Melissa Christine Mielke

Melissa Christine Mielke

<melissa@dave.private.mielke.cc>
To: Dave Mielke <dave@mielke.cc>
Subject: CAS

Dear Editor:

The article in today's paper about the CAS (40% rise in number of children in CAS care, September 22) caught my attention, because a number of my brothers and sisters are in their "care".  I will fully admit that the house we lived in was in a disasterous physical state due to various things that my family has been through, but that was no excuse for the separation of 13 children and 2 parents who care about us into five (might I add, "strange", when children today are taught to steer free of strangers) foster homes across the region, under the false accusation of violence!

Jeanette Lewis is right when she says "these children are being taken away from their families and this is traumatic."  It hurts, and there's the answer to one of Nico Trocme's questions.  It is not better for children to be in foster homes, where even the values are conflicting. I was not removed because I am 18, and had my own choice in the matter; although I had been working at a wonderful Christian camp, so I found out about it a little while later when I contacted my family (which means, I didn't have a choice anyway.  But I would have chosen to stay.)  Which is one of many examples to show that my parents care. 

They phoned the camp, and requested that my phone calls be screened until they had an opportunity to tell me themselves what had happened so none of my work at camp would be interrupted.  I didn't hear a word about the situation for two weeks, when I phoned them while we were at a church in Kanata to witness a girl's baptism, to avoid a long distance call. 

My 20- and 16-year-old brothers are here, too.  Another example is that we have our teeth checked every 6 months.  Some of my friends hardly ever have their teeth checked.  While this doesn't mean their parents don't care, it expresses some of how much mine do.  My mom often took the little ones to play groups, and my dad often helped us out with our homework, despite the fact that he is blind. 

My dad works from home so he can help keep a closer eye on the children, and my parents were always very careful about who took care of the children should they both have to go somewhere (which, they made sure, was not very often.)  Our family has higher moral standards than most.

According to the CAS, my family was abusive and neglective.

Excuse me?

I have lived with them for 18 years, and feel that I cannot pay them back for what they have given me, constant support from the time I was conceived in my mother's womb.  And yet from Trocme's research reference, the CAS doesn't know whether I would have been better off in a foster home or in my own home (had I been a few years younger.)  I am generally a hard worker, but I found out that I have to be told by someone who doesn't even know me and is pre-judging me that I have to help out at home. And I know that I would have been worse off in a foster home, because God didn't put me in this family for no reason. 

I have many people in my family to love and care for.  And have I "fared poorly in life" as a result of being in my own home, because it was "abusive" and "poor" and "neglective"?  I doubt it.  (Parents do not suddenly become that way after they've been raising children for 21 years.) 

My marks are not all A+'s, but neither are they D's or F's.  The only course in high school that I've failed is 4A math, and now I am completing my OAC's.  I could have had my O.S.S.D. in the middle of my Gr. 12 year, had I taken 4A English in the first semester.  Although I am shy, there are many things I am capable of doing, which are of far more value and significance than doing well in school.  I owe much of it to the support and guidance of my parents, next to the amazing love and genuine blessings of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

Instead of tearing families apart that love and care for each other, if a 'serious' problem (such as a dirty, worn-out house) is found by a culture which judges exteriors rather than what really counts, then why not use some of that money to help them fix the physical aspects rather than separating the family under the vain assumption that they have been neglected and abused?

In doing so, they would prevent many devastating problems which are currently being created as a result of the system; the children wouldn't be suffering, and we'd all get along just fine.  And, their funds would be better spent.

We feel very blessed to have a loving, supportive church family that cares for us and lifts us up in prayer continually, and I am thankful to have a father who has a decent enough income to help get us out of this mess, which has been made a mess far worse than the physical state of our old house by people who don't even have children and think they know what they are talking about.  But how would those with an unsubstantial income in this situation fare?

As long as my little brothers and sisters are not with my family, they suffer.  And so does my mother, and my father, and all of us.

Tell me this isn't so.

Melissa Mielke, 18 726-0014