ADOPTED RUSSIAN BOY REJECTED, IN SELF DEFENSE

I remember at the height of our problems, telling Mr. B "if you treated me like this, I'd leave you".

Russia Suspends Adoptions by Americans
(By CLIFFORD J. LEVY, The New York Times, April 15, 2010)

MOSCOW " 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.

The announcement by the Russian Foreign Ministry gave no indication of how long the suspension would last. The State Department in Washington is sending a high-level delegation to Moscow to hold talks on reaching an agreement, and both countries have expressed hope that the matter can be resolved quickly.

“Future adoptions of Russian children by citizens of the United States, which are now suspended, are possible only if such an agreement is reached,” a spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Andrei Nesterenko, said at a briefing on Thursday.

Officials at the United States Embassy in Moscow said they had not received official notification of a suspension and were seeking more information from their Russian counterparts.

Without formal notification, some American officials said they would continue operating as if no suspension had been put in place. But Russian officials said in interviews that no adoptions would be allowed for now. More than 250 American families have nearly completed the adoption process and are poised to pick up their Russian children, but their cases will not be allowed to conclude until the new rules are approved, Russian officials said.

In all, some 3,000 American families have begun the adoption process, according to the Joint Council on International Children’s Services. Russian officials said they would continue to accept applications and process paperwork from potential adoptive parents.

Russia was the third leading source of adoptive children in the United States in 2009, with 1,586, after China and Ethiopia, officials said. More than 50,000 Russian children have been adopted by United States citizens since 1991, according to the United States Embassy.

Artyom, who was named Justin by his adoptive American mother, arrived in Moscow last week after flying by himself from Washington. He presented the authorities with a note from his adoptive mother in which she said she could no longer handle him.

The mother, Torry Ann Hansen, a registered nurse from Shelbyville, Tenn., said the boy was “violent and has severe psychopathic issues.” She added that she “was lied to and misled by the Russian orphanage workers” about his troubles.

The authorities in the United States are now investigating her conduct.

Russian authorities, who now have custody of the boy, have said he behaves normally and have harshly criticized Ms. Hansen for sending him back.

Cases of children adopted from Russia being harmed in the United States have received intense publicity here. Fourteen Russian children have died of abuse or neglect at their hands of the adoptive American parents since 1996, Russian officials said last year.

Last Friday, the Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, calling Artyom’s case “the last straw” and said he was proposing the suspension.

And that they think help is so easy to find.

I'm fairly certain that isn't our problem. I knew his other mom pretty well and at that point in her life she was not a heavy drinker though she did drink.

I don't know if she drank when she was pregnant. I don't know how much exposure it takes to cause problems.

Luckily we have moved past that stage of our lives although we do still go into "lock down" mode once in a while to reassess and reconnect.

It's a process.

overwhelming can be simply overwhelming, over

Quote:

Russia Suspends Adoptions by Americans
(By CLIFFORD J. LEVY, The New York Times, April 15, 2010)

MOSCOW " 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.

The announcement by the Russian Foreign Ministry gave no indication of how long the suspension would last. The State Department in Washington is sending a high-level delegation to Moscow to hold talks on reaching an agreement, and both countries have expressed hope that the matter can be resolved quickly.

“Future adoptions of Russian children by citizens of the United States, which are now suspended, are possible only if such an agreement is reached,” a spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Andrei Nesterenko, said at a briefing on Thursday.

Officials at the United States Embassy in Moscow said they had not received official notification of a suspension and were seeking more information from their Russian counterparts.

Without formal notification, some American officials said they would continue operating as if no suspension had been put in place. But Russian officials said in interviews that no adoptions would be allowed for now. More than 250 American families have nearly completed the adoption process and are poised to pick up their Russian children, but their cases will not be allowed to conclude until the new rules are approved, Russian officials said.

In all, some 3,000 American families have begun the adoption process, according to the Joint Council on International Children’s Services. Russian officials said they would continue to accept applications and process paperwork from potential adoptive parents.

Russia was the third leading source of adoptive children in the United States in 2009, with 1,586, after China and Ethiopia, officials said. More than 50,000 Russian children have been adopted by United States citizens since 1991, according to the United States Embassy.

Artyom, who was named Justin by his adoptive American mother, arrived in Moscow last week after flying by himself from Washington. He presented the authorities with a note from his adoptive mother in which she said she could no longer handle him.

The mother, Torry Ann Hansen, a registered nurse from Shelbyville, Tenn., said the boy was “violent and has severe psychopathic issues.” She added that she “was lied to and misled by the Russian orphanage workers” about his troubles.

