A Personal Journey
by Debbi DeSisto
Recently, my daughter had a baby, 8 lbs 8˝ oz , 21 inches long. She named him, of all things, Nathan Zackary, (where she got this name from I'll never know). Michelle just turned 18 in February. This is my oldest child, and she was the child from hell. At 3, while I was in the restroom, Michelle ran out the front door completely naked. I couldn't find her in the house nor near the outside door. She had run down the street to the convenience store. I was checking for her in the apartment complex, building by building.... There she was -- across the street, which was near a busy intersection and she was accompanied by a policeman. Whew!
By five, I had several babysitters quit, because the child was out of control, nothing would make her behave. She and I had a door slamming incident. She had to voice her displeasure with some little thing I didn't want her to do (like draw on the walls), now mind you I am not a spanker, the best or worse I do is an occasional swat when seriously warranted. She slammed the door to her room, I went into her room told her I to please close the door nicely. She did, then opened it up and slammed it again. She and I went through this several times, this was not an easy child.
Michelle in kindergarten!! What a time! She kept the teacher hopping! One day, I was watching, I don't know, something like Oprah, and they had a show on about ADD. That same day, Michelle had been to the hospital, with a cold, and was prescribed some medication, Sudafed, I think. I read the label -- may cause hyperactivity in some children. I thought -- I don't need that, but gave it to her for her cold. The show was talking about how Ritalin acted on children with ADD was the reverse of how children without ADD reacted. Michelle was coloring in her coloring book. In the lines!!! Quietly! Hmm...
I took her to the hospital and suggested to the doctor she may have ADD. Michelle was at the best of her behavior. We were in there 15 minutes and she had opened all of the doctor's desk drawers, picked up his pen, used his name stamp on his desk, played with the toys, tried to take off his stethoscope, climbed on his chair, wrote on his desk, played with the paperclips... He quickly gave me a referral to University Medical Center.
At the University, they had Michelle do a series of tests which I could not watch, then had me interact with her. Naturally, it was a nightmare. She did not focus on anything for more than a few moments, and was openly defiant. It was awful, I felt so overwhelmed by this child.
The day they put her on Ritalin, I watched a child who went from complete and total defiance into one who played nicely for more than about one minute with her toys. Amazing, a totally different child . I was numb.
Six months later, Michelle was better but her defiance was back, she was a little more focused. She decided one day to get off the school bus at a friends house , after 1/2 an hour of waiting, I called the school. Yes she had gotten on the bus. So, I started to look for her, she isn't anywhere around her friend's house. I check the entire neighborhood, nothing. After about 3 hours I had no choice but to call the police. This happened four times.
My mother did not want her on medication (it's addictive) nor did her father, who felt it was unsafe. Michelle took her medication for about 6 years, but by 13, she would no longer take her medication, didn't like therapy with anyone (and would not cooperate anyway), and was arrested for shoplifting. She decided her medication was unsafe and with my mother and husband on her side, helping her not take it, what could I do.
At fifteen, she was skipping two months of school and had run away -- again. This time she was gone a day before the police were called.
At sixteen and a new school district, every day she was checked up on at school, she skipped one day. One! That's it and she got caught. By now she didn't do most of her homework. And what she did do, she wouldn't turn in. She then ran away again, this time, she still went to school. We knew she was safe. I have chased Michelle so many, many times... It was three days before the police were involved. They called me. Michelle was at the police station hauled in as a runaway. They brought her home.
She was shortly thereafter taken to Desert Hills, a group home for children with behavior problems. During the time she was there a girl died from being restrained by the staff. The girl was Michelle's roommate.
Michelle was now playing a different game. She was no longer going to be controlled by anyone. She was informed that she could petition the court to be emancipated. She knew how the game was played. Someone set her up with an apartment (the ubiquous 'they'), and a job. Boom, she was gone!
I didn't hear from her until January of this year, she's pregnant. Beautiful. I asked what she was planning on doing. She wasn't sure. It was too late for abortion and she didn't believe in it anyway. She didn't find out until she was 4 months pregnant. Ahh, youth. The father is not involved any more. He's sixteen years old anyway.
She wanted to keep her baby. She had also taken a urinalysis for drugs which showed her positive for marijuana. But she had quit after she found out about her pregnancy.
Apparently the health insurance the state put her on got messed up and she was trying to straighten it out, she did not get prenatal care for the next three months. She was living with a friend of my by then ex-husband's.
