American Torry-Ann Hansen SENDS BACK Adopted Russian Son Artem
 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/0..._n_531477.html

ussia should freeze all child adoptions with U.S. families, the country's foreign minister urged Friday after an American woman allegedly put her 8-year-old adopted Russian son on a one-way flight back to his homeland.

Artyom Savelyev arrived in Moscow unaccompanied on a United Airlines flight Thursday from Washington, the Kremlin children's rights office said Friday.

The children's office said the boy, whose adoptive name is Justin Hansen, was carrying a letter from his adoptive mother, Torry Hansen of Shelbyville, Tennessee, saying she was returning him due to severe psychological problems.

"This child is mentally unstable. He is violent and has severe psychopathic issues," the letter said, according to Russian officials, who sent what they said was a copy of the letter to The Associated Press. The authenticity of the letter could not be independently verified.

The U.S. ambassador to Russia, John Beyrle, said he was "deeply shocked by the news" and "very angry that any family would act so callously toward a child that they had legally adopted."

The boy is now in the hospital in northern Moscow for a checkup, Anna Orlova, spokeswoman for Kremlin's Children Rights Commissioner Pavel Astakhov, told The Associated Press.

Orlova, who visited Savelyev on Friday, said the child reported that his mother was "bad," "did not love him," and used to pull his hair.

Savelyev was adopted late September last year from the town of Partizansk in Russia's Far East.

He turned up at the door of the Russian Education and Science Ministry on Thursday afternoon accompanied by a Russian man who had been hired by Savelyev's adopted grandmother to pick him up from the airport, according to the ministry. The chaperone handed over the boy and his documents, and then left, officials said.

That is absolutely horrible. And I hate to be selfish, but my husband and I were starting to go through the process of adopting a Russian child... I hope the process isn't stalled too long or cancelled completely.

I swear, the Law & Order episodes are starting to become self-fulfilling prophecies.

If this child does have major emotional problems and they weren't fully disclosed or outright lied about to the adoptive parents, IMO they are completely justified in returning him to the adoption agency. This sure isn't the way to do so though.

I ironically saw a "Police Women of Maricopa County" episode last night (there was nothing on, and it's totally a guilty pleasure of mine) and there was a woman who called the cops to take her foster son away- apparently he was a teenager, had some sort of mental disease that made him act much younger, and even though he was in the family's house since he was like 7 years old, they decided they had enough of him and told the cops, "Here, you take him". It's sad.

So do I! My friends are in the final stages of adopting an 18 month old girl from Russia. They are supposed to leave next week for a 28 day trip to pick her up and bring her back to the US.

The foster system itself is sad. Yes they do take children from crappy home lives, but they also are often put back into a foster family that is just as messed up. It happens in Kentucky all the time. A few of them were former patients of mine.

Do they tell you if a child is mentally challenged prior to the completion of an adoption?

I agree

Sometimes you get more than you bargained for in adoption.. or with your own kids.

To think these kids come with a money-back guarantee though... someone should lock this lady up. In adoption, you get what you get.

I don't think that's moral at all, nor justifiable.

There are no guarantees in adoption. Adoptive families need to be open to what they get as that's what they sign up for.

This is part of the problem. A lot of orphanages and agencies aren't disclosing known mental OR physical health problems with the kids, especially when foreigners are adopting the kids. Do you remember what happened when Americans adopted the children from Romanian orphanages after the fall of Communism?

There was a similar case in Minnesota, where the adoptive parents went to the state and shared their concerns. In this case, the parents had already adopted a Russian baby with little problem; the orphanages were different.

Also, let's not forget that many, if not most, of the kids in these orphanages aren't orphans at all and were just dropped off by their parents for whatever reason. Who knows what they saw and experienced before being dropped off?

