connected to that answer, he said.

Perhaps that “answer” is related to the January 5th entry to the timeline:

Jan. 5, 2009: Butler County Sheriff Craig Murphy holds a news conference in El Dorado, telling reporters that detectives are treating Adam’s disappearance as a death, although he could still be alive. Without elaborating, Murphy says investigators are “holding tightly” to something they found and not revealing it. He welcomes national attention to the case, saying it could help locate Adam if he is alive. He asks for the public’s help and releases Adam’s fourth-grade picture.

This is the latest post in a series I have done around the Adam Herrman/Irvin Groeninger III case. I urge readers to explore my earlier work to gain familiarity with the case and my interpretation of it. See my Irvin Groeninger III tag for more. My most recent post will always appear first on the tag.

***

Consider this a Saturday round up of sorts.

Again, I urge readers to use KWCH’s chart profiling Adam Herrman’s Family to help with keeping all the names and relations straight in their own minds as they follow along.

Irvin/Adam’s family, like that of many adoptees is a tangle of both members of his family of origin and his family by adoption. In my writing, I tend to use “mother, father, sister” etc to refer to family of origin and adoptive mother, adoptive father, adoptive sister or similar to help with clarity. Exceptions come up in for example, describing the (biological) daughter of an adoptive parent.

I should also add that while I sometimes use “Adam” as that was his legal name after the adoption, the boy spent the first two years of his life as “Irvin.” I fluctuate between the two names, or sometimes use a “/” between the two. People search on both, and ultimately, he is both. I lean towards use of “Irvin” as original names are important to those of us who have been adopted, among many other reasons.

As I’ve said before, this is a Bastard Blog, and that is my perspective, language is not neutral.

So that out of the way, I’m mainly going to point at a few articles and pull some quotes. I’m not going to do a lot of analysis around these pieces.

Most missing kids reported quickly

The investigation into the 1999 disappearance of 11-year-old Adam Herrman had several law enforcement experts struggling Thursday to think of a more unusual case.

There have been cases where a person has been missing for years before a body is found and a criminal investigation is launched.

There have been plenty of cases where the parents of missing children have failed to file reports in a timely manner. But it’s usually a delay of a few days or weeks.

But the case of Adam, who was reported missing by a relative only seven weeks ago, has drawn widespread attention and speculation from around the country.

“I’ll be honest with you, I can’t think of a single case like this,” former Sedgwick County District Attorney and Sheriff Vern Miller said of the delay in filing Adam’s missing person report. “I’ve known them to wait a week or two — maybe three or four — where they say they think he’s gone off to his dad’s. And usually that’s what happens…. I don’t remember a single case like this.”

and

Brian Withrow, an associate professor of criminal justice at Wichita State University, said the fascination with the case probably stems from the behavior of Adams’ adoptive family.

“These people lied for 10 years; that’s what makes this different,” he said. “They just flat-out lied to everybody who cared to ask. They made up stories for 10 years.

“Normally, when you have a person that’s missing — particularly a child — there’s a report made. Somebody misses that person, and then you go looking for that person. Sometimes you find him and sometimes you don’t. Sometimes it’s months before you find him, and sometimes it’s years.”

It should be noted, they not only lied, they also appear to have to have defrauded the state through the years the Irvin / Adam was missing.

Be sure to see the video connected to this piece for an interview with his mother. Missing for a decade, search only begins now

It’s an issue that has prompted a lot of questions in the state of Kansas. It’s also an issue that is deeply troubling to the boy’s biological mother who lives here in Colorado.

“This is the last picture I have of him since my rights were terminated,” Gerri George said while she showed us a picture of a young boy. He was 6 back then, she says.

George admits she wasn’t the best of mothers. She knows her abusive relationship with her children caused the state of Kansas to take away her children permanently around 15 years ago.

But she says she never expected this to happen.

“I’m very angry and very upset wondering where everybody’s mind was,” she said.

She only found out about her son’s disappearance two weeks ago. The caller told her “to sit down and stay calm, don’t panic. (The caller) said, ‘You’ve got a boy missing,’ and I said, ‘What?'”

Obviously most people assume that if a child is being placed with a foster family and they are eventually allowed to adopt him, then the foster/adoptive family has been vetted by the state (or what in practice often ends up being a state’s contractors or subcontractors.)

The bedrock assumption is that children like Irvin who had been removed from one abusive situation by the state would now be placed somewhere “safe,” not into yet another abusive situation, and such certainly would never be allowed to adopt him… right?

Well, in theory that’s how it’s supposed to work.

In practice? Who knows.

His mother holds out hope he’s still alive out there somewhere.

“I don’t think he’s dead. Until I find out for sure, I will always believe that,” George said.

