Please excuse the cross post...
Please alert anyone you know who may be able to get involved this
Tuesday in
Toronto not only in support for her civil rights as a Deaf woman and
member
of our community but of a breastfeeding mother and child who's
relationship
has been severed.

I would encourage all to write or call to CAS in Toronto in protest of
this
decision.

      Mar. 2, 2002. 01:00 AM
      www.thestar.ca


      Deaf woman's newborn taken by CAS
      Nicholas Keung
      STAFF REPORTER

      A Toronto woman is outraged that Children's Aid Society workers
took
away her 2-week-old boy after her landlord complained the woman, born
deaf,
couldn't hear and neglected her son's cries.

      Michelle (not her real name) and her son were visiting a deaf
couple's house near Glen Shields Ave. and Dufferin St. when a team of
four
Toronto police officers and CAS workers showed up at 7:30 p.m. on
Wednesday.

      "I just finished breast-feeding my baby and was rocking him in a
car
seat. They just picked him up and took him away," the distraught
27-year-old single mother said yesterday.

      "There was no sign-language interpreter. We had no idea what they
were talking about. I didn't know why and where they were taking my
baby."

      The children's aid workers and police were at the house for about
30
minutes and left the mother a business card.

      Through the help of social agencies for the deaf, Michelle was
allowed a one-hour visit with her son yesterday at a Scarborough
children's
aid office and to breast-feed the infant for the first time in three
days.

      Nancy Andrews, acting service administration manager of CAS
Toronto,
said privacy legislation prevented her from revealing the nature of the
complaint against the young mother.

      But Chris Kenopick, executive director of the Ontario Association
for
the Deaf, said he was told by children's aid workers that Michelle's
landlady laid the negligence complaint. The woman rented a room to
Michelle
in her Scarborough apartment last summer.

      The landlord, Kenopick said, claimed Michelle did not respond to
her
child's crying. The landlord, who did not return calls from The Star,
also
claimed a baby-monitoring device - designed especially for deaf parents
-
wasn't working.

      Michelle, who denies the allegations, said: "Steven cries a lot at

night, just like other babies."

      Kenopick said his association receives about 10 calls a year from
parents with hearing disabilities whose children are taken away by
children's aid, but it's the first time a newborn has been involved.

      "There are a lot of misunderstandings and miscommunication out
there
about deaf parents. Most people think if you are deaf, you are
incompetent.
They wonder how you can hear a baby cry when you are deaf," said
Kenopick,
who himself has impaired hearing.

      "Can you imagine (having) someone come into your house, talk to
you
in a foreign language and then just grab your child away?"

      Andrews admitted the Children's Aid Society does not have a
specific
policy to deal with deaf parents, but quickly added its workers only act
on
complaints when reasonable grounds are established after thorough
investigations.

      "In every situation, we would make every effort to secure an
interpreter for a family. However, sometimes in an emergency situation,
when a child may be facing imminent danger or risk, it may not always be

possible to have an interpreter on the spot," she said.

      Beth McAdam, a counsellor with Silent Voices who has been offering

support to Michelle since August, said the young mother asked to
participate in various pre-natal and parenting courses, and actively
sought
help to ensure all her child's needs were met.

      "She has shown me she is a responsible mother," McAdam said.

      A family court judge is scheduled to hear the matter Tuesday and
decide if the mother should have her child back.


Diane~~
Mother's Helper.
maternity and nursing clothing and baby accessories
[log in to unmask]

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