[the kids need a safe,stable home]

I've mentioned the Medical Kidnap website a few times.

Their current campaign is for a family with 7 kids from Alabama.Two of their kids are wanderers(i.e. leaving the house and winding up a ways away from home).There are some questions about domestic issues with the parents(it was an issue with the Rengos who I have mentioned before;they have 3 kids under the age of 2-a one-year old and newborn twins(yep, the mom Erica got pregnant almost immediately after her older son was born.)

The kids were all sent to several different foster homes(I would think it would be impossible to put 7 kids all from the same family with foster parents.)

One of the comments on the story mentioned a case which I remembered from a few years ago-a little boy with autism wandered away and was found in the woods.The detail I *didn't* remember was that the little boy was tethered to the tent his parents were living in whilst they were getting organised(they were living in a tent in their backyard;the house had been foreclosed on but they were still allowed to live in the backyard *shrug*). Of course there were people that defended the parents doing that- "You do what you have to do", that sort of thing.

Look, I get that parents of severely autistic children get overwhelmed(and you can't blame them..)..but is that REALLY the best solution?


They get charmed by the "woo"-"holistic" treatments and the like. Those things have a place..but where it starts to concern me is when autistic parents use it as a crutch.To the exclusion of everything else-the natural treatments may or may not work,the kids get worse and that's when the authorities get involved.

Reading through the stories on Medical Kidnap, you can see why the kids may have been taken away-in a lot of cases  family members(or neighbours or someone close to the family) sounded the alarm. With the family in Alabama, one of the little boys with autism wandered to a neighbour's house. Whilst a autistic child wandering *is* cause for alarm, I'm struck by two things:

1)Why didn't the parents try to make it more difficult for the kids to get outside

2)The neighbour whose house he wandered to  must have had a lot more concerns than just the kid running away-could she possibly have seen some evidence of neglect?Who knows.

I am, by my very nature, a skeptic. And I would love to think that these parents are being falsely accuse.However, from reading(REALLY reading) the stories,there are things that make me think only part of the story is being told;also, there's quite a bit of commonality in the sort of accusations(quite frequently alleged domestic abuse is a factor;parents are told that they must get a divorce of they want their kids back. ) This leads to suggestions(on more than one occasion)that the family should take the kids and run.

Well,that's the WORST thing they could do.But some parents feel like it's the only legit option-it's what the Rengos did-claiming they were "visiting family" but word is they were about to get their kids taken away again-which they did-for not following rules. Mind you,they're living in a one-bedroom apartment with Erica's husband's father(the babies' grandfather) who is bipolar. Far from an idea living situation(that's putting it mildly!)