Also see the video segment connected to this piece Adam’s biological mom: I believe he is still alive.

“If they didn’t have anything to hide, they wouldn’t have done what they did,” George said.

and

George says if she were face-to-face with Valerie Herrman, she would have just one question.

“I would ask her why,” she said. “Why did you do what you did, when the Department of Social Services trusts you to protect the children against me? You did the exact same thing that my own father did to me.”

Just as I pointed out Kim Winslow, (an adopted aunt’s) video interview in yesterday’s blog post, in today’s Wichita Eagle there’s an article giving an adopted Uncle, Sam Bush’s account of claiming to have seen the abuse but failing to report it, Missing boy’s uncle says he witnessed verbal and physical abuse:

Over the years, Sam Bush said, he repeatedly saw his older sister, Valerie Herrman, scream and curse in Adam’s face, slap him, strike him with a belt and throw him down. Sometimes, Bush said, he tried to intervene but backed away because he thought it would bring more abuse to Adam.

I strongly urge readers to follow the link across and read the full article as there are far too many pieces worth quoting to really try to pull quotes for the purposes of this blog post, but I will include a few:

Bush, now 46, said he partly blames the state for the abuse he says Adam suffered.

“They saw the bruises,” but did not permanently remove Adam from his adoptive parents’ home, Bush said.

But Bush said he also blames adults in his family — and “myself because I witnessed so much” and didn’t report it.

“We should have done more. I don’t blame Crystal” or her younger biological brother, Justin. “At the time, they were kids….

We also gain some insight into yet another of what I’ve been calling the “missed opportunities”, Crystal, the Herrman’s daughter, had come up to the edge of contacting authorities, but apparently was talked out of it by her Uncle:

“I was the adult the night I went in there and Crystal was sitting on those stairs, and I talked her out of it.”

Crystal, now 31, said Friday that she remembers being upset and having such a conversation with her uncle.

“I waited up to tell him that I was going to turn her in,” said Crystal, who asked that her last name not be used to protect her children’s privacy.

“Sam’s my favorite uncle,” she said, adding that she doesn’t fault him for persuading her not to report her allegations.

“We kept praying it was going to get better,” she said.

Finally, around this past Thanksgiving, Crystal reported her concerns to the state’s child protection agency, uncovering Adam’s 1999 disappearance and triggering an intense law enforcement investigation into what happened to him.

Not surprisingly the Herrman’s are firing back.

Doug Herrman said Friday that the account given by Bush and his daughter is wrong. He also said Bush didn’t live with them during the period Bush said he did.

“He’d do anything to ruin us,” Doug Herrman said.

“Everybody wants to hear dirt, and I’m sick of it,” Doug Herrman said.

Once again, that 1999 final date for seeing Irvin comes up:

Bush said he last saw Adam around the spring of 1999 — it was just starting to get warm — at a Wichita church.

As I said, the full article with it’s allegations of abuse is important to read and too long to quote, other than perhaps this last important bit:

Bush said he had a message to share: “If you see a family member abusing their children, turn them in. Don’t sit there and be going through what our family is going through.

“I’ve sat here, constantly thinking: ‘Why didn’t I do more? Why didn’t I do more?’ Because I thought it would go away, it would stop. I love my sister. I can’t turn her in.”

This piece gives a little insight into possible timing for any charges going forward Missing Kansas boy once taken into custody, returned

No charges have been filed. Butler County Sheriff Craig Murphy said consideration of any charges would wait while officials concentrate on the search.

The Herrmans did not return a message seeking comment Thursday.

The family’s attorney, Warner Eisenbise, has said Adam had a history of running away and that his clients said he had done so again when he disappeared in 1999 and felt “very guilty” not reporting it at the time. Eisenbise has said the family had nothing to do with his disappearance, but acknowledged other charges may be coming in connection with the case.

The Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services confirmed Thursday the Herrmans continued to receive adoption subsidy payments for Adam after he was missing, but the agency could not immediately determine how much. The department said it was researching the case.

and the reporting obligations related to the adoption subsidies:

“Post-adoption they are a private family like any other,” Ponce said. “That said, if our agency were to receive a report of abuse or neglect, that certainly would be investigated in any other situation.”

Families receiving adoption subsidies are required to file a yearly report to verify ongoing legal and financial responsibility for the child, she said.

“If there were a situation in which an individual would knowingly supply false information to the state in order to receive benefits, that is a crime,” Ponce said. “And that is a crime in which our agency would use all legal remedies at our disposal to rectify.”

Finally, in my last article for this post, today the investigation included a six hour search along the Whitewater River. It was not prompted by any tips or clues, but rather “common sense.” See Search along river turns up no clues in missing boy case.

The video connected to the piece pretty well sums up the attempted search.