Advocates are fighting to change a New York law which allows the state to terminate child custody if a parent has a developmental disability or a mental illness.
The provision, which dates back to the 1970s, is one of a handful of reasons the state can permanently take children from their parents. The other reasons are abandonment, permanent neglect and severe and repeated abuse.
Advocates argue that the inclusion of mental illness and mental retardation in the law is based on an outdated understanding of those conditions. Furthermore they say diagnoses of disability or mental illness should not play a role in custody decisions. Rather, those determinations should be based on behaviors alone.
Currently disability is cited in less than 300 of the state’s parental termination cases each year and just half of those result in a parent losing their child.
Nonetheless, several New York interest groups support keeping the provision in the law, saying that it does not allow parental rights to be taken away based on a diagnosis alone. Plus, they say the law only applies to cases where children are already in foster care and it actually includes protections for parents such as the requirement of a psychiatric evaluation, reports the Binghamton (N.Y.) Press & Sun-Bulletin. To read more click here.
We had a mentally retarded mother at a school where I worked. She was moderately retarded and had two little boys. In this inner city project school where there was plenty of abuse, neglect, and drug abuse to the point that mamas sold the furniture for crack and had the kids eating dinner on newspapers on the floor and many ate cereal for dinner if they were lucky, the children of the retarded woman were always bathed, neatly dressed and well fed. She put their Christmas gifts on layaway each fall, and took her boys to the doctor when they needed to go or when the teacher told her they did–such as when the older one complained of an earache at school. And every morning, instead of just sending them, she walked her boys to school and came back in the afternoon to walk them home. If she was asked a question she could not handle, she said, “I will call the lady. (Meaning her social worker)”.
This mother could not remember her address or phone number, but she had them on a card in her pocketbook. She could not read and could barely write her name. She kept her house clean and her boys did not wander the streets of the project and never appeared at the school hungry on planning days. They were not bright and the teachers grew frustrated with the older one who had a strong personality but was really very sweet. Her life was her husband (also slow) and her kids. (And she got her tubes tied after only two–a reasonable number for a poor family.)Some of the teachers made fun of this mother, but I considered her one of the best parents in the school.
While mental illness might affect one’s ability to parent, mild or moderate retardation does not have to, especially if the person does not have a drug problem and wants to parent. They will find a way and, because they don’t multitask, the children are likely to be well cared for and the center of attention.