Mishpacha - Lifelines 9/10/14 p76 "Food for Thought"

MaBelleVie

Sat, Sep 13 2014, 11:12 pm

It was a very sad piece. The saddest part for me was how she excused herself for being a young mom who didn't know better than to take her child's care seriously. Nope, not an excuse. If you don't have enough common sense you should not have children. And if you mess up, accept responsibility.

amother

Sat, Sep 13 2014, 11:13 pm

I read the article over an over. I discussed it with my husband, which helped me calm down... but still couldn't take a shabbos nap after reading it.
There where a lot of signs that something was wrong.... The story is horrible, but the mother should have seen a bunchve red flags. You can't blame her- this is a crazy story! However she should have stayed in the city where her son received therapy or made sure that he received it..... He is impacted for life!!! Socially, emotionally. .. I wonder how he will get married- will he rat in a different room than his wife? Will he live on his extremely limited diet of dry foods forever?

I hopefully will be aware and lookout for signs of any abuse, as I have looked in the past but this article is making me super aware.

wispalover

Sat, Sep 13 2014, 11:44 pm

Yup. I thought the whole thing was awful. I also think that she should be reporting the babysitter or called others who sent their child there to find out what was going on. Other kids deserve to be protected too.
As an aside I found the angry birds story pretty bad too - I don't read mishpacha often but the way the author threw in the part about her father "finding a way to write off clothing, restaurants, vacations etc as a business expense" did not seem fitting for a frum magazine that focuses a lot on middos and being a good frum Jew. Anyone else notice?

MaBelleVie

Sat, Sep 13 2014, 11:50 pm

wispalover wrote:

Oh yeah, I was horrified that she claimed she had no way of investigating further to protect kids who are currently there. Overall, just incredibly irresponsible.

I thought the line about writing off expenses was kind of tongue in cheek. As in, acknowledging that it wasn't kosher, although not explicitly stating so.

wispalover

Sat, Sep 13 2014, 11:58 pm

MaBelleVie wrote:

I hope you are right re writing off business expenses.

I don't understand why the woman wouldn't call the rebbitzin who recommended her to the place. Or a competent Rav. Or someone clearly more qualified than her to make a decision on such an important issue. How many other kids might be ruined due to her failure to act?

MaBelleVie

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 12:07 am

Well there was an underlying note of irresponsibility running throughout the story, so I guess it wasn't really surprising. She doesn't mention any efforts to help her son with accommodations for eating throughout the school day. Instead he just fasts. Hello? Where is anyone's head here?

bnm

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 12:18 am

this kid has deeper issues than just being force fed/oral motor issues. he sounds spectrumy and should have gotten basic counseling over the years too.
signing as mother of 2 kids with feeding issues and discussed this with a speech therapist over shabbos. this kid sounds like one of my cousins who comes to visit with a basket of food he is willing to eat and he suffered no traumas as a kid.

gold21

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 12:28 am

I also thought "what the heck is wrong with the mom"

Then I was unsure, cuz I remember being a new mom at 21, no real support system, doing the kollel mom thing.... I remember how clueless I was about babysitters. The lady I dropped my son off at told me every day how he never wanted to take his bottle... he was 3 months old. It took me like a whole month to figure out the place was abnormal and switch my son elsewhere. She obviously was propping the bottle. Duh. I was young and sooo dumb. Bad memories.

Last edited by gold21 on Sun, Sep 14 2014, 1:17 am; edited 1 time in total

wispalover

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 12:34 am

bnm wrote:

Does anyone remember if the child's age was mentioned? The reason I ask is because the babysitter told him he can't go home until he finishes his food. My DD is two and understands everything, however I do not think she would understand if a babysitter told her she wouldn't be able to leave if she didn't eat up. Working on the assumption the child is younger since she mentioned jarred baby food (and half a sandwich much later on in the story), how would being told he can't leave have really affected him?
To be honest, the mom should have him completely evaluated for other difficulties and social issues. I also am wondering how the babysitter had time to force feed a bunch of kids in the same manner.

bnm

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 12:40 am

gold21 wrote:

I also thought "what the heck is wrong with the mom"

Then I was unsure, cuz I remember being a new mom at 21, not living near family, parents not particularly helpful, doing the kollel mom thing.... I remember how clueless I was about babysitters. The lady I dropped my son off at told me every day how he never wanted to take his bottle... he was 3 months old. It took me like a whole month to figure out the place was abnormal and switch my son elsewhere. She obviously was propping the bottle. Duh. I was young and sooo dumb. Bad memories.

