“Mom, take me home! How children live in a children's social shelter

It is difficult for an ordinary person to imagine what life circumstances might force an adult to think about how to place a child in an orphanage. It is difficult to talk about this topic, realizing that there are no uniquely bad, scary and angry adults, just like there are no unhappy and offended children. It is easy to make a decision to place a child in an orphanage if the parents lead an antisocial lifestyle, drink or beat - in this case, living with their own family is perceived as a threat to their life, and the orphanage becomes salvation. But it is precisely these parents who do not think about whether it is possible to send their child to an orphanage - they generally think little about children.

It is more difficult to understand what needs to happen in a relatively prosperous family for a parent to begin to think about this issue. It’s worth understanding this not in order to savor the details of someone else’s family misfortune, but in order to notice and prevent a problem in your family in time.

Reasons for abandoning a child

There are no ideal parents. In their family, children sooner or later are dissatisfied with their parents, just as parents would always like to correct something in their children’s behavior. But these conflicts between “fathers and children” do not always become a reason to think about how to send a child to an orphanage. The reasons for abandoning a child can be different - momentary spontaneous decisions resulting from a heated quarrel or conflict with the child, as well as balanced ones made as a result of a difficult family situation. Do not rush to immediately condemn such parents (and, as a rule, this is a single mother); there are really difficult cases. Real life sometimes throws up situations that are much more intricate than the most confusing series.

Several streams, one ending

OFFICIALLY Psychoneurological boarding school (abbreviated as PNI) is an inpatient institution for social services for persons suffering from mental disorders, who have partially or completely lost the ability to self-care and who, due to mental and often physical health, require constant care and supervision.
Psychoneurological boarding schools are part of the general system of psychiatric care in the Russian Federation and at the same time are institutions for social protection of the population. — Recently, there have been a lot of publications in the press about psychoneurological boarding schools. What kind of structure is this?

— In theory, the tasks of the PNI include protecting a person who has serious mental health problems and is therefore unable to live independently, and there is no one to care for him. And then the state takes care of the person and guarantees him a modest, but worthy life by human standards. And supposedly the doctor is nearby when you need help...

— As I understand, part of the problems of PNI lies in the fact that completely different people are forced to live side by side for years under conditions that are far from favorable. What “categories of citizens” fall there?

— There are, so to speak, several streams.

Thus, in boarding schools there are many elderly people with dementia - those who are lonely or whose relatives cannot cope with them. After all, not everyone can hire a nurse. And it happens that a person’s impairments are so severe that relatives simply cannot stand it.

The boarding school also houses people with severe intellectual disabilities and mental disorders. After all, a mentally ill person is not always the only problem for a family. It happens that relatives themselves are frail or another family member needs care. In this case, the resources of “close assistants,” as they are called abroad, are quickly depleted. Either a person with disabilities does not have a separate room in his apartment, but it is difficult to be with him, or it is difficult for him to be with others. And such a life can last for many years.

People also end up in PNI whose relatives themselves are not quite adequate and cannot assess the severity of the sick person’s condition; he simply gets on their nerves, and they try to get rid of him.

Not everyone who turns over their relatives to PNI is selfish or malicious; I think not everyone even understands what kind of life awaits a person in a boarding school. However, it sometimes happens that relatives of people with mental disorders send them to a boarding school and deprive them of their legal capacity, trying to take possession of their living space. They choose themselves and their own well-being and push the person out of their life. Moreover, if he is sick and cannot stand up for himself, this is not so difficult to do.

Disabled children who have reached adulthood after leaving orphanages end up in PNI as if they were sentenced to life imprisonment. These are orphans or “refuseniks” - the children of those parents who could not cope, who had nothing to live on, who were scared and believed the doctors’ conclusion that their children would be “plants” or “meaningless animals”... Some manage to “give up and forget.” However, many who see no other option and therefore place their child in state care experience great suffering. Perhaps there was no one to advise or support them when the fate of a child or an adult was being decided.

Photo from doctorpiter.ru

Another part of the PNI residents are people with developmental disabilities who lived in families as children. The parents tried to cure and educate the child, looked for specialists, and took him to a special school. However, time passed, and the child turned eighteen. And for “special” (as they are now called) adults in our country there is neither a present nor a future.

If the mother gave birth to such a child not too late, then by the time he reaches adulthood, she herself will be forty to forty-five years old. By this time, even the minimum state assistance that was due to the mother of a disabled child ceases. If a mother raises a child alone (and families with disabled children break up quite often), only the “child’s” allowance remains for living. She still has ten to fifteen years until retirement, and she just needs to feed her family. At the same time, a “special” person cannot suddenly grow up; he still needs care, communication, development and employment. But now he has nowhere to go, nothing to do, no one to stay with. And boarding school seems like a way out.

