Again?!?!??!?
- Thread starter JJJ
- Start date
H
HaoZi
Guest
Not surprised, but why didn't they inform you? Because they know they screwed up or because they don't know about it yet?
Can you file a complaint against both her staff and his staff for not maintaining the supervision that is mandated for her? This is outrageous. At least she cannot get pregnant - that is some comfort. I hope the random staff person doesn't get into trouble for doing her job. It happens that way sometimes.
This place is truly looney tunes - the staff I mean. They really have no intention of doing their jobs or helping these kids, do they?
This place is truly looney tunes - the staff I mean. They really have no intention of doing their jobs or helping these kids, do they?
JJJ
Active Member
My message for the supervisor of residential programs was very blunt. I said it was completely unacceptable that she continues to be unsupervised. I stated that I expected to hear from her no later than tomorrow. Our grant case manager was looking into filing a complaint against this Residential Treatment Center (RTC) already, this latest incident will just speed things along.
Do you know the name of the corporation that owns and/or runs the facility? Have you considered contacting the CEO/President of that corporation? At one point we had a real problem with a nursing home that an elderly relative was in. We found signs of neglect and the mgmt was not doing much, didn't figure they had to because we were not in the same state as the relative was. Finally we contacted the head office and it resulted in BIG waves and some real changes. Sadly my relative died and we didn't see the long term results of the changes, but we did hear that a LOT of heads rolled.
I would go to the CEO/Pres of the company and then also figure out what state agency is in charge of their contract. Or what group in the state legistlature is in charge of the contract. A complaint to that group could result in HUGE changes because it can really impact their $$ - in some cases contracts are cancelled or not renewed because enough complaints are made or there is proof of problems of the magnitude of the kind that has already happened with Kanga. I doubt that the contract would be cancelled on the basis of this one contract, but just making the complaint (and letting the CEO know about it) might result in some rather dramatic staffing changes.
I could see not going to this level with complaints if it had just happened one time. This place has let it happen multiple times, has tried to hide it from you, and generally performs all of their responsibilities with regard to Kanga in at best a lackadaisical manner. They sure haven't taken your complaints seriously. Neither have they supported you or any restrictions for Kanga.
If you need help finding out the name of the corporation that runs this place, let me know. I will help any way I can. This is just crazy. Esp given the $$ they waste on things like that trip they wanted to take Kanga on and the plans to purchase formal dresses for the girls. In a time when budgets for health care, esp mental health care, are being cut way past the bone, I cannot figure out how they think they are being responsible with the $$ that they are paid to care for their charges.
I am sorry you have had to deal with all of this.
I would go to the CEO/Pres of the company and then also figure out what state agency is in charge of their contract. Or what group in the state legistlature is in charge of the contract. A complaint to that group could result in HUGE changes because it can really impact their $$ - in some cases contracts are cancelled or not renewed because enough complaints are made or there is proof of problems of the magnitude of the kind that has already happened with Kanga. I doubt that the contract would be cancelled on the basis of this one contract, but just making the complaint (and letting the CEO know about it) might result in some rather dramatic staffing changes.
I could see not going to this level with complaints if it had just happened one time. This place has let it happen multiple times, has tried to hide it from you, and generally performs all of their responsibilities with regard to Kanga in at best a lackadaisical manner. They sure haven't taken your complaints seriously. Neither have they supported you or any restrictions for Kanga.
If you need help finding out the name of the corporation that runs this place, let me know. I will help any way I can. This is just crazy. Esp given the $$ they waste on things like that trip they wanted to take Kanga on and the plans to purchase formal dresses for the girls. In a time when budgets for health care, esp mental health care, are being cut way past the bone, I cannot figure out how they think they are being responsible with the $$ that they are paid to care for their charges.
I am sorry you have had to deal with all of this.
timer lady
Queen of Hearts
JJJ, our difficult children, like many teens, are going to find a way to spend "quality time" with boy friend/girl friend. The minute I tell kt &/or wm they cannot see so or so is the time they will run, lie, sneak, etc to get to that person.
The fact that Kanga is in Residential Treatment Center (RTC) should make this a non issue. After all the RTCs stays between the tweedles I've seen it all; sadly these kids are determined & hormone crazed.
I'd like to hear staff's reasons for unsupervised peers of the opposite sex.
The fact that Kanga is in Residential Treatment Center (RTC) should make this a non issue. After all the RTCs stays between the tweedles I've seen it all; sadly these kids are determined & hormone crazed.
I'd like to hear staff's reasons for unsupervised peers of the opposite sex.
timer lady
Queen of Hearts
JJJ, I'm not trying to sound so negative....I'm just seeing more & more that all the endeavors, all the interventions we warrior mums put into place don't mean squat if you haven't a sound & strong treatment team. Additionally, if your difficult child isn't stable &/or invested in him/herself enough to make choices that are safe there's little we can do other than sit back & watch the fall out.
