Depressed children in foster care are very vulnerable. What if someone took you from your home, put you on a plane, and the next thing you know, you are in China, or Spain, or a unfamiliar place on this Earth. You are alone, and you are  frightened. The people look differently, sound differently, and it is not your customary environment. How vulnerable would you be? Imagine how you would feel. You don't like the feeling, do you? Yet, the expectation is for you to show happiness and society expect you  to mask your true feelings of depression, after a few days.

This is what foster children, who have been taken away from familiarity experience. The are  expected not to cry, not to whine, not to act out, and not to show adverse emotions. They are expected to appear happy, smiley, and to emotionally show that they have not been adversely affected. The reality is that most children in foster care experience great depression after being removed from their parents. The parents can have the worst parenting skills in the world, but  most children, if had a choice, would want to remain with their abusers. Parental bonding is very powerful. These children try to adjust to their new foster family, and new school, and new environment. Once visitation is initiated with their parents, the cues from their biological parents/caregivers will dictate whether it will be a successful placement until reunification takes place. In most states, the juvenile court orders visitation within a week. It is harmful to the children to remove them from their parents, and not see their parents in weeks. Generally, a neutral visitation site is monitored by an agency of the Child Welfare Division. Reports are routinely sent to the court to assist the judge in making  informed decisions. If age twelve and over, these children are able to articulate their feelings to the judge.

These supervised visits can be horrible and further damaging to the children or it can be a start to family healing. It becomes damaging when the biological parents/caregivers talk against the placement, against the foster parenting environment, and encourage the children to upset the placement. It becomes damaging when the children are encouraged to engage in negative behaviors: fight, steal, and be disrespectful. The thought is,  "If you act up in placement, they will send you home faster". The reality is...if children act up in placement, there will be subsequent placements, and returning home will be prolonged until the children behaviors  are stabilized.

The visitations are healing for the family when the biological parents/caregivers encourage the children to be the best persons, get good grades, be obedient, and follow house rules. When the biological parents/caregivers are encouraging and the children know that their parents are truly working toward reunification, the frequency of the depressive symptoms in children will lessen. When biological parents/caregivers send the message to their children that they can love the foster family and maintain  love for them (parents), the depressive symptoms will lessen. Children should not be made to think if they like their foster parents, they are disloyal to their biological parents/caregivers. Jealousy should never rear its ugly head between parents and foster parents. This is the challenge, and it can undermine the healing process, as well as the reunification process.

Children experience depression, the same as adults. Children may not necessarily display a lot of sadness but may present to be irritable. Children may tend to have  cranky moods, and tend to lose interest in passionate activities. For example, they may no longer enjoy playing chess, checkers, music, athletics, etc... Children may experience weight loss, drop in school grades, loneliness, fighting, bed wetting, self defecation, property damage, poor concentration and increased aggression, to name a few.

Most children who enters the foster care system, should have the opportunity to have counseling. Children need counseling to process the lost of their immediate family, home, and their familiar environment. Removal from the home may compound on problems that led to the reason the children were initially removed. These issues may be anger, rejection, abuse, neglect, and/or other family dynamics. The children may have to take medication to alleviate the manifestation of physical or behavior problems. If the children are in a good foster home, receive therapy, recommended medication, and have positive encouragement from parents, then the manifestation of depressive systoms will subside. Remember, foster care is the best option for children whose parents are failing them, and who would be in  worst  predicament  without child welfare intervention.