FREDERICTON, N.B. – The province of New Brunswick will take time Saturday to honour children and youth growing up in the care of the province.
Like Katherine Adams.
“I found her downstairs beating her head off the door, her eyes were frothing and she was frothing at the mouth, and it was a really disturbing image. I didn’t know what to think.”
That’s because Adams was only 13 years old at the time. She was watching her mother overdose on Tylenol.
“I managed to drag her into the living room and I let her lie on the cushions on the middle of the floor, and I didn’t know what to do so I called my uncle.”
Mental and physical health issues plagued Adams’ mother. She never lived with her mother again after that. As she put it, she was “free.”
“Looking back on it I think, ‘Wow, that was the day I got out of that house.'”
The province has proclaimed November 29 as ‘Children and Youth in Care Day.’
It’s meant to recognize the accomplishments and needs of children growing up in the system, like Adams.
“‘Youth in care,'” said Norman Bossé, the province’s child and youth advocate. “It means in the province of New Brunswick, whether they’re foster children or guardianship orders have been issued, they’re under the care of the province and really the province is standing in the place of their parents.
“It’s important to recognize that they’re should be no negative attachments to that.”
According to the province, there are about 1,000 youth in care within New Brunswick.
Proclaiming a day is one thing, but Adams says what these children need is someone they can trust.
“I had two social workers come by throughout my life and my mother’s sitting in front of me with a scary look on her face, like, ‘If you say anything you’re done.’ And all I’m thinking is ‘Okay, I have to live with her when you leave, so I’m not going to say anything,'” she said.
“There needs to be a way that children can tell the truth.”
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