We have a family member who was adopted from Russia. At the time the child was 7 months old. The adoptive parents were sent a tape of the child to be reviewed by doctors. They knew that there might be some developmental delays since he was turned over to the orphanage by the mother the day he was born and thus not given the attention necessary for proper development. Once the child turn 4 the parents were informed by doctors here that many of the child's problems were because of attachment disorders. There is no way the child is going to be returned to Russia, the parents spend lots of money on therapy and special school in order to help the child become successful in life.

To send the child back after 6 months because of behavior is awful. A 7 year old come with lots of baggage, and that means it will take time to adjust, learn a new language, not feel as if they are abandoned, and feel loved. There is no way this child will develop instant love and respect for the adoptive family. He is still trying to figure out what is going on.

DaffyKD

former co-worker of mine adopted from Russia and said that the biggest problems with the children in the orphanages were attachment problems and fetal alcohol syndrome- and in many cases both. When they returned with their son (he was about 1 when they go him) they began therapy almost immediately with him because of delays. He is now around 5 and is still in therapy, but leads a pretty normal life. (at least based on what I can tell via facebook)

I can sort of understand getting so frustrated that you don't know what to do to help a child, but sending them back in this way does not help with attachment issues that the child already has!

Like Munchkin03 said, many Russian orphanages aren't fully disclosing physical or mental problems. That isn't moral or justifiable either, if they're purposely doing it to unload kids who they don't think will get adopted. Some parents have no problem adopting special needs kids at all - in fact they request them. But you shouldn't be told "this child is 100% healthy" only to get him home and have to pay for $20,000 worth of surgery and ongoing psychiatric care.

I am unsure as to what all Russia discloses. I know that Fetal Alcohol Syndrome is a huge issue in a lot of the orphanages, and it does an adoptive family well to request current weight and measurements and allow a doctor who is experienced with foreign adoptions to review the medical history they send you. This helped my friends avoid some trouble. They were up for a brother & sister adoption. Once they got the current measurements back on the boy, it was clear he had fetal alcohol syndrome which was something that wasnt disclosed initially on the paperwork. It is not uncommon for adoptive parents to bring children back here from a foreign adoption, get checked out by an American doctor, and discover other problems. If the problems are intentially left out of the paperwork or not is speculation. Failure to thrive is a major issue with children from a lot of foreign countries because there are so many children and not enough help.

With Russia anyway you do have to make a trip to Russia to meet your child for a few days, and then in a few months you go back for about 28 days or so to pick them up and finalize the adoption process. Atleast that is how my friends have done it/are doing it.

Many countries do this, even our own. Some wonderful people we know adopted a set of sisters a few years ago. The county that sent them swore that they had no problems, that they just needed love. After a brief honeymoon period, all hell broke loose. It seems that the home county lied; 2 of the girls had been in psychiatric hospitals several times. They put our friends--both warm, incredible teachers--through hell, I don't know how else to put it, for 5 years and our friends finally had to disrupt the adoption. They hung in there a lot longer than most people would have. Our friends will never be the same again.

There is a term for this, when the agency knowingly places a child with severe problems with someone but passes them off as normal: *wrongful adoption*. More and more agencies are being sued for this, as they should be. Lying about a child's problems in order to get him or her placed is horrendous! Adoptive parents have had to suffer through the intrusion of home studies and then they're usually turned down for child after child until finally their family is chosen. Normally, they've spent thousands of dollars by this time.

The adoptive mother should have gone through the regular channels to disrupt her adoption--probably that involved connecting with the American agency she used--but most experienced adoptive parents, and I am one, have no problem with a family who was lied to deciding to disrupt their adoption.

How sad for everyone. It's obvious that this family was terrified by whatever behavior was going on that they were past caring. I wish they had acted through the proper authorities sooner.

A woman in my Panhellenic group just told me on Wed. evening that she and her husband are supposed to find out any day now when they will be able to go pick up their 2-year-old adoptive son from Russia. The agency they're using is the same agency Hansen used- and that agency's license has been suspended pending further investigation by Russian authorities. I'm sure this means that they won't be able to pick up their son anytime soon, and that's just awful.

I don't. What happened?

