Sleuthers-- I got a little out of control in some of my comments re: Dr. Phil and I sincerely apologize if I offended anyone.
My 12-1/2 year old stepdaughter's mother seems to have Borderline Personality Disorder with Narcissistic and Histrionic tendencies. She can be "over the top" lovey dovey to her daughter at one moment, verbally and emotionally abusive the next. During a peroid of time when her mother was in her "Witch" personality (as I refer to it), my stepdaughter talked to her counselor at school. She was told there was nothing they could do to help her unless her mother is physically abusive.
With mothers such as my stepdaughter's (and, I suspect, such as Octomom), there is really not much CPS can do unless a child is physically abused or gets hurt to the extent that the household is deemed to be an unsafe environment. Even then, they will go out of their way to keep the children with the mother.
Recently in Manitoba, Canada, where I live, there have been a number of young children who have died at the hands of parents and relatives after they have been taken out of healthy foster care environments and returned to family menber's care. This seems to happen more with Aboriginal children because Child and Family Services is required to try to keep the children with extended Aboriginal families rather than with non-Aboriginal foster families. Some of these children have been virtually tortured to death by their mothers and stepfathers or boyfriends. I imagine it is hard balancing the rights of the parents with the rights and needs of the child. It was finally written into the Law that the safety of the child must be of primary importance. I hope that in the future tragedies such as I described will one day just be history.
