As a child I cried out for help to child protective
services. But the system didn’t help me when I was a child, and it hasn’t
helped me as a parent.
Almost as soon as my older son was born, child
protective services came into my life saying my son needed protection from me,
and it has remained in my life to this day. Instead of helping me, it weakened
my family and left me vulnerable. Because of the system, my child lives with anger
and anxiety.
“Foster” is a documentary that aired on HBO on May 7th and focuses on the lives of a few children in the Los Angeles foster care system. I’ve been hurt by the system as a child and a parent. I expected the film to show only the angelic side of the system—to portray how the system protects children and saves their lives. But I found myself shocked at the rawness of the film. It showed … Read More
In the HBO documentary “Foster,” Jessica Chandler is a foster care social worker, a mother of two boys, and a former foster youth who speaks candidly about addressing the root causes of child welfare involvement—racism, historical trauma, poverty and family stress. Since age 18, Jessica has been an advocate “writing letters, sharing my story, and explaining to people that kids shouldn’t be penalized for the things we go through in poverty.” Jessica hopes the film … Read More