And thanks everyone for your insightful posts. I find the story to be disturbing on so many levels.

Dang...this is sad and worse yet starting to sound like a "Don't Adopt from Russia" case.

Which brings up the question: Why aren't we adopting kids in the US?

Because people want their kids to be at least one or preferably both of these things:
1. White
2. Babies

Not to mention if the kid's mom is from somewhere in Russia there's not a whole heck of a big chance that she'll show up somewhere down the line. I think with the new era of open adoptions this is a bigger worry for adoptive parents than it used to be. I am NOT against open adoption at all, and I think all adoptees should be able to see their records at least for medical purposes, but I can totally see where if you've been through all the IVFs and other disappointments, you don't want to worry about birth mom from 2 states over showing up. Even if you do an old-fashioned closed adoption, I think some of the uneasiness still applies.

That's what I said when I first hear this (though I admit it's not the point). Thanks, at least I know I'm not alone on that one.

This is disgusting. You can't just return a little boy like he's a purse or a lawnmower. I question the mental stability of two people who could put a child on a plane to Russia with no one to care for him on the other end. If he was really that bad, why not take him to a psychiatric facility to be evaluated and his behavior somewhat stabilized while they contact the agency and figure out what to do? I've always thought poorly of parents who use psych hospitals as dumping grounds for kids they don't know what to do with but given the alternative....GOOD LORD WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? Even if it was more than you bargained for, even if there were things the agency didn't disclose, even if you just flat out didn't know what to do...there were a number of better, safer, saner options.

One of my best friends adopted a child from Romania, after being told that in California, the definition of a healthy white baby was one who was "only" addicted to crack.

They signed the papers to adopt two sisters, born 11 months apart. They had all of the US paperwork done when they landed in Romania - where they discovered that four other American couples had also adopted these sisters! But not to worry, none of them could adopt the sisters anyhow, as they had found their mother. Can we say bait and switch? So, each couple adopted another Romanian baby. None of these babies had ever had anything to eat but orange juice or cold milk, and lived in cribs with gated tops - even the one my friends adopted, who was two and a half.

Fast forward eight years, when I was visiting. This absolutely beautiful child was found to be so developmentally challenged that she will never be capable of living alone. Those first few years are so important, and they were basically thrown away. She now bags groceries.

So sad...so true. Adopitng a child from the U.S. has been on my heart a long time. When I'm in the position the do so it will be one of the first things I look into to see if it is realistic for me. I wish others would look into stepping up to the challenge as well. White babies aren't the only type of children that need love. Everyone does! :)

While I totally agree with what 33girl said, there is also an ugly other side. There is also a big backlash against white couples adopting black children. Many AA feel that white parents will rob them of their black heritage, of course, I see their point, but at what cost will preserving their heritage rob them of a family?

^^ Whomever will give them loving homes regardless of race is fine with me personally. Race can become a big issue for the children as they grow, but not enough of a problem that I would be opposed to black-interracial adoptions. I just think that the parents should be understanding and willing to do what is necessary to help the child remain aware of issues it will face as a minority in the U.S. because unfortunately to be black is to be "other" at least some of the time. Also, if you adopt a black daughter, you simply must get schooled on the hair situation, it can get really sensitive. There is a wonderful article/video about a white man who learned to comb his daughter's hair (she is from Africa), he's better at it than my MOM! He can do zig zag corn rows, everything! And her hair is done regularly!

I often wonder about all of the children adopted from Asia and how this may be an issue for them. I only see articles regarding black children so I don't know anything other than the glimpses I may get from Carnation on here from time to time. From what I can guess it doesn't appear to be as much of an issue, but that's just a hunch since I don't experience anything addressing it. I also get a glimpse of interracial adoption from a friend who was adopted into a white family from Latin America, but she deals with it very well in my opinion, although she deals with it rather frequently.

ETA: Thank you for sharing Carnation. I believe what you have experienced to be true for most. Most children in interractial adoptions for lack of a better word "assimilate" very well into their families and communities.