Such a bleak outcome awaits those whose relatives have fallen ill or passed away.

— Can relatives somehow influence life in a PNI?

“It happens that the staff sees that the person’s relatives did not abandon them, they visit, maintain contact with specialists - then they treat him more attentively. What remains for the orphans and the lonely? These abandoned people are defenseless.

Difficult life events

Some people are familiar with the situation - a single mother living in a remote area wants to go to work for the sake of her family in a large city or abroad. There is no one to leave the child with, and she comes to the decision: “I want to put the child in an orphanage. Temporarily!". It is assumed that the mother does not abandon her child forever, only until she earns a living. The situation can be aggravated by the fact that the mother may have several children, and one of them requires expensive emergency medical care.

How to take a child from an orphanage to visit for a weekend or vacation

Then, within 5 working days, guardianship officials must check the documents provided, inspect your home and issue a conclusion on the possibility of temporary transfer of the child, which is valid for 2 years from the date of its signing, or issue a written refusal indicating the reasons.

Who can accept a child for “guest mode”
What documents need to be provided
The documents have been collected, the conclusion has been received, what next?
What documents will you be given for the duration of your child’s stay in your family?
For which children is guest mode suitable?
Why does a teenager need temporary stay in a family?

Return of foster and adopted children

Sometimes parents have to think about returning their adopted children to the orphanage. There is a known situation where adoptive parents took a child into a family with existing children of their own. After some time, it turned out that the adopted child has a serious mental disorder, due to which he practically terrorizes the younger children in the family. Moreover, due to their age, the children cannot fight back, but in front of adults, the adopted boy behaves adequately. The parents did not rush to get rid of him immediately; on the contrary, they held repeated conversations and looked for other methods of influence, which were not successful. Moreover, they themselves have become attached to their adopted son, they are well aware of what a psychological blow for the adopted son his return to the orphanage could result in, but, looking at the bruises and beatings on the younger children, they simply do not see any other way to resolve the issue.

How can a pensioner get into a boarding home for the elderly and disabled?

According to statistics, there are many pensioners in Russia who find it difficult to cope with household chores on their own. For them, help from the state is the only possible way out.

The state boarding house for the elderly and disabled is usually overcrowded. And this situation is observed throughout the country , despite the fact that living conditions in such establishments leave much to be desired. Of course, there can be no talk of a dignified old age, but every pensioner will receive the necessary care, and this is important.

In order for an elderly person to enter a boarding home for the elderly, he will need to collect the necessary documentation . First, an application is submitted to the social protection department to which the pensioner belongs at his place of residence.

An elderly person must have the following documents:

Passport/other identity document;
Medical insurance (original);
A document confirming that the elderly person has reached retirement age;
Certificate of disability and expert opinion.

After you have collected all the necessary documents, they need to be submitted to social security, whose employees will carefully check them. Then, if everything is in order with the documentation, a commission is appointed that checks in what conditions the elderly person lives and whether he has employed/able-bodied relatives.

If the commission makes a positive decision , then after some time you will receive a ticket to a boarding home for the elderly. If social workers assess the pensioner’s living conditions as acceptable, then, most likely, he will be denied placement in a boarding home for the elderly.

Read material on the topic: How to get into a nursing home

Lack of contact and mutual understanding in the family

Parents cannot always cope with their own child. The reasons for this are different, but the result is the same - parents have lost their authority and cannot exert the proper influence on the teenager. The latter is aggressive, sees his relatives as a threat to his freedom, tries to run away from home, and even grab some of his things, and his parents do not feel safe being around him. Do they have the right to make a harsh decision for educational purposes, or should they meekly await their fate? Each parent answers this question independently in each specific case. You should not expect help or advice from others in such matters - this is your personal choice and your responsibility.

How to register a child for boarding school

Contact your district education department and explain the situation to them. It is allowed to transfer to a boarding school not only children left without relatives, but also those whose mother or father finds themselves in a difficult life situation. In this case, their rights to the child can be preserved so that they can later take it away. Write a statement addressed to management indicating the reasons for your action. The letter is written on behalf of the parents or legal representatives.

For somatic diseases, a conclusion from the MSEC (medical and social expert commission) is required, which is carried out at the place of registration of the child. To conduct MSEC, a characterization is required with the obligatory inclusion of issues of learning, mastering social skills, and gaming activities.