The authorities in the United States are now investigating her conduct.

Russian authorities, who now have custody of the boy, have said he behaves normally and have harshly criticized Ms. Hansen for sending him back.

Cases of children adopted from Russia being harmed in the United States have received intense publicity here. Fourteen Russian children have died of abuse or neglect at their hands of the adoptive American parents since 1996, Russian officials said last year.

Last Friday, the Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, calling Artyom’s case “the last straw” and said he was proposing the suspension.

How do u decide when to go into "lockdown mode" ?

Quote:

How do u decide when to go into "lockdown mode" ?

Mo will start having problems at school, or start not getting along with his friends, or start fights with me and Mr. B. When asked what's going on he can't explain it. He'll be upset and depressed and anxious and he just doesn't know why. He'll get clumsy and start forgetting things.

We don't really lock down but we simplify our lives for a period of time -- cut out everything that isn't necessary, especially social interaction. We stick together and try to remain very calm.

Wandel, do u recommend a retaliatory suspension of Russian adoption of American children ?

Adoptive mom, neighbors
had colorful feud in 2006

Mom, neighbors squared off in 2006

By Chris Echegaray • THE TENNESSEAN • April
15, 2010

SHELBYVILLE, Tenn. " A Bedford County woman who
sent her 7-year-old adopted son alone on a plane
back to Moscow last week still isn't talking to
investigators.

But Torry Hansen said plenty to deputies during a
2006 feud with her neighbor in Chapel Hill, where
she lived before Shelbyville. She said in a police
affidavit that her neighbor sneaked onto her
property as she slept.

"This has been an ongoing problem," she wrote in
the affidavit, saying the feud had spanned seven
months.

The woman who bought Hansen's house said there
was a neon-painted trailer near the road loaded with
camera equipment pointing at the house across the
road, plus sensor-controlled lighting.

Hansen's neighbor troubles came to a head at 4:19
a.m. on Oct. 7, 2006, when she looked out an
upstairs window of the house she shared with her
parents, sister and a young boy. She said she saw
neighbor Robert Abbott on her property at 3188
Halls Road in Chapel Hill and had him arrested and
charged with criminal trespassing.

Hansen has declined comment through her lawyer,
Trisha Henegar, and didn't answer the door at her
new home today.

Henegar is listed as Abbott's lawyer in court
records. The charge eventually was dropped. Abbott
and his wife, Dwyne, still live on Halls Road but
declined to comment on the arrest.

Bedford County Sheriff Randall Boyce said he
vaguely remembers the feud but not what triggered
it.


"I remember they were putting cameras on each
other," he said.

Boyce said he recalls Dwyne Abbott speaking with
him about the case, but he didn't think either side
committed a crime.

Fredia Smith, who purchased the 4,300-square-foot
Chapel Hill home and 30 acres from the Hansens in
2007 remembers visible evidence of the feud well.

She keeps a picture of a trailer Hansen painted neon orange, green and purple and placed near the road, apparently to irritate her neighbors. It was loaded with video equipment and sensor-activated lighting facing the Abbotts' house. The Hansens insisted on keeping the parcel of land it sat on out of the sale.

"It was like " whoo! " football stadium lights all of sudden in front of their house," Smith said. "I thought it was kind of odd that they would not even think about selling that piece of property to me and they insisted on having that trailer there."

Smith finally told the Hansens she would not buy the property if the trailer was not painted a solid color or removed. They removed it months later, she said.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20100415/NEWS01/4150365/Adoptive+mom++neighbors+had+colorful+feud+in+2006

Intercountry adoption, particularly of older children, and most especially of children from abusive families or neglectful institutions, is inherently a high risk process. Children coming from traumatic backgrounds commonly suffer from serious psychological, behavioral, cognitive and educational issues. The language and cultural transitions of intercountry adoption compound and complicate both the child’s trauma and therapeutic interventions.

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.

Thus, too many prospective adoptive parents, even when warned about hypothetical possible problems, are asked to make a purportedly permanent adoption decision based on inadequate or misleading information about the particular child with whom they are matched. Too many prospective adoptive parents are matched with children whose behaviors, issues and needs are far beyond the capacity of a normal family to manage. Too often, the only expert services offered to such families are too far away or too expensive to be practical, if they exist at all.....

But the risk is that in focusing on the specific wrongs involved in sending this child back, policymakers will ignore the larger story about child tragedy and related policy lessons. That story has to do with the systemic abuse that victimizes the millions of children in institutions worldwide. Many decades of social science demonstrate the destructive impact of such institutions on children’s mental, emotional and physical capacities