The Best Interest of the Child Vs the best interest of the adult

What really constitute the best interest of the child?

This is a million dollar question...

Read on to get more on this...

On many ocassions instead of focusing on the interest of the child, they tend to focus of the interets of the adults.

Some inexperienced social workers too tend to get carried away with the interests of other parties and focus largely on furthering the interests of the adults instead of those of children.

This has resulted in many children being disadvantaged or being prejudiced...

Thes best interest of the child should always be given paramount consideration in all respect...

Is this happening, practically on the ground?

What is happening is that the best interest of the adult seems to be taking precedence over everything.

It is critical to assess what is best for the child before addressing the needs of the adults who happen to be trying to assist the child. This happens in many cases of adoption of children or custody cases.

The best interest of the child looks at his health, economical, social, psychological, emotional etc of the child.

It is important to always keep the focus on the child and not the adult who brought the matter before the social workers or before the court.

Do we really know what the best interest of the child is?

Let's hear your opinion on this one..

Discover how a dysfunctional family can cause difficulties in childhood development

Here's how a dysfunctional family can lead to wayward behaviour on a child...

Whenever social workers conduct an assessment on a child's alleged mischievious behaviour or when they are in conflict with the law, they usually trace how the child was brought up by his or her parents. This helps them make a good character analysis of the child and assist in pre-judgement in a juvenile delinquency case.

One of the most punishing tasks would be to identify and admit that a child was brought up in a dysfunctional family. Acknowledging this fact is however crucial to outgrow such relationship issues and transform oneself into an emotionally stable and happy person.

A dysfunctional family is a disastrous unit which can lead to repeated malfunctioning of children in their adult lives. The effects can be realized at a later stage in life when they achieve an enormous form of destructive psychological effects on children. The social workers should always assess the home environment and look at the socio-economic background of the child’s parents because that has a bearing on the upbringing of child. For instance, a substandard environment meted out to the child by such parents may be attributed to the unpleasant memories of their own childhood.

Here are some of the characteristics of a dysfunctional family

Lack of trust
Absence of security
Absence of the feeling of love and belonging
Lack of understanding between family members
Parents' failure to nurture and support the children
Needs and desires of the child are always neglected
Verbal, physical, or sexual abuse in the family
Family member(s) creating an unpredictably unhealthy environment
Disputes develop on petty issues like money, love, work or almost anything
Negative dealing of stressful situations
Family values and rules are rigid, incomprehensible and illogical.
In some cases, parents’ over protecting of the child may affect the child's upbringing.


Negative Impact on Child’s Psychological well-being

In dysfunctional families, parents’ distorted attitudes have a traumatic effect on children. As such, unnatural relationships become the norms of child’s life.
The behaviours displayed by children tend to reflect those of their deficient parents. These traits can be exhibited singly or in combination as reflected below:

Feelings of loneliness
Being too hard on oneself
Difficulties in relaxing and enjoying oneself.
Difficulties in expressing feelings openly.
Extremist responses and decisions
Problems in forming intimate relationships
Involving themselves in abusive relations
Concerned of others’ responsibilities
Apprehensive to seek approval
Taking over more than they can handle
Being unable to handle anger, frustration and hatred
Children’s Compliance to Unusual Roles.

An affected child normally exhibits disorders like study problems, drug or alcohol addiction and other disturbances in the family. It is common in some cases, to attribute the family dysfunction to the problem child even if he or she is not causing significant trouble. People always attribute the child's behaviour to that of his or her parent or a dysfunctional family that brought him or her up. In some cases, growing kids can use their sense of humour to rescue themselves and act as entertainers in groups. On rare occasions a few children love to stay in social isolation. Moreover, some children rarely play more than one of the above roles causing pain and confusion among those living with him or her.

Good Parenting - being more sensitive to the child’s feelings

It is apparent most of the parents do not wish to really hurt their children by choice, but they should intentionally be more sensitive to the child’s feelings. Family disputes are inevitable but should not be an accepted pattern. Each person should also preserve his own space and not invade others’ while being free to express, discuss and opine. One can focus on the plight of the problem child, the over-achiever or the silent sufferer. However, there is one thing in common applicable to each of these personality types i.e. an attempt to understand them, being a friend than being a parent or sibling.

Parental Support on the Child’s Needs and Helping him Recover


One of the prominent accomplishments of difficult childhood is that the child is fine tuned to being adjustable which helps him pull through adversity. It is advisable for the child to seek support from parents, friends and other companions whom they trust is helpful. The child should express himself or herself and most importantly keep yourself away from deficient members who are likely to hurt you. Moreover the child should accept that his or her accomplices too have limitations and react optimistically. He or she should take a break from daily chores to involve in his or her favourite hobby and recreational activities.