When we knew we'd be adopting Asian children, we threw ourselves into preparing. We got adult and children's books about the countries, got to know even more people from their countries...we were the poster children for preparing for intercountry adoption. The children came to us as infants.

Once they got to be about 4 years old, all that preparation went down the toilet. They did not want to go to Atlanta for Japan-America Society picnics. They didn't care for the Filipino food at Phil-Am picnics here. Carrying the flags of their countries in parades was not going to happen. In many ways they let us know they were all-American!

We have dozens of friends who adopted from overseas and every one of them got the same reaction from their kids that we did- more or less, "okayourculturesaregreat, now can we have a hamburger?" Baby Berry and Baby Berry Cousin are so funny..you just don't expect those drawls to come from those beautiful faces, plus they're major country music fans.

One of our teenagers is from Central America, although she was born here in town. There are lots of kids from her birthparents' country at her school and she said that they can't seem to understand that she can't converse in Spanish, only say a few phrases, and they keep trying as though the language will spring to her lips!

I don't regret all the prep work we did. Maybe someday they'll be interested in their heritages but so far, they've been too busy "living life" to care much.

My best friend and her husband, and my future sister in law and her husband, have been trying to adopt in the U.S. for more than two years. Both couples went through all of the classes mandated by their adoption agencies, home visits and everything. And they have waited, and waited, and waited and waited for their profile to be chosen by some mom giving up her baby or young child. They have NOT limited their search to only white children or only babies. They both even went through the steps to be certified as foster homes because they're open to adopting kids that way. Nevertheless, they have not been selected by any mothers, and only one of them has even fostered a couple of kids, and that was only for a few days.

What AOII Angel said is true. My friends and future sister/brother in law have not been chosen, according to the adoption agencies, probably because they are white couples and the childen so frequently being given up for adoption or who are new to foster care are minorities. Both couples have wonderful families, are college educated, employed and would offer a very stable home, so it's not like they're ill-fit to adopt. The prejudice that they're facing is that they aren't the same race as the child and they speculate that it is even possible that they are being discriminated against because they are too...successful. So for couples who DO want to adopt in this country, it is much harder than what media, government and nonprofits would have you believe.

PeppyGPhiB, you are so right. For years we've sought to adopt just once more since so many of ours have graduated and gone on to college. We got a study and decided to ask for a sib group. Month after month we would make it to the 'finals' of the adoption selection meetings for various groups but then not get chosen.

I finally called a worker I'd gotten to know and asked what it was about us that was causing us not to be chosen. He said, and I still can't believe this: "Some of the workers are concerned that your kids have been too successful in academics and activities and they wonder if you'd resent adoptive children who might not be able to match that." :eek::eek::eek:

So there you are, folks. We see signs everywhere begging people (especially bilingual ones like us) to adopt or foster but we're being punished for our kids' success! I asked the worker if we should start tearing up our children's homework or refusing to let them try out for any more teams and then reapply (jk) but he's on our side and he encouraged us to keep applying.

We should know in 3 days if we were successful this time. Please pray for us, everybody.

I don't understand this because it seems to me, especially for minority children adopted from another country, the adoptive parents have spent so much time and money researching and preparing that I find it unlikely they'd ignore their child's cultural heritage.

FAIL on the first portion. I can't believe some of the excuses people try to get by on. Perhaps they should commend you for the standard of excellence you maintain in your home and the encouragement you provide for your children instead? No?

Second portion: GOOD LUCK! FINGERS AND TOES CROSSED!

Say what now?

Do completely closed (i.e., parent surrenders baby to adoption agency and that's the last they know of it) adoptions not exist anymore? Or did they just not want to do it that way?

One of the reasons we decided to wait on trying to adopt is that open adoptions are very popular right now...right down to the fact that some mothers want to have the ability to call the house if they are having a bad day. When Andy and I heard that, we decided that we may not be ready for the adoption route yet. Adoption through fostering may still be an option for us, but we haven't decided yet because that brings a whole set of risks with it.

