NOWHERE TO TURN

KIDS IN CRISIS

A HOBART foster mum has exposed the woefully inadequate care options for mentally ill or drug-addicted children.

The carer, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said she cannot find help for her intellectually-disabled son who is also addicted to cannabis.

She said her case was continually thrown in the “too hard basket”, she could not see a Hobart-based psychiatrist and there were no rehab options either.

“We’re just about at the end of our tether,” she said.

WITH the deaths of two boys and a teenager struggling with addiction, the past two years for Hobart foster mother and guardian Diane* have been nothing short of “horrible”.

In the wake of her family’s grief over the deaths of two profoundly ill young boys in her care, they’re now dealing with her intellectually disabled teenage son turning into “Jekyll and Hyde” thanks to a serious cannabis addiction.

But try as she might, Diane says she just can’t get any help.

She said she’s continually thrown in the “too hard basket” by the Department of Communities and Tasmania’s health service providers.

She said her 15-year-old developed a serious dependency to cannabis while grieving for his 17-year-old brother, who had cerebral palsy and died at their Eastern Shore home a year ago.

Diane said she’d taken him to the Royal Hobart Hospital twice after he made attempts to take his life, only to be told he wasn’t suicidal, and simply sedated for his aggression and sent home the next day.

She said she couldn’t get access to a Hobart-based psychiatrist to prescribe him with the antipsychotic medication needed to wean him off illicit drugs.

And she said there was nowhere in Tasmania where she could check him in to rehab.

Diane said his behaviour had escalated to the point where earlier this week, she called the police.

“We’re just about at the end of our tether. This cannot go on,” she said.

“After upsetting all the house, tipping the furniture upside down, breaking the windows, threatening to smash my car and grabbing a knife – then turning around and saying what are we having for dinner tonight mum – he’s Jekyll and Hyde.

“He’s also taken my car a few times. Everything has to be locked up. I have to keep my car keys on me or in the safe – he’s impulsive so he might take my car, take it on the Brooker and kill someone.”

Diane said she was now trying to get her son into a Canberra rehab facility, given there were no options left for her in Hobart.

“I’ve asked and asked for help and he just seems to be in the ‘too hard basket’,” she said.

“We try to do a service for our community and you get treated like dirt by the department.”

She said with his intellectual disability, he was vulnerable to peer pressure with dangerous illicit drugs.

“He’s so vulnerable, someone is going to give him something one day (that seriously hurts him). He rang me once and said mum I feel so sick, I feel like I’m going to die. He said I don’t know what the pills are.”

Shadow Child Safety Minister Sarah Lovell told journalists the government’s response times for child protection had blown out over the past five months, with more than 100 vulnerable Tasmanian children still not allocated case workers.

“This government is failing atrisk children. It’s failing the child safety taskforce, and it has to do better,” she said.

“The government hasn’t made a commitment to employ new case workers,” Ms Lovell said.

“It’s just not good enough that children who are potentially without risk are being left without an adequate response.”

Minister for Mental Health Jeremy Rockliff said he couldn’t comment on individual cases, but said plans were in-progress following a review of the state’s Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services, with $41.2m in the 2021-22 budget to implement a range of reforms.

Mr Rockliff also said the government had recruited a new statewide speciality clinical director to lead the reforms, overseeing peri-natal mental health, out-of-home-care and youth mental health.

* Name changed to protect identity of children.

For 24-hour crisis support contact Lifeline: 13 11 14 or lifeline.org.au; Beyond Blue: 1300 22 4636 or beyondblue.org.au; Kids Helpline: 1800 55 1800 or kidshelpline.com.au; Headspace: 1800 650 890 or headspace.org.au