IN - Couple charged with abandonment of adopted child after legally changing her age, Sept 2019

[ioethe]

I wonder if it was even the Ciccones in the other room at the Florida adoption agency then. I mean they were from New Hampshire right and the DePauls were in upstate NY. Why did they have to pick her up in FL?

That’s a really interesting point, actually. How the hell did she end up in Florida?

 

[claudianunes]

What are the odds Kristine’s son was not formally diagnosed with autism, or the severity of it was overblown?

All of the videos about him, before all of this situation with Natalia became public, are full of comments about him not "looking autistic", this has been a suspicion for a very long time.

 

[jjenny]

Seriously, if you adopt a child from a country like Ukraine, you should expect some issues. Especially a child with disabilities, who could be in constant pain because of that disability, is unlikely to be perfectly behaved.

 

[Meloni88]

I'm appalled at the reaction of the idiotic YouTubers characterized in the screenshots. The comments are so much worse than anything you all alluded to in generalities...

Those were pretty tame in comparison to others I've seen. People are wishing her dead and calling her ableist slurs.

 

[jjenny]

Even if she were an adult (which I don't believe) when these people left her, sounds like she is severely disabled and would be in need of all kind of services. To leave her by herself, especially if she was only 9, it's mind boggling.

"In other words, due to Natalia's physical and mental health, it may not matter whether she was or wasn't a child when the Barnetts moved to Canada, an Indiana prosecutor told Insider."

The Ukrainian orphan accused of being an adult hung out at a drug recovery house and took adult education classes after her adopted parents moved to Canada

 

[jjenny]

It’s so sad. Damn it. Really horrible that she couldn’t have been adopted by that lovely Dupaul family. Poor N had the luck of getting the bizarre Barnett’s.

Not sure why Dupauls haven't adopted her? She certainly looked a lot younger back then. She's aged over the years. If she is 30 now, she would be an adult even back then and clearly she didn't look like an adult at all. I don't understand how Barnetts managed to legally change her age and by such a large number of years.

 

[jjenny]

This is huge. Their main expert witness for changing her age can't differentiate types of dysplasia and diagnosed her incorrectly on her primary medical issue. He says her past records are unreliable but must have never read them. Why would Kristine go around saying she has a different type of dwarfism? Natalia herself said she had SED in the affidavit. I thought that was the one thing everyone could agree on.


She definitely has the hitchhiker's thumb and the IEP mentions her breathing problems.

There is a different pattern of inheritance between the two types of dysplasia. One is dominant (she would have to inherit one gene from one parent), and the other is recessive (she would have to inherit two genes, one from each parent). If both her parents were of normal statute (which I am assuming, although I don't know) then she likely has diastrophic dysplasia.

 

[ioethe]

There is a different pattern of inheritance between the two types of dysplasia. One is dominant (she would have to inherit one gene from one parent), and the other is recessive (she would have to inherit two genes, one from each parent). If both her parents were of normal statute (which I am assuming, although I don't know) then she likely has diastrophic dysplasia. I believe she also has clubfoot based on the photos, which would be consistent with diastrophic dysplasia.

If this;

A woman who claims she's the Ukrainian orphan's biological mom says the girl is a child

claim is to be believed (and I can't come up with a reason not to do so), her mother is Anna Volodymyrivna Gava, and both her mother and father were of normal stature.

 

[mickey2942]

There is a different pattern of inheritance between the two types of dysplasia. One is dominant (she would have to inherit one gene from one parent), and the other is recessive (she would have to inherit two genes, one from each parent). If both her parents were of normal statute (which I am assuming, although I don't know) then she likely has diastrophic dysplasia. I believe she also has clubfoot based on the photos, which would be consistent with diastrophic dysplasia.

I read the article, and the Barnett's state they figured out that Natalia was an adult because she was menstruating. I have worked with many students who have disabilities, who have had various syndromes, hormone issues, and it was not uncommon for early menarche. 7, 8 years old. Pretty typical.

 

[ioethe]

I’m curious if they came forward before now but the media hyping the story chose to not follow up until now.

Apparently the Insider interview was carried out on the 23rd.

 

[jjenny]

If this;

A woman who claims she's the Ukrainian orphan's biological mom says the girl is a child

claim is to be believed (and I can't come up with a reason not to do so), her mother is Anna Volodymyrivna Gava, and both her mother and father were of normal stature.

It would be pretty easy to verify if this is the mother by a DNA test.