What documents are needed to place a child in an orphanage?

A child is a full citizen of his country. Therefore, if such a decision has been made, a package of documents will need to be provided to the orphanage. The main rule is to contact the local guardianship and trusteeship authorities, they will provide all the necessary information. Registering a child in an orphanage is not a one-day process, since this will require a decision from local governments or other government bodies, and an application form must be filled out at the guardianship authorities. The minimum set of documents includes:

birth certificate (or passport) of the child. If there are none, a medical report is drawn up establishing the approximate age of the child;
act of inspection of housing conditions;
if the child goes to school, educational documents will be needed;
information about parents (parent);
inventory of the child's property.

Procedure for placing a minor in a special closed educational institution

If it is impossible to bring a minor to criminal responsibility and there are grounds for placing him in a special school, the prosecutor or the head of the internal affairs department applies to the commission on juvenile affairs with a request to consider the possibility of sending the minor to a special school and, if there are such grounds, to submit an appropriate petition.
The head of the internal affairs department or the prosecutor sends the following set of documents to the court:

all materials of a terminated criminal case or documents on refusal to initiate a criminal case
petition for placement of a minor in a special school and resolution of the commission on juvenile affairs
characteristics from the minor’s place of work and study
materials for inspection of a minor's home
information from the police department, which contains information about all offenses and crimes of a minor
medical report on the health status of the minor and the absence of grounds preventing the minor from being sent to a special school

Problems of personality formation in children's institutions

In any case, keeping children in orphanages does not leave its mark on them. These problems cannot be prevented either by increased attention from educators or the best funding. All personal problems of pupils in an orphanage can be divided into several types:

In the cognitive sphere, associated with a lack of mental development. Moreover, this does not mean mental retardation; it is the result of irregular exposure to the external environment when acquiring any skills.
In the emotional sphere, caused by the lack of close emotional contacts, primarily with the mother and with peers.
In the social sphere, provoked by a lack of experience in interpersonal contacts and communication in a team.
Sensory sphere - due to a lack of stimuli in the auditory and visual spheres.

As a result of these factors, orphanage children are characterized by emotional poverty and lack of experience of social life, which can only be obtained in the family. They have either low or high self-esteem due to an unformed self-image. Lack of social experience leads to the fact that children cannot find a common language with the people around them, because of this they become rude, distrustful, suspicious, and may begin to deceive. They tend to want to separate themselves from others, to assert themselves by any means.

How to adopt a child from an orphanage: necessary documents

An important factor is the ability to support a child. The financial side of the issue greatly influences how orphanages treat newly arrived parents. Adopting a child also means that the little person, in addition to love and care, must enjoy material benefits to the fullest, without feeling the need for anything.

Another problem is the adoption of a baby that is absolutely healthy in all respects. There are a minority of such children, so the queue for them is correspondingly longer. In addition, no one can guarantee with absolute certainty that even a completely healthy child at a later age will not suffer from various types of abnormalities.

Negative consequences of living in child care institutions

Before making a final decision, you need to have a correct idea of how children live in an orphanage and how their personality is formed there. This is a place where children will not be able to develop a stable attachment to a person, to the so-called “significant adult” by psychologists. And without this, according to L. Petranovskaya, a Russian psychologist, teacher and publicist, the formation of a full-fledged personality is impossible. Any child should feel a reliable rear behind him, know that he has someone who will protect him.

Living in an orphanage, he sees many adults (speech therapists, psychologists, educators, librarians, cleaners, and so on), but none of them is attached to him personally, and he, accordingly, does not become attached to anyone. A feeling of closeness and devotion can only be formed in conditions of division into one’s own adults and strangers. Living life without a significant adult, the child is essentially in a situation of constant stress and fear. The world around him is not open, interesting and educational, but cold, ruthless and hostile.

Event: music was playing in the corridor

— How do people with disabilities feel when they find themselves in a mental health facility?

- I don’t know, I haven’t been in their shoes yet.

I think many people understand what is happening to them. They experience fear and powerlessness.

In all PNI there are people who ended up there as a result of a tragic combination of circumstances, although they could live independently in the open world. For them it is deprivation of liberty. What can you feel? Fury. Loneliness. Despair. The desire to fight. Depression? Apathy? Anything but joy, optimism, hope for the future...

And how can a young person feel when, at the age of eighteen, he is transferred to a mental health facility from an orphanage? They “move” without his knowledge, and the doors of a densely populated house slam behind his back, in which he, especially if he is not very independent or does not move himself, against his will, without having done anything wrong, finds himself locked for the rest of his life. It is difficult and scary to imagine yourself in this place.