They do exist; it depends on the agency and some of them give the birthparents a choice of open, semi-open, or closed. I've seen prospective adoptive parent profiles that omit their names and other identifying information. Also, not all agencies allow the birthparents to look through profiles.

We've known 2 of our birthmothers. The one here in town knew of us ahead of time and she and her kids moved away when the baby was a year old. We've been in touch with one of our overseas birthmothers since our daughter was born, exchanging yearly letters, and this year a couple of her children friended us on Facebook.


Thank you, BabyPink; we do appreciate your support! :) I also suggested to the worker that we could have our kids run out and knock over a few banks and then might we be able to adopt again?

Carnation,
Best of luck with your next adoption. I think (even as a proud non-parent) that the key to parenting is realizing that every child is different. I get the impression that you and your husband would not be disappointed if your next child was not able to achieve as much as your other children in the world of academics. We all have our own gifts, even if they aren't all academic.

The thing is people seem to forget that there are many Black families out there that wish to adopt.

And also, while agencies will often let white couples adopt Black children, it is rare that they allow Black families to adopt White children.
I personally don't much care for white couples adopting Black children because I do feel that there are culture issues. But I feel that way in general. Prime example was one of my former students who was Navajo. She was adopted by a white woman when she was 3. She is now 19 and she knows absolutely NOTHING about Navajo traditions and culture. NOTHING. It broke my heart to see that because I felt that while she got a good home, she was still being robbed of the opportunity to explore her heritage. Her mother's excuse was that she didn't know anything about the Navajo culture and so she figured that the child would just be okay without knowing it.

I would think a 19 year old could investigate the Navajo (or any other) culture on her own, if she so wanted to. So could a 12 year old with a computer, for that matter. She was hardly "robbed" of something she can go out and get. It's not the same as growing up with it, but growing up with it through books isn't the same either. What was the mother supposed to do? Send her to a reservation for the summer?

Like carnation said, sometimes the kids just flat out do not care. I was tested and found to be "gifted" and my mother often said that she worried that she hadn't exposed me to classical music, opera, "higher" culture, etc...the fact of the matter was, the few times they dragged the gifted class to things like that, we would have rather gone shopping or something.

Should you try to teach the kids about it? Yes, but there also comes a time where you need to stop blaming your parents (bio or adopted) and do what you need to do on your own.

In many ways I agree with you, IF there is a choice between an equally qualified black and white couple, the black child should go to the black couple. If there is a plethora of black families looking to adopt black children, then why are there so many older black children looking for homes? Or is it that no one wants an older child no matter what color? Is being raised in a white family with no inkling of black heritage (which is easier for the average white persona to bumble through than Navejo culture, BTW...also, might I add that many Navejo have lost their culture while living in their own reservations!) than to be raised in a system of foster homes?

I have a really good friend who is Vietnamese and was raised along with her adopted brother, who is mixed white/black, by a white family. She has NO Vietnamese culture and no interest. She is highly educated, and if you try to tell her that she should have an interest, she would tell you that it's not your business. Her Vietnamese parents gave her up for adoption. Her white parents gave her a life. She isn't without her problems (not because of her lack of Vietnamese culture but because of other family issues that would be there if she had been their natural child.)

The sad thing about Russia is that THEY don't want to adopt those children. Less than 300 children are adopted within the country each year! That is pitiful. If American adoptions stop, all these children will just stay in horrible orphanages for longer periods of time.

I haven't read any articles about an influx in family adoptions or anything to indicate an increase. There are articles regarding black women who are single, not anticipating marriage and are seeking to adopt or do IVF or what have you.

(NOT saying news articles are the end all be all of life, but just that I haven't run across any indication of this information media-wise or otherwise).

While I'm sure they exist, my black family doesn't personally know any black families adopting either. Do you have any personal experiences you could share as to help clarify?

Wow. Really? are you serious? There's so much that woman could have done. She just didn't care enough to do it because she felt that she had done her duty simply by adopting the child. smh