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Does DHS Discriminate Against Parents with Mental Illness?

© Amy Hillgren Peterson

Jack and Holly have certainly had their ups and downs. Married at 20 when Holly was pregnant, they were impoverished students during the first several years. Mitchell was a difficult baby and impossible toddler. But Jack and Holly had no experience as parents and chalked it up to the terrible twos.

Jack and Holly's relationship, however, was straining to the breaking point. Jack never noticed while they were dating how mercurial and irrational Holly could be. Holly felt Jack was insensitive and did not try to understand her. When Holly, at 24, was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and treated with medication, their marriage seemed instantly repaired. Jack was "intensely guilty" about the possiblity that Mitchell's temperment was caused by Jack and Holly's fighting. Holly was afraid he had inherited her bipolar disorder.

When Mitchell was three, Jack and Holly had him tested by the local Area Education Agency and he was diagnosed with an unspecified developmental delay and slight mental retardation. He began attending a special education preschool class and Head Start. It became apparent that the mental retardation label was inappropriate as Mitchell learned more in that school year than the experts thought he could learn in all of elementary school.

Mitchell made such wonderful progress, he was placed in a regular kindergarten class. From the beginning, Mitchell and his teacher experienced major personality conflicts. Things came to a head when, on an ambulance call to the family home when Holly became suicidal, the police and paramedics found the home to be "unacceptably cluttered" and Mitchell was taken away in the middle of the night to an emergency shelter by DHS.

After a week, and inspections by two DHS workers and a guardian ad litem assigned to represent Mitchell, Mitchell was allowed to return home "with parenting skills services in place." The DHS investigator repeatedly assured Jack and Holly "we are just concerned about the condition of the house. Once you show us that you can keep the house cleaned up regularly we will dismiss the case."

That was a year ago. Each week the in home service provider says "the house looks fine."

The reports from the DHS worker and Guardian ad Litem mention numerous other issues. They feel Holly is not handling her bipolar symptoms well. Holly's doctor reports that she is quite stable for now and has always kept in touch when her moods fluctuated.

DHS writes that "Mitchell has behavior problems in school." Jack and Holly counter that they have taken Mitchell to a University hospital pediatric specialty clinic, a pediatric neurologist out of state, and two pediatric psychiatrists, mostly at their own expense. Not one specialist has diagnosed Mitchell with anything more than a pervasive developmental delay not otherwise specified. They have given Jack and Holly suggestions to help him cope with school. Jack and Holly have passed these suggestions on to the teachers, some of whom use them with moderate success, and some of whom say, "we can't do that."