How To Tell Doctors

Another issue that a parent who adopts a child has is if they start with a new doctor. Today we took Steve to the orthodontist and one of the questions was about mouth injuries. It is very hard to have a conversation telling a doctor about any injuries or history that may be relevant when there are children present. When Steve was younger he did sustain a facial injury when his biological mother’s boyfriend punched him in the face. His adult teeth actually got damaged during that time even though he was only 2 when it happened it permanently damaged … Continue reading →

Talking About Tough Issues: Child Abuse

The key message here is that birthparents probably love their children, but some have reasons why they just cannot keep a child safe. For preschoolers: “Your birthparents probably loved you, but they couldn’t keep you safe. All children need parents who can keep them safe, so that’s why you came to grow up with us.” Talking About physical abuse: For early elementary-age children, or a child who remembers being abused: “Do you ever feel angry with your friends or with Mommy and Daddy (siblings, etc.)…sometimes you yell and hit even though you love us. But you are learning not to … Continue reading →

The Violence to Young Children Continues

It’s getting so bad that I do not want to read the latest news. A mother left her two year old girl and an almost one year old boy with her boyfriend. He had agreed to bring them to meet her in the store parking lot where she was employed when she got off work. When they picked her up, the mother apparently realized that the little girl was seriously injured. They took her to a local hospital. The hospital immediately “life flighted” her to a trauma center where she died that evening. The cause of death was a brain … Continue reading →

Work of the Devil: Cocaine

In my last blog, I wondered whether drugs have some of the blame for the increase in child abuse cases in our country. There have recently been a number of incidents in elementary schools where children have brought cocaine to the classroom. A few days ago, an eight year old boy in Houston brought three packets of cocaine to school. Apparently, several of his classmates told a teacher and the Houston police were called in. The boy told authorities that he did not know what the substance was, other than that it was valuable. He had taken it from one … Continue reading →

Is a Society That Disregards Children Civilized?

Some years ago, my wife and I went on two church trips. First, we went to New York City to work with a children’s ministry based in a distressed section of Brooklyn. As previously reported, we found the average child to be living in appalling conditions. In some areas, young children consistently had black, rotten baby teeth. The children were essentially taking care of themselves. The main problem was that their parents were either physically absent or totally absorbed with their own issues. The reason for all of this chaos was drug addiction and the crime that it causes. We … Continue reading →

Another Baby Left With Boyfriend Tragedy

It is another verse of the same song that seems to be playing everywhere. The twenty year old mother of a fourteen month old little girl went to work and left the child with her twenty-one year old boy friend who lived with them. When she came back to the couple’s apartment from her job, she discovered that the child was unconscious. She summoned help in the apartment complex and someone administered CPR to the child. It was too late. The child was dead when they arrived at a local hospital. Upon examining the baby, medical personnel noticed unusual swelling … Continue reading →

Toddler Brutally Murdered by His Father

Two years ago, twenty-five year old Daniel Hernandez was arrested for brutally shaking his one month old son and severely injuring him. Since then, he had been free on bond. The agreement on which his freedom was based stipulated that he would not be with the boy. Now the child is dead and Hernandez is in jail once again. After the 2005 incident, the child lived with Hernandez’s aunt. The mother, twenty-one year old Jessica Ann Emhoolah, was required to go to counseling and take parenting skills classes. She did everything that the court asked her to do and this … Continue reading →

Give Them a Chance

A few days ago, I reviewed the redacted file that the state gave us when we adopted four of our boys. It has the photographs that were taken of the three oldest children when the state removed them from the place where they were living. Seeing the pictures enabled me to benchmark where they were then and where they are now. Our oldest was four and a half when this occurred. He was aware of their living conditions and I can see fear and anxiety on his face in the picture. He was very anxious when he came to live … Continue reading →

Hard Work with Little Return

Our former church worked with the children in a housing project in north Houston for many years. It all started when a woman in the church starting bringing a few children from there to church. More and more kids wanted to come to our church and other volunteers started helping. I have been in most of the worst housing projects in Houston in terms of poverty, living conditions, and crime. Jefferson Park (not the actual name) ranks right up there with the very worst. Drug dealing, robberies, rapes, and murders were common. Once when our volunteers returned the children from … Continue reading →

The Impact of Exposure to Cocaine in the Womb

A few years ago, there was a lot of information in the media concerning the damage that women who habitually use crack cocaine were causing to the children born to them. Today, there is a lot of evidence that the damage was not as profound as some medical researchers predicted it would be. This is an important subject to me because I have adopted five children who had the misfortune to spend nine months in the womb of a crack addict. I do not pretend to be an expert on this subject. I am forced to rely on the information … Continue reading →