When she finally showed up at my house, she was almost 8 months pregnant and just then getting her insurance straightened out. Her pregnancy was normal, she had sonograms done and knew her baby was a boy. Her weight was fine, her baby's heartbeat strong and the baby was big. They guessed 7 lbs 8 oz at 38 weeks. She had appointments every week. The baby was doing well.
She looked like she was hiding a basketball in her clothes. And he kicked her all the time. The baby was born at 41 weeks and 2 days. Her labor started Saturday morning at 9:15, she didn't want to time her contractions. I told her don't even talk to me until you have a time frame. I was unconcerned, it was early. At about 3 or 4 in the afternoon, we went to the hospital, she was in back labor, badly.
Once she got to the hospital, the put her in a marvelous room and we were all excited. She was to give birth in this room, it was beautiful. Two nurse practioners came and spoke with her, then one of them left and the other took Michelle 's history. And it's a colorful one.
I had to be to work by one so I had to leave by 11:30, her new boyfriend had stepped out for a moment and got back at 11:45 so I didn't leave until then. At 2 am, I called and still no baby. I got back to her at nine fully expecting to have a grandson, but still no baby.
They had her on an IV and given her something to induce her labor. They were telling her to push and you could see the top of the baby's head. Then it would go back in...She was pushing with all of her might and it wasn't happening.
Around 10:00 am, they asked her if she wanted a vacuum extraction, what is that she asked? They explained that she provided the pushing and the used a suction hood to suck him out of her. She would need an epidural. She was not told of any complications. And expected none. The baby was born within an hour.
When Nathan came out all you could see was his head, and his eyes were bulging, he wasn't crying, but it looked like he was breathing through his mouth. His umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck and the doctor loosened it. It looked pretty tight to me. They flopped the baby onto Michelle's tummy for about 5 seconds then took him to the warmer where they were trying to suction out his nose, which had yellow mucus. He started to cry, whew! They were footprinting him. I got them to put one in his baby book. While near the warmer I looked at his APGAR scores, 3 and 7. Oh, God, how sad. They said he had a respiratory infection. But he was beautiful and big, they took him to the NICU. He looked like a giant next to all the preemies.
By the next day, they had concerns, he was irritable and preferred one side to another, by the third day, he was sunsetting his eyes, (they kind of rolled around and looked at nothing specific), but he could see, and hear, they did a drug screen and found none, they scheduled an ultrasound of his head. It showed nothing. They scheduled a CT scan.
They had concerns, the pediatrician said. The pediatrician was very kind. The next call was not. Child Protective Services called, Nathan had neurological damage, she said. My daughter was on her way home from the hospital and I called the pediatrician. He said nothing different than he'd said that morning, concerns, nothing definitive. How did CPS know before the CAT scan was taken? They didn't, they jumped the gun getting to us before any diagnosis. Claiming neurological damage before getting any hard evidence.
The CAT scan showed my grandson has some blood on the back of his head, kind of like a bruise, the neurologist said. It should dissolve itself. It was probably caused at birth. There was no damage to the brain itself.
Child Protective Services claim that the marijuana my daughter had done earlier in her pregnancy caused Nathan's neurological damage. Medical research does not bear this out.They want to be involved in her life and make her take drug tests so she can prove to them that she can take care of this child.
CPS requested the hospital put the baby on hold until they agreed to release him. The hospital complied without a court order.
The CPS worker doesn't like me as I've spoken with them before.
A nurse practioner came to the house and told us Nathan had neurological problems, we told her what the neurologist told us. She looked at some papers and said, ah yes, subdural hematoma. This was the first we heard a diagnosis. She saw no problems with Nathan's enviroment nor his weight. He had gained 1/2 lb in the week he was released from the hospital. His head circumference was okay. He looked like he was being well taken care of.
A public health nurse came to the house, she checked his head circumference and wants to come by once a week. She also found no problems.
Nathan is a beautiful baby, and has some problems but his mother is not one of them. She is a loving mother who is doing the very best for her child. She has finally grown up. (Well, mostly)
Michelle is not doing drugs, not cooperating with drug testing, allows all of them access to Nathan, and is struggling with CPS while trying to deal with his medical problems.
When I asked the CPS worker what gave her the authority to force Michelle into a violation of her 5th amendment right of self-incrimination, you now what she said?
I CAN TAKE THE BABY!
Is this a violation of her civil rights?
If you don't cooperate, we will steal your child.
Feedback email me
Help us in our fight against the abusive power of CPS.
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