It’s no easier for those who come from a family to the PNI. You were at home, with your family, all day long something was happening around you or with your participation; they talked to you, they hugged you; then suddenly they packed up their things and took them somewhere - and you find yourself in an unfamiliar place, where some people around you are sitting on identical beds or walking aimlessly along the corridors.

You cry, turn to the wall (what if this turns out to be a dream - and you wake up at home?), then you try to adapt to this incomprehensible world - but you lack the core of existence - your loved ones: you were needed at home, but there are no loved ones here, the staff changes, and time has frozen and is measured only by meals and filled with TV.

But there are also those who do not see, do not hear, do not move, or are too deeply immersed in their own world - residents of the so-called “mercy departments”. Probably, not all of them are able to understand what happened to them during the transition from their familiar environment to the space of a boarding school for disabled adults. Many of them are unable to share their thoughts and feelings.

We don't know whether such people immediately discover that their lives have changed. It seems to me that they are realizing that there is less touching, that the smells have become different. Locked in their weak bodies, they (if miraculously the nurse doesn’t feel sorry) become the object of “care and attention”, “corresponding to the medical diagnosis”: fed (the food is pureed so as not to choke), given medicine, washed (in bed) and changed into someone else’s clothes clothes received after washing; cut bald or “boyish”...

And on the TV on the wall, frames flash.

So it was and will be. Lie down.

- What an interesting turnaround. When talking about PNI, the formal rights of residents are often listed - to leave the territory, to have a varied diet, to have an individual daily routine. But it turns out that the most important thing is the right to communicate?

— I would say that this is a person’s right to their own feelings and the need of other people. So that you can choose those you need and not be separated from them. So that you are the chosen one, and not one of the masses, not a grain of sand. So that there are not strangers and indifferent people nearby, but close and loving people.

Photo from the site psyinternat.ru

- And still. How should the stay of such different people in one institution be arranged - according to the law? And how does it work in reality?

— In PNI we are not talking about an individual person, it is always about a disabled person living in an institution (he is called “resident”), who must be included and must fit into the format of the institution.

At the same time, usually the life of every adult “in the wild” is conventionally measured in three formats: home, work, leisure. Let’s try to see how this is “implemented,” in official parlance, for residents of PNI.

Independent, capable people who ended up in PNI due to circumstances are sometimes employed outside the walls of the boarding school or in low-paid positions in PNI. As a rule, they do not have families and children, because marriages are not concluded in PNI and, with rare exceptions, there are no conditions for living together. Capable people can leave the boarding school.

For those who want some useful activity, but are not employed, some boarding schools have workshops. I saw one such workshop where people capable of monotonous work spend years doing work, orders for which the institution can provide them with. In that workshop they made paper cemetery flowers and rolled shoe covers into tight balls. One of the successful hardworking workers proudly said that he earns as much as seven hundred rubles a month. Against the backdrop of the emptiness and meaninglessness of life in a PNI, this is a blessing.

It’s harder for the rest who don’t work, because in general, for every five hundred residents of PNI, there are often no more than five non-medical employees - social workers, teachers, psychologists... I think this is also a reason for serious staff burnout.

People deprived of legal capacity can only enter the territory if accompanied by a relative (at a pre-agreed time), a boarding school employee, or when going to group events (which, as far as I understand, does not happen too often).

People who cannot move themselves and cannot dress themselves are entirely dependent on the capabilities and will of the staff.

In one boarding school, I asked a social worker what the lives of people in the so-called “mercy department” are filled with, where the most difficult, in many cases non-ambulatory, people are kept (I noticed that almost all of them are lying in beds, there are no strollers nearby, which means they are not walking and they don’t leave the room). The social worker replied that people with disabilities do not get bored, since holidays are often held in the department’s lobby. I asked how people get to the holidays if they don’t have strollers. They told me that they play the music very loudly, you can hear everything in the wards...

— Is a staffing of five hundred to six hundred people common among such institutions?

— Yes, and this is not the limit, there are quite a lot of boarding schools where the number of residents reaches up to a thousand. However, there are still not enough places, and thousands more are waiting in line.

Some boarding schools until recently had rooms for sixteen people. I’m not sure that in such conditions it is possible to take into account the compatibility of people by age and temperament.