The best way to prevent dysfunctional relationship is to detect it at an early stage, find ways to cope with it through communicating, counselling and transforming the conflict into a productive life plan. As a parent you should be able to empower yourself through this tough situation which will ultimately transform you into an outstanding person and help you live life to the fullest.
So far so good.

Little Boy's suffering

I got this from a colleague and I thought I should share it with you…

It is SAD INDEED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


“I was walking around in a Target store, when I saw a Cashier hand this little boy some money back.

The boy couldn't have been more than 5 or 6 years old.

The Cashier said, 'I'm sorry, but you don't have enough money to buy this doll.'

Then the little boy turned to the old woman next to him: ''Granny, are you sure I don't have enough money?''

The old lady replied: ''You know that you don't have enough money to buy this doll, my dear.''

Then she asked him to stay there for just 5 minutes while she went to
look around. She left quickly.

The little boy was still holding the doll in his hand.

Finally, I walked toward him and I asked him who he wished to give this doll to.

'It's the doll that my sister loved most and wanted so much for
Christmas.

She was sure that Santa Claus would bring it to her.'

I replied to him that maybe Santa Claus would bring it to her after all, and not to worry.

But he replied to me sadly. 'No, Santa Claus can't bring it to her where she is now. I have to give the doll to my mommy so that she can give it to my sister when she goes there.'

His eyes were so sad while saying this. 'My Sister has gone to be with God. Daddy says that Mommy is going to see God very soon too, so I
thought that she could take the doll with her to give it to my sister.''

My heart nearly stopped.

The little boy looked up at me and said: 'I told daddy to tell mommy not to go yet. I need her to wait until I come back from the mall.'

Then he showed me a very nice photo of himself. He was laughing. He then told me 'I want mommy to take my picture with her so she won't forget me.'

'I love my mommy and I wish she didn't have to leave me, but daddy says that she has to go to be with my little sister.'

Then he looked again at the doll with sad eyes, very quietly.

I quickly reached for my wallet and said to the boy. 'Suppose we check again, just in case you do have enough money for the doll!''

'OK' he said, 'I hope I do have enough.' I added some of my money to his without him seeing and we started to count it. There was enough for the doll and even some spare money.

The little boy said: 'Thank you God for giving me enough money!'

Then he looked at me and added, 'I asked last night before I went to
sleep for God to make sure I had enough money to buy this doll, so that mommy could give it to my sister. He heard me!''
'I also wanted to have enough money to buy a white rose for my mommy, but I didn't dare to ask God for too much. But He gave me enough to buy the doll and a white rose.''

'My mommy loves white roses.'

A few minutes later, the old lady returned and I left with my basket.

I finished my shopping in a totally different state of mind from when I started.

I couldn't get the little boy out of my mind.

Then I remembered a local news paper article two days ago, which
mentioned a drunk man in a truck, who hit a car occupied by a young
woman and a little girl.
The little girl died right away, and the mother was left in a critical state. The family had to decide whether to pull the plug on the life-sustaining machine, because the young woman would not be able to recover from the coma.

Was this the family of the little boy?

Two days after this encounter with the little boy, I read in the news
paper that the young woman had passed away.

I couldn't stop myself as I bought a bunch of white roses and I went to the funeral home where the body of the young woman was for people to see and make last wishes before her burial.

She was there, in her coffin, holding a beautiful white rose in her hand with the photo of the little boy and the doll placed over her chest.

I left the place, teary-eyed, feeling that my life had been changed forever.. The love that the little boy had for his mother and his sister is still, to this day, hard to imagine.

And in a fraction of a second, a drunk driver had taken all this away
from him.

Now you have 2 choices:

1) Send this message to others, or

2) Ignore it as if it never touched your heart.

The quote of the month is by Jay Leno: 'With hurricanes, tornados, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, 'Are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?'

For those who prefer to think that God is not watching over us.... go
ahead and delete this. For the rest of us... pass this on.

The value of a man or woman resides in what he or she gives, not in what they are capable of receiving".

Let's hear your views here...

Are children's rights protected during war or conflicts?

It would be interesting to findout how children's rights are protected under international law... The International law provides that non combatants should be protected at all times during wars but the issue is who takes care of children when war erupts? We have seen children being killed during wars such as the war in Irag, Afghainstan, Darfur, and lately in Gaza

Who is to blame?

Children and women are always victims when war erupts and there seems to be no remedy for that. Non combatants should not e targeted.

What should be done to protected children's rights and well-being during times of war?

Let's hear your views..