Confessions of a Disillusioned Child Welfare Worker, Part Six: Death by a Thousand Paper Cuts

In the first portion of this series, I told you lots about me. Now, I’d like to start zooming out. As discussed in the introduction, one of my goals of this series was to talk about the human cost of paperwork. But to simply say paperwork may not capture the essence of what I mean. By paperwork, sometimes I surely do mean physical paperwork; stacks and stacks of paperwork. But I also mean bureaucracy, hierarchy, liability, politics... I would argue that there are few fields where we see the impact of politics and policy so sharply than in child welfare. With every assessment, every document, and every procedure that we add, it is important that the child welfare system be honest about what we stand to lose.

Let’s paint a picture:

·        As a child protection worker, you are required to see families with open cases once every 30 days. The system mandates this. In remote communities with no child protection worker, this means one must travel to them. Surely then you can just travel there, right? Of course not. Submit a travel request with a rationale of why you must travel. This must be approved by the same manager who told you to travel in the first place, then onto the director and the executive director. By the time you receive these approvals, the flights are all booked. That family that could really use some support will now wait another month; the rest of your calendar is full.

·        A grandparent who has been integral in raising their grandchild now has to apply to be a foster caregiver, all because Child & Family Services opened a file on the children’s parents. Now we need criminal record checks and child protection record checks for each adult in the home. Foster home application, foster home study, medical assessment, direct deposit form, placement information form, special needs assessment. Grandpa has a criminal charge from a bar fight 30 years ago? You guessed it- that’s a different form, this one needs directors’ approval. Jump through all these hoops and in the meantime, we would sooner see their grandchildren placed with a stranger.

·        A family struggling with intergenerational trauma and addiction would like to attend an out of territory treatment program as no options have been made available in the territory. For their application, you must complete seven sections of information per family member, obtain all previous medical assessments completed on each, letters of recommendation from every professional they have identified they are involved with including their doctor, feedback from their school, photocopies of all of their IDs… Once completed, submit to the supervisor, then the manager, then the director. Denied by one, sent back to the start. Once approved by all, on to the interprovincial team for approval or denial. If approved, complete a travel request for the family to travel out of territory for treatment, despite the fact that they were just approved to go out of territory for treatment and surely must travel to get there. Onto the supervisor, manager, director, executive director for approval…

Surely, some purpose can be found for each paper and each process. I presume in many cases lots of well-intentioned and well-educated people got together and spent many hours coming up with each. And sure, if humans functioned like robots, perhaps all these processes compiled together would not be so catastrophic to those they are meant to support.

But we are not dealing with robots. In fact, we are often working with the most vulnerable. We are working with the people that do not have phones to call their doctor and make an appointment for that medical assessment. We are working in communities where there is nowhere to get your photo ID. We are working in the north where there are only ten seats on the flight that worker needed to be on while directors are sitting with travel requests unopened in their inboxes. We are working in a system with workers carrying the load of at least 2-3 people at almost all times. We are working in an environment where even the smallest barriers compound on one another to create mountains.

Most importantly, we are working with people who need help now, not in a month when their worker finally gets a chance to review the latest round of revisions needed on their application. We are working with families in crisis who need our presence, meanwhile we are absent completing their quarterly case review.

As a worker, I quickly learned the system would rather I neglect you than my paperwork. So, to survive, I shut myself in. And my caseload kept growing, and new reports kept flowing in. Each moment at my desk was a moment I could not show up for you. It is a moment lost that could have meant something to you. It’s a missed graduation, it’s a rushed interview, it’s a feeling that I ask you all these questions just to do nothing about it. It is a clear message that even the people paid to care about you couldn’t be bothered.

To those I delivered that message to, I am sorry. I am sorry for the days I chose to be what the system wanted instead of what you needed. I am sorry for the days I had the choice to make and chose wrong. I’m sorry for the numerous times I lacked the courage to stand up and instead chose to fall in line.

To “the system”, I am honestly still trying to figure you out. Some would say you are functioning just as intended. Some would say there is no point in drawing your attention to all of this because you never intended to help families anyways. Some would say you are just a slightly more watered-down version of all your colonial ancestors; some would argue you are not watered down at all.

But in the event this representation does not capture the full picture, or that I reach someone willing to receive this, I will ask this of you: Be honest. Be honest that you know you cannot have it all. Be honest that each day you have a choice to make and it is an either/or. Recognize when you are choosing the status quo even if it means the death and destruction of those you claim to be rescuing. Then ask yourself, are you satisfied with this legacy?  

Sincerely,

A Disillusioned Child Welfare Worker