Millions of tax dollars are spent every year by Family Services in an attempt to repair broken families in the United States. We have approximately 500,000 children in this country living in foster homes, kinship homes, group homes. There are probably another 500,000 should be in the system, however, there is just no place to send them. In author Rene Howitt's book, Whose Interest, she tells the true story of a fight to save children from abuse and neglect. Parents are given chance after another to put their lives together. Children are taken away from their parents, only to be returned to them time and again. The children become like pingpong balls bounced back and forth between these temporary homes and then back to their parents. By the time that Family Services concludes that there is no changing the parents, years have passed by and the children are irreparably damaged.
Because I have a huge interest in protecting children, I found this book difficult to put down once started. Sadly enough, the story told by this author is very common in our society.
This book makes you think about things that our mind blocks out because they aren't pretty, hard to understand, and society has a tendency to just sweep things like this under the rug.