I was a first time mother whose kid started solids at 5 months. I remember mentioning to a neighbor with a laugh that my kid didn't like certain textures and she told me to have the kid evaluated.... I laughed at her and told her she is a principal and a mother of a special needs kid, bunch of kids with therapists, that's all you see. She ended up being right, EI wouldn't approve her but insurance paid for feeding therapy and she still has sensory and oral motor issues now at age 5.5

She used to go to a babysitter where I didn't send food because combined with my kid's allergies and the baby sitter's kids allergies it was simpler for the woman to provide food for everyone. She would be very honest with me how much the kid ate, 1/2 cup yogurt-would last 2 days. I would get reports of how many spoons of farfel she ate. I felt comfortable enough sending my next kid there who wasn't there for 2 months but when we went past said 'oh thats the babysitter's house, when can I go back'

seeker

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 12:43 am

wispalover wrote:

At the beginning of the article it says they moved when he was 9 months old, and started at the sitter a little after that.
I think the point was not that the sitter told him he couldn't leave, but that her saying that to the mom was in itself a little off. Though I could easily see writing that off as a lighthearted joke!
It doesn't say how many kids she was babysitting at the same time that she could have force fed. And sometimes when a person is abusive not everyone is abused equally.

wispalover

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 12:48 am

seeker wrote:

To be clear, I think the babysitter should be reported but I think the mother was a little neglectful too. I wish the story had given more info cause there are just so many unanswered questions.

MaBelleVie

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 1:29 am

seeker wrote:

Yeah, I didn't understand it to mean that she literally told this to the child. Just that in hindsight, this line was some kind of hint to the fact that she was abusive with him- although alone it would be easy enough to wrote off, there were too many other red flags.

It seems that people don't recognize how trauma affects a person. Yes, all of his issues today can very much be attributed to the trauma he experienced as an abused infant and toddler. Trauma has a profound effect on a person's psyche, and the long term ramifications can be devastating, especially if not managed well from an early stage. There's no reason to believe he has ASD or any other diagnosis, given his history.

Maya

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 8:08 am

To me it seems that the mother is still equally irresponsible all these years later.

Her son should be in serious therapy. And she should be doing more to ensure that this babysitter stop taking care of kids. You can't excuse yourself as being a young clueless mother at 21if you're still doing the exact same things eleven years later.

cookiejar

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 1:01 pm

seeker wrote:

The "couldn't go home til he finishes" most likely manifested as "I'm not taking you out of the highchair until the food is done", not actually VERBALIZING "you can't go home", more kine you can't come out, whether spoken or not. That is how force-feeding a child that age would play out.

And I was not surprised by the story, horrific as it is, because SO SO SO many ppl take ppl's opinions on babysitters, morahs, etc, without really having any idea what they're getting into.

I know EVERYONE in the neighborhood sends to this morah, I know she's AMAZING, I know your kid was THRILLED, but really does she love the kids? Really do you know what went on there? Really can you vouch for her in any way other than how your child looked at pick-up?

At this point, having seen many many morahs that other ppl say are great where I vehemently disagree, I am very selective about who I take my reference information from. only certain ppl's recommendations will mean anything to me. everyone else can be thrilled at their morahs, but I won't be sending there.

Truthfully, I knew from the first sentence that it was a bad idea to rely on this Rebbetzin for a baby-sitter reference!

mirror

Sun, Sep 14 2014, 1:24 pm

cookiejar wrote:

At this point, having seen many many morahs that other ppl say are great where I vehemently disagree, I am very selective about who I take my reference information from. only certain ppl's recommendations will mean anything to me. everyone else can be thrilled at their morahs, but I won't be sending there.

But also every child is different. Some children are happy by one Morah and others can be miserable with the same.