After all these years we parents have little input at a treatment facility ~ as badly as the facility is needed for our "little wonders" once that unsafe child is out of our physical custody we have little to no say in many matters.
After all these years we parents have little input at a treatment facility ~ as badly as the facility is needed for our "little wonders" once that unsafe child is out of our physical custody we have little to no say in many matters.
DDD
Well-Known Member
I gather that it is not uncommon in Residential Treatment Center (RTC)'s for kids to meet up. Supervisory ratios make it very difficult for staff to monitor determined teens. I'm sorry you are facing this issue and hoping that birth control is in place and sex ed is part of the program. Hugs. DDD
nvts
Active Member
Hey! Sadly I'm not surprised at this. difficult child 1 has certain staff members that everytime I walk into the place are on the cell phones, texting, talking and not doing their jobs. He, my friend and I spend one visit cleaning his room - there was still **** under the bed from the prior kid.
One Saturday, he ended up melting down because the kids wanted to go see that Anthony Hopkins is in about exorcism. I told him he wasn't allowed to see it. He put me on the phone with one of the staff members and I was told "well, it's majority rules and if it's PG-13 or less, they can see it. We have no say." I was stunned. I called the director and asked her "if the movie was about casual sex, rape or other violent crimes, why would you want mentally unstable children making the decision to see it?" She was agast! I also told her that they were watching shows like "Law & Order SVU" you know - the one about sex crimes? This was also going on in the psychiatric hospital. that he was staying in during Sept. and Oct. of last year.
It seems like a lot of staff in various facilities are difficult child's themselves and when the cat's away the mice will play.
It's disgusting.
Beth
One Saturday, he ended up melting down because the kids wanted to go see that Anthony Hopkins is in about exorcism. I told him he wasn't allowed to see it. He put me on the phone with one of the staff members and I was told "well, it's majority rules and if it's PG-13 or less, they can see it. We have no say." I was stunned. I called the director and asked her "if the movie was about casual sex, rape or other violent crimes, why would you want mentally unstable children making the decision to see it?" She was agast! I also told her that they were watching shows like "Law & Order SVU" you know - the one about sex crimes? This was also going on in the psychiatric hospital. that he was staying in during Sept. and Oct. of last year.
It seems like a lot of staff in various facilities are difficult child's themselves and when the cat's away the mice will play.
It's disgusting.
Beth
Marguerite
Active Member
The issue here is not merely that Kanga managed to evade overworked and overstretched staff. I do get that this will happen if the teen is determined enouGh. But here - THEY KNEW, AND FAILED TO REPORT IT TO YOU.
You have problems at several levels. Whether or not it is unrealistic of you to expect them to keep Kanga's chastity belt on - I can't say. On that matter, however, I would examine every bit of their advertising as well as any agreements you have with them, verbal or written, as to exactly what service they promised to provide. I do feel it is wrong to expect too much of them, if they are not really able to 100% prevent Kanga having sex. But if they said that their brief would be to properly supervise her to ensure she had no access to the opposite sex, as well as work with her to help her learn to control her own urges, then they are failing there. Now, they could be failing because they didn't realise hat they were getting into. But if that is the case, there should be some sort of realisation of this, not denial.
The biggest problem as I see it, is that you are finding out from Kanga, that she got caught again. The staff member who caught her should not be in trouble, because she didn't squeal to you. All she did was her job, and possibly not even that to the full extent, if you were not told.
I strongly suspect they either did not tell you because they knew you would be angry with them and they didn't want to give you any more ammunition, or they didn't really think it was important enough. In fact I wonder if they privately think she shouldn't be in Residential Treatment Center (RTC), she's only there because she's wanting to be sexually active and you're a prude who needs to let your daughter do what comes naturally. I don't know how much of Kanga's other issues, they might be blaming purely on parental repression. Which of course indicates even more, that you have to get her transferred to somewhere with tighter security, a more serious approach to these matters and at the same time, you need to kick rear ends as high up as you can reach them. High kicks.
With Kanga's determination to have sex, I do think you need to at some level accept (if you haven't already) that she is increasingly skilled at defeating whatever an Residential Treatment Center (RTC) can put in place, and you need to be outwardly understanding of this, in the new place, so they won't be afraid to tell you WHEN they begin to discover that the amount of supervision they thought was needed suddenly is shown to be woefully inadequate. It may be possible that Kanga's determination will defeat any Residential Treatment Center (RTC)'s supervision. But I do agree - they need to at least be trying.
One scary thought- Kanga told you because she knew she had been caught and probably assumed you had been told. How many times has she not been discovered, and not told you?
And an even scarier thought, to echo Linda's - how and when is anybody going to get through to her, so she can begin to work on her own issues? Currently she is making less than zero effort and it doesn't augur well for her future.
