They were at the shelter rather than their home because their
stepfather, who worked part time as a youth pastor at their church, was having
sexual intercourse with the girl, P, in their tent while they were living at
the lake. An off duty police officer saw what was going on through an open tent
window and called the police and CPS. Their mother didn’t believe the
allegations, despite the eyewitness, the statements of her daughter, and the
subsequent DNA evidence. Their father was in prison because he had previously
sexually molested the boy, J.
No wonder they were beaten down.
Finding foster homes for teenagers is a challenge. Finding
foster homes that understand the deep trauma of sexual abuse is difficult.
Finding foster homes that will take teen and preteen boy and girl siblings
together, with this trauma and accompanying trauma behaviors, is impossible. P and
J were placed in separate homes. Both were in and out of behavioral hospitals
over those first months. P identified as lesbian and possibly transgender, and
preferred boy clothes, boy haircuts, boy things. I don’t know if she was born
that way or if it was a defense mechanism because of her history of abuse. I
suspect she was born that way. I also suspect that her stepfather was in part trying
to justify having sex with her because he was attempting to change who she was
by showing her what it was to be with a man. P’s foster mother had her own
ideas of trying to change who P was. She insisted she wear capri pants, and
women’s blouses. She refused to buy the boxers or other clothes that P
preferred. And then she wondered at why P would shame her by stealing men’s
cologne and men’s underwear while visiting a relative’s home.
Visits with the mom were their own set of torture. She
brought her Bible and those of the kids each week. And engaged in a Bible study
for the hour that they had together. I would take notes on the passages she
quoted so that I could read and research them afterwards, to make sure she
wasn’t trying to say something to them she wasn’t supposed to say. Despite her
repeated failures to protect them, the kids were always happy to see their mom.
They were less happy to see the Bibles.
One day, the subject of the stepfather came up. I don’t
remember what was said or by whom, but P finally showed more expression than I
had ever seen her show. She railed at her mother over her failure to believe
her, her failure to protect her, her decision to stay with him despite the
allegations, her choice of him over her children. Child Advocacy Center
counselors were brought in to try to calm P down and help her process her
feelings. We questioned whether she was stable enough to go back to the foster
home.
I had never before seen P display such emotion. Normally she
kept it all inside, only letting it leak out through the cuts she placed on her
arms when she couldn’t bottle it up any more. She loved to create art so I
entered into a contract with her. I would buy her a good set of gel pens that
she had been wanting and some good drawing paper if she would express her pain
and her feelings with those rather than her blood. I held up my end of the
deal. She wasn’t quite as good, but I
let it slide because she tried. And she needed someone to grant her some grace
for once in her life.
Eventually the hospitalizations and the thefts broke down P’s
final placement and both children were moved to Houston, again in different
foster homes. P got lucky. She ended up
in a home that finally let her be who she was.
Where she felt comfortable. Where
she felt accepted. Where she felt loved. Where she felt safe.
J went from one group home to another, each run more like a
business than the last. I would go visit him each time he changed
placements. To see how he was. To make
sure his basic needs were being met. To make sure he felt safe. To take him away
from the home for awhile. We would go to dinner and to the mall. He had a sweet tooth and loved to visit the
candy store in the mall. Each time I
would tell him it was time for me to take him back, he would come up with just
one more thing he wanted/needed to do.
It was never about that thing. It was about feeling cared for and not
wanting to go back to where he wasn’t.
In his last foster home in Houston, he acted out sexually on
another child in the home. He was sent to an inpatient residential treatment
center for juvenile sex offenders where he spent most of his last 18 months or
so in care. He did well in the program. Each time I would visit him, I would
take him out to eat. For a little skinny thing like he was, he could sure
manage to pack away some food. He would joke about things at the RTC that most
typical people wouldn’t find funny. But I wasn’t typical. While he would always
want to stay with me as long as possible, his hesitance to go back had a
different feel than it had in the foster homes. Less desperation. I think that
he sensed the counselors and workers at the RTC cared about him more than his
foster parents had. They wanted him to succeed.
After successfully completing the program at the RTC, J was
sent to a foster home in the Dallas area shortly before his 18th
birthday. He left soon after turning 18 and I lost touch with him after
that. It was several months or so later
when I got a call from his former CASA, who had remained a good friend. She had
been contacted by a police detective for information about J. He was in jail because he had been arrested
for aggravated sexual assault of two toddlers, the children of an old family
friend with his own history of abusive behaviors toward J. J had been living in
the home leaving care and going home to his mother, whose rights had previously
been terminated, and then leaving there because he realized that nothing about
her had changed.
My first instinct was to go to the jail and visit J and tell
him it would be okay. But I knew that it probably wouldn’t be. And I knew that
it wouldn’t be proper for me to do so. The best thing I could do was to reach
out to his court appointed attorney to try to give him the relevant background
information he needed to have on J’s own victimization to use as a mitigating
factor in punishment. I found out later that he had plead him to a 40 year
sentence without ever even reaching out to any of the people with information
that may have helped reduce his sentence. In all the years since, what has
bothered me most was whether J had wondered where I was. He always bragged that
he had the best attorney. That I would come to see him whenever he went to
someplace new. There he was. Someplace new. And I couldn’t go see him. To
ask him if he felt safe. To take him out for a little while to get some food
and to remember what it was to feel cared for.
He went to prison without ever knowing that again from me.
There are times still I want to reach out to him. To let him
know I still remember him, and I still care whether he feels safe. To apologize
for letting him down during the time in his life that he needed me the most.
These kiddoes. They were more than just my clients. I was
more than just their attorney. They are part of the reason I am who I am as an
advocate, as a person, as a future pastor. I hope they always knew how much I
always believed in them, always cared for them, and always had their backs.
Until I couldn’t anymore.
No comments:
Post a Comment