Photo from raptus.su

Limited personal space

Another fact that characterizes life in children's institutions will tell you about what kind of children are in orphanages - the total inability for pupils to lead their personal lives. In the orphanage there is a constant violation of the boundaries of personal space - a shared shower, toilet, there is nowhere to be alone with your experiences and thoughts. The child gets used to being constantly examined, being watched by adults who are strangers to him and equally strangers and not always friendly children.

How to send a child to a boarding school or orphanage? Neighbor needs help

Yes, a five-day period can actually be a benefit for some healthy children (if the parents are alcoholics or a large family is on the verge of survival).
We have a small DD in our city, it is financed by Caritas or something. So this is generally a fairy tale for children who have difficult family circumstances. In our city, an orphanage was closed because... there is no money to maintain it. And the shelter was renamed a rehabilitation center, because... Children can stay there longer, but in a shelter a child is temporarily staying and his status must be established within 3 months and sent to a state institution for full state support.

Lack of responsibility

A problem for the future life of a person who grew up in an orphanage is the inability to learn to take responsibility for one’s life and one’s actions. On the one hand, the constant absence of problems with daily worries about where to get food and how to wash dirty clothes makes life easier, on the other hand, the student gets used to the fact that someone has to do this work for him every day.

To summarize, we can say that the issue of transferring your own child to an orphanage in each specific situation is always decided individually. Perhaps there really is no other way out. This is a moral and ethical question and everyone answers it in their own way. It is very important that in the case of a positive answer - yes, give it away - this happens with the full understanding that the only condition for the formation of a successful personality of each child is the family. Everyone will agree with this statement - from psychologists, teachers to the children themselves - inmates of orphanages.

Goals and objectives of the psychoneurological boarding school

The institution is a medical and social institution intended for permanent residence of the elderly and disabled, and those in need of care, household and medical services.

An institution (boarding school, boarding house, etc.) carries out its activities under the leadership of a higher-level organization.

The institution is headed by a director, who is appointed and dismissed by a higher-level organization from persons with higher medical, pedagogical or economic education.

The director organizes the work of the institution and bears full responsibility for its condition and activities.

A director, without a power of attorney, acts on behalf of the institution, represents it in all institutions and organizations, disposes of the property and funds of his institution in the manner prescribed by law, enters into contracts, issues powers of attorney, including those with the right of subrogation, and opens appropriate bank accounts for the institution.

Monitoring the quality of medical care for mentally ill people living in a boarding school, compliance with sanitary, hygienic and anti-epidemic regimes and the provision of specialized medical care is carried out by health authorities in the prescribed manner.

The procedure for placing a child in a boarding school

When a decision is made to send children to a boarding school for their own good, you need to know what will have to be done for this. To register a child, you will need to write an application to the relevant authorities and provide them with a package of documents.

If children have reached an age exceeding 10 years, then it is necessary to ask their opinion on this matter. The final decision on whether to place a child in a boarding school is made by the guardianship authorities. If there are serious reasons for placing a child in this institution, then a written agreement is concluded between the educational institution, parents and the boarding school.

This document must contain the following information:

How long will the child stay in the institution?
Possibility of visits and their order.
Duties of the parties.
What psychological support does the child or parents need?
Responsibility of the parties.

If the adults do not violate the agreement, the child will be able to return to the family. This method can be used to correct the behavior of children, and also if there is a need to send the child to a boarding school for a while.

Alternatives

It is not necessary to transfer a minor to a boarding school if problems arise in the family. There are additional options.

The best option for both the child and the parents are highly specialized schools aimed at educating athletes, cadets or geniuses in a certain branch of science. Getting into such institutions is more difficult than getting into a boarding school - you must successfully pass exams and pass a selection process. But the pros outweigh:

education in such institutions (if they are state-owned) is provided completely free of charge, as is accommodation;
there is no risk of deprivation of parental rights;
the child feels more comfortable, since the population in the boarding school is much worse than in a sports or cadet school;
Staying in a sports, humanitarian, cadet or other specialized school not only allows you to solve problems with discipline, accommodation or financial support, but also gives the child a ticket to a successful adult life.

Parents with problematic offspring should pay special attention to military schools. They will instill in children the basics of discipline, which in many cases will help cope with the difficult character of a teenager.

It is possible to send a child to a boarding school without depriving parental rights, but before taking such a measure, you should weigh the pros and cons. Sending to a boarding school should be a last resort; you cannot resort to this procedure because of a child’s minor offense.

Before transferring a minor to a permanent institution, it is imperative to have a conversation with him, preferably with the involvement of a child psychologist. During the child’s stay in an educational institution, it is important to maintain contact with him so that family relationships do not deteriorate.