I would have thought that staff at Residential Treatment Center (RTC) have certain standards of best practice to maintain. Surely there is a professional body they have to report to, or meet the standards of? If one exists, I would definitely be reporting this mob to them as well.
Marg
You have problems at several levels. Whether or not it is unrealistic of you to expect them to keep Kanga's chastity belt on - I can't say. On that matter, however, I would examine every bit of their advertising as well as any agreements you have with them, verbal or written, as to exactly what service they promised to provide. I do feel it is wrong to expect too much of them, if they are not really able to 100% prevent Kanga having sex. But if they said that their brief would be to properly supervise her to ensure she had no access to the opposite sex, as well as work with her to help her learn to control her own urges, then they are failing there. Now, they could be failing because they didn't realise hat they were getting into. But if that is the case, there should be some sort of realisation of this, not denial.
The biggest problem as I see it, is that you are finding out from Kanga, that she got caught again. The staff member who caught her should not be in trouble, because she didn't squeal to you. All she did was her job, and possibly not even that to the full extent, if you were not told.
I strongly suspect they either did not tell you because they knew you would be angry with them and they didn't want to give you any more ammunition, or they didn't really think it was important enough. In fact I wonder if they privately think she shouldn't be in Residential Treatment Center (RTC), she's only there because she's wanting to be sexually active and you're a prude who needs to let your daughter do what comes naturally. I don't know how much of Kanga's other issues, they might be blaming purely on parental repression. Which of course indicates even more, that you have to get her transferred to somewhere with tighter security, a more serious approach to these matters and at the same time, you need to kick rear ends as high up as you can reach them. High kicks.
With Kanga's determination to have sex, I do think you need to at some level accept (if you haven't already) that she is increasingly skilled at defeating whatever an Residential Treatment Center (RTC) can put in place, and you need to be outwardly understanding of this, in the new place, so they won't be afraid to tell you WHEN they begin to discover that the amount of supervision they thought was needed suddenly is shown to be woefully inadequate. It may be possible that Kanga's determination will defeat any Residential Treatment Center (RTC)'s supervision. But I do agree - they need to at least be trying.
One scary thought- Kanga told you because she knew she had been caught and probably assumed you had been told. How many times has she not been discovered, and not told you?
And an even scarier thought, to echo Linda's - how and when is anybody going to get through to her, so she can begin to work on her own issues? Currently she is making less than zero effort and it doesn't augur well for her future.
I would have thought that staff at Residential Treatment Center (RTC) have certain standards of best practice to maintain. Surely there is a professional body they have to report to, or meet the standards of? If one exists, I would definitely be reporting this mob to them as well.
Marg
JJJ
Active Member
Thanks all. The director called back and said that she talked to Kanga's case manager who claimed to know nothing about this. She did tell me that Kanga had been caught planning to meet with a boy on the job site but that staff stopped her (gee, why am I just finding that out now??). The teacher and another direct staff were off today so she is going to talk to them 1st thing tomorrow. They are also having a previously scheduled meeting with all the right people and will add Kanga to the agenda.
Complaints will be filed but the state is down to so few places that are willing to take kids (due to the very very late payments the state is making) that I doubt they will drop this place as they currently have over 100 residents on state funding. In talking to people, it seems that this place is very cyclic, they provide great services, there is staff turnover, quality of services decline, parents complain, service improves, repeat.
This place assured us that they were very capable of supervising hypersexual youths. Kanga is on a special protection plan that is suppose to ensure even tighter supervision than normal -- "eyesight at all times outside of the unit". Yeah, right.
I was blunt with the new place that the #1 reason we were moving her was this lack of supervision. They were horrified and said they'd move their child as well. The new Residential Treatment Center (RTC) is much smaller (18 youth in the Residential Treatment Center (RTC) and 16 youth in the TLP compared to ~150 youth at current Residential Treatment Center (RTC)). The smaller environment means a smaller pool of staff so a better chance of everyone being up to speed on her protection plan.
We have accepted that Kanga will not change. She is happy with who she is and is merely biding her time until she is old enough to leave treatment. Chances are very good that we will lose contact with her at that point. The new place said that if/when she is accepted that we will work with them to develop a long term plan for her that will meet our requirements, fit in their system and give Kanga a very clear plan on what to do to get to TLP and then to adult living. They have basic behavioral requirements that the youth must meet to move to the next level but each youth also has individual goals for each level. Kanga's would include (1) not manipulating staff (2) not making plans to violate the protection plan (3) no sexual acting out. If she does those things, it will trigger an automatic consequence.
She is being interviewed on Friday. I think we will tell her either the night before or that morning. Not sure I trust the staff enough to give them anymore advance warning.
