After struggling to get treatment for her mentally ill son, a mother’s act of desperation: Giving up custody.
Educators in low-income communities embraced meditation as a way to help students manage stress and anxiety in school. Can it help kids cope with being stuck at home?
Child mental health experts offered some key takeaways reporters can relay to worried and overwhelmed parents.
A 5-year-old's long wait for care is emblematic of a much larger problem — too few mental health providers for low-income kids on public coverage.
Ashley wanted the abuse to stop. But Butch, her adoptive father, was always around.
I met Ashley for the first time in March 2015 at a Noodles & Company in Indianapolis. Her adoptive father Craig Peterson had arranged the meeting. He initially reached out to me about an article I'd written, then shared bits of Ashley's story.
Ashley stepped out of Sandy’s red-and-white van. The 10-year-old didn’t say a word, didn’t glance back at Sandy, her adoptive mother. And she refused to meet the hazel eyes of the man waiting in front of her.
This is Part 2 of a five-part series was produced as a project for the 2017 National Fellowship.
Other stories in this series include:
Ashley would be exploited, abused and, ultimately, abandoned by people who said they cared about her. And her invisible wounds would persist for decades.
One consistent memory I have from reporting on California’s mental health system for low-income children is repeatedly asking myself, “Why is this so hard?”