 

[jjenny]

On TLC show, little people, big world, father has diastrophic dysplasia. I believe son Jeremey inherited the gene for it, but he doesn't have dwarfism, because he would need to inherit this gene from both parents. And his mother had a different form of dwarfism, achondroplasia. Son Zach has achondroplasia which is dominant, so he inherited the gene from his mother.
Matt Roloff - Little People, Big World Cast | TLC

 

[jjenny]

If this;

A woman who claims she's the Ukrainian orphan's biological mom says the girl is a child

claim is to be believed (and I can't come up with a reason not to do so), her mother is Anna Volodymyrivna Gava, and both her mother and father were of normal stature.

I guess you couldn't really tell from inheritance pattern which form of dwarfism she really has, because even with a dominant inheritance, both parents could be of normal statue but child could still have dwarfism because of spontaneous mutations in a gene that would only appear in a child.
But if that woman really is her mother, then N. was really abandoned to live by herself at the age of 9. She had to have been highly intelligent and resourceful to survive by herself despite her physical disabilities.

 

[Meloni88]

I guess you couldn't really tell from inheritance pattern which form of dwarfism she really has, because even with a dominant inheritance, both parents could be of normal statue but child could still have dwarfism because of spontaneous mutations in a gene that would only appear in a child.
But if that woman really is her mother, then N. was really abandoned to live by herself at the age of 9. She had to have been highly intelligent and resourceful to survive by herself despite her physical disabilities.

She survived because she was rescued by the Mans family. I absolutely dread to think what could have happened to her if they hadn't found her.

 

[jjenny]

She survived because she was rescued by the Mans family. I absolutely dread to think what could have happened to her if they hadn't found her.

Yes, but there appears to have been several years in between when she was on her own.

 

[squareandrabbet]

Well, almost everyone has had something to endure....And if you think something is normal while its happening its not as bad as realizing you were being ‘tricked’ by family. To be honest I have a hard time figuring out what is/was true. I DO know I can trust whatever the majority of doctors agree with. With people like this I think its safe to trust specialists over self proclaimed experts. But when your parent is the self proclaimed expert it is actually hard to trust doctors over your own family.

Plus, let's stop to think about whatever overbearing and bullheaded manner KB undoubtedly deploys whenever she's assuring a child that she, in fact, knows more than said child does. Were you standing up to adults and contradicting them at age 9 (l0l)? I know I wasn't. It takes a lot for a child doubtless unsettled from an overwhelming majority of upheaval in their life (an entirely new country and language; PT; multiple sets of foster families, etc.), to stand up to a strange adult... it'd be a miracle if N didn't occasionally "act out", not that we've as of yet seen any type of compelling proof that she was diagnosed with any psychiatric disorder.

The more I think about this, every time I do I am newly disturbed. The Barnetts abandoned a child, who then spent her time hanging out at drug halfway houses (nothing against recovering addicts; but 9 is a little young to learn about drug abuse). I see people on different threads up in arms all the time about people who take their eyes off their kids for more than 15 seconds. "I helicopter over my kids like a hawk!" These people abandoned her. Anything could've happened to Natalia. Legitimately anything, and they tossed her out on the street like it was 1860's London, or the modern day favela. And then just said "hey, act like a college student if anyone asks, wouldja?"

 

[jjenny]

And then because her legal age was changed to that of an adult, she couldn't even go to school-I believe she still can't because legally she is 30 now.

 

[Meloni88]

Yes, but there appears to have been several years in between when she was on her own.

The Barnetts left for Canada in July 2013, Natalia was living with Antwon and Cynthia in August 2013. Unless they actually abandoned her before July she was not on her own for very long, she definitely was not living alone for years.

 

[jjenny]

The Barnetts left for Canada in July 2013, Natalia was living with Antwon and Cynthia in August 2013. Unless they actually abandoned her before July she was not on her own for very long, she definitely was not living alone for years.

This article says Mans took her in 3 years later.
"She took local adult education classes and socialized in a halfway house until the Mans family took her in three years later."
The Ukrainian orphan accused of being an adult hung out at a drug recovery house and took adult education classes after her adopted parents moved to Canada

 

[Meloni88]

Well that's just not accurate. They have pictures of Natalia all over their facebook pages uploaded August 2013, Thanksgiving and Christmas 2013 up to present day. They petitioned for guardianship in 2016 but they'd been taking care of her a long time before that.