Complaints will be filed but the state is down to so few places that are willing to take kids (due to the very very late payments the state is making) that I doubt they will drop this place as they currently have over 100 residents on state funding. In talking to people, it seems that this place is very cyclic, they provide great services, there is staff turnover, quality of services decline, parents complain, service improves, repeat.
This place assured us that they were very capable of supervising hypersexual youths. Kanga is on a special protection plan that is suppose to ensure even tighter supervision than normal -- "eyesight at all times outside of the unit". Yeah, right.
I was blunt with the new place that the #1 reason we were moving her was this lack of supervision. They were horrified and said they'd move their child as well. The new Residential Treatment Center (RTC) is much smaller (18 youth in the Residential Treatment Center (RTC) and 16 youth in the TLP compared to ~150 youth at current Residential Treatment Center (RTC)). The smaller environment means a smaller pool of staff so a better chance of everyone being up to speed on her protection plan.
We have accepted that Kanga will not change. She is happy with who she is and is merely biding her time until she is old enough to leave treatment. Chances are very good that we will lose contact with her at that point. The new place said that if/when she is accepted that we will work with them to develop a long term plan for her that will meet our requirements, fit in their system and give Kanga a very clear plan on what to do to get to TLP and then to adult living. They have basic behavioral requirements that the youth must meet to move to the next level but each youth also has individual goals for each level. Kanga's would include (1) not manipulating staff (2) not making plans to violate the protection plan (3) no sexual acting out. If she does those things, it will trigger an automatic consequence.
She is being interviewed on Friday. I think we will tell her either the night before or that morning. Not sure I trust the staff enough to give them anymore advance warning.
LittleDudesMom
Well-Known Member
JJJ,
so sorry this has happened again. I do agree with Marg that the larger issue is not that she got away, it's more that you were not told. I'm glad the interview is this week. Fingers and toes crossed.
Sharon
so sorry this has happened again. I do agree with Marg that the larger issue is not that she got away, it's more that you were not told. I'm glad the interview is this week. Fingers and toes crossed.
Sharon
DammitJanet
Well-Known Member
JJJ.....I am really aghast at how this is all happening. As you know Cory has been in many facilities and except for two incidents, there was never any sexual contact. Once it was so stupid that I thought the whole thing was overblown. It was when he was at wilderness camp and at the time he was just turning 12. One of the boys who had already turned 12 and closer to 13 had just come back from their home visit. Evidently this kids older brother "shared" what bigger boys can do...ie...masturbation. The boy came back to the camp and told all the other boys and they all got rather intrigued and got caught by the counselors that night trying it out in their tents. Not with each other but in their own sleeping bags. What was the horrible thing was the camp staff made the boys tell all their parents about it in person. Cory was absolutely embarrassed to no end. I thought that was idiotic. Big to do about nothing in my eyes. A boys will be boys thing.
The second time was also a pretty much non issue too. Cory was in a group home at 16 and a half. After he got out of his Residential Treatment Center (RTC). In fact he was almost 17. One day the group home noticed he was MIA. He was in the city right above me. The group home called me very concerned. We werent quite as concerned. We knew there was a little girl in the town he was interested in and when she had to go home and he got hungry he would head back to the group home. He did.
Actually, Cory hasnt had all that many sexual conquests. At least of the full kind. Now plenty of girls have picked him up for oral sex. Why I have no idea.
The second time was also a pretty much non issue too. Cory was in a group home at 16 and a half. After he got out of his Residential Treatment Center (RTC). In fact he was almost 17. One day the group home noticed he was MIA. He was in the city right above me. The group home called me very concerned. We werent quite as concerned. We knew there was a little girl in the town he was interested in and when she had to go home and he got hungry he would head back to the group home. He did.
Actually, Cory hasnt had all that many sexual conquests. At least of the full kind. Now plenty of girls have picked him up for oral sex. Why I have no idea.
Shari
IsItFridayYet?
I hope the interview goes well. What a mess.
Ya know, this reminds me of a "story"....difficult child 1's bio mom has done several stints in jail, and she conceived her two youngest children while incarcerated for 18 months.
She was caught in the utility closet once, but when they babies were born (fraternal twins), they did paternity tests on at least 3 men to find out who the fathers were (last I was told, they did not have the same father). Utility closet guy wasn't the father of either of them.
Yeah, its a sad state of affairs - those who are supposed to be watched the closest...quite obviously, aren't.
I'm sorry for you.
Ya know, this reminds me of a "story"....difficult child 1's bio mom has done several stints in jail, and she conceived her two youngest children while incarcerated for 18 months.
She was caught in the utility closet once, but when they babies were born (fraternal twins), they did paternity tests on at least 3 men to find out who the fathers were (last I was told, they did not have the same father). Utility closet guy wasn't the father of either of them.
Yeah, its a sad state of affairs - those who are supposed to be watched the closest...quite obviously, aren't.
I'm sorry for you.
