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GAZETTE
SEPTEMBER 1979
The Child and the Law
—The Child Psychiatrist's viewpoint
Dr. Jerry O'Neill, Child Psychiatrist, Warrenstown House Residential Centre
Warrenstown House Residential Home
I am talking to you today from my own experience as a
Child Psychiatrist in a community setting for the past ten
years, and I would like to share with you some practical
clinical problems which I have experienced in child
psychiatry in regard to the law over this period. I am not
sure of the answers to these various problems and will
probably be asking more questions than giving a solution.
As one Of the earlier speakers in this conference I thought
it might be appropriate to present some factual clinical
material as I anticipate later speakers will be talking more
expertly about the law and its implications in regard to
children.
Placing a child In care:
The first problem I would like to deal with is the
difficulties I have found in trying to place a child into
care. Child guidance clinics, social workers, childrens'
hospitals, and many other agencies dealing in child care
often have to make this extremely difficult decision. It
arouses in those involved in the decision much heart-
searching, as none of us went willingly into child care
viewing our role as one of taking children away from their
parents. Secondly it is sometimes extremely difficult to
find a suitable placement for these particular children and
the paradox exists that the most difficult and most needy
children are the hardest to place yet these are the ones
that need the most help. Thirdly, parents are usually
extremely sensitive to their children obviously progressing
satisfactorily away from them, being cared for by other
people and may tend to sabotage these placements,
expecially if foster placements. Residential care may be
much more acceptable because of its more impersonal in
nature. You may say, quite rightly, that surely one should
first of all try and work with the family to try and improve
the unsatisfactory situation; that we should make every
effort to give support to deprived parents, who themselves
were possibly battered and deprived, and try and break
the vicious circle of deprivation and prevent another
generation of damaged adults emerging. This certainly
sounds fine in theory but in practice may prove to be an
exhausting, time consuming, task for a clinic, social
worker, or various caring personnel, and over a long
period the mothering or fathering qualities of the parent
concerned may only improve marginally. It is also
true to say that if one particular worker in the
field of child care has to deal with or handle too
many of these extremely difficult unrewarding cases,
that it can be very hard to maintain an optimistic, positive
approach to one's work. I feel much more frequently we
should see the writing on the wall in time and consider
alternative measures, such as a group home placement,
foster care, or some good residential setting etc., before it
is too late. Irish tradition, culture and religion have in the
past very much emphasised the importance of family life
and of families staying together at all costs. How often
has a submissive, ill-treated wife, or a totally dominated,
hen-pecked husband been advised to turn the other cheek
and offer it all up. I wonder has it ever occurred to people
who give this sort of advice to ask them what is
happening to the children of the marriage in the
meantime.
We all know that physical evidence of abuse, neglect,
or deprivation has been needed in the past to safely secure
a child care order and less importance has been attached
to psychological factors, although I am sure we would all
agree that these can be as damaging to a child if not more
so. I believe and hope that this is now changing.
Pointers to Psychological Damage
What sort of pointers might suggest a child was living
in a psycholgically damaging situation whether from
neglect, deprivation, rejection or abuse. Of course any
symptoms of emotional disturbance or delinquency may
be relevant but there are more specific indicators worth
watching for.
(a)
Excessive clinging behaviour suggesting fear of
abandonment.
(b) Frozen watchfulness: A very specific sign, where
the child remains extremely still and quiet in the
abusing parents presence never taking his eyes off
his parents; looking for the slightest and earliest sign
of the parents wriath so as to take quick avoiding
action.
(c)
Failure to thrive with ravenous appearance, but
thrives when away from home.
(d) The child who seems to be constantly provoking
adults to punish it.
(f)
The young child with very shallow superficial
attachments, who is instantly extremely friendly to
everyone, with the whole world as his parent. .
(0
The child who is cruel to animals. He is behaving to
animals as his parents behave to him.
The Law is weak
The biggest dilemma and the greatest frustration can
arise in our sort of work when it is known a child is living
in an ongoing, damaging situation, yet we are aware that
we can do very little intervening to improve the situation.
This can be due to lack of co-operation from the parents
concerned or lack of firm evidence available to secure a
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