The Washington Post - USA (2020-10-20)

C2 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.TUESDAY, OCTOBER 20 , 2020

ACROSS

1 Play divisions

5 Citrus coolers

9 Caroline, to

Bobby Kennedy

14 Site of many a

college party

15 Vatican leader

16 Garden

trimming

gadget

17 Singer __ Amos

18 Stuffed shirt

19 Pastry with tea

20 Bach mini

comic opera

about a

beverage

addiction

23 Pillow filler

24 Anthem

contraction

25 Modern car

receivers

33 Letter-shaped

plumbing trap

34 Shade tree

35 Layer on

a stagnant

pond

36 Opp. of

56-Down

37 Secretly

41 Denver-to-

Chicago dir.

42 Beginning on

44 Hide-hair

connector

45 German camera

47 He played the

interviewer in

“Interview With

the Vampire”

51 Ye llowfin tuna

52 Very often

53 Last parting, or

what can liter-

ally be found

in 20-, 25- and

47-Across

59 Liberty Bell flaw

60 Artificial bait

61 “The First __”:

holiday song

63 “Voices Carry”

co-songwriter

Mann

64 Perched on

65 Impulse

66 Models strike

them

67 Acknowledges

applause

68 Mexican

bread?

DOWN

1 Back on board

2 Gator’s cousin

3 Poi source

4 React to an

insult, maybe

5 Legal challenge

6 Scale starters

7 Grand-scale

production

8 Genesis

creator

9 Snapple rival

10 They’re often

swiped at work

11 Entertainment

awards

acronym

12 Wrestler John

13 Prior to, in

poems

21 To sses in one’s

cards

22 Expected

outcomes

25 The “poison”

type contains

the skin irritant

urushiol

26 Disconcert

27 Pavarotti,

for one

28 Earth, to Cato

29 “Xanadu”

rock gp.

30 Seal the deal

31 Prevention

measure?

32 Makeup

streak

38 “Open __

9 p.m.”: store

sign

39 Avril Lavigne’s

“Sk8er __”

40 Give permission

43 Bride-to-be

46 Wiped out by

excess costs,

as profits

48 Burger joint

drinks

49 Limited in

scope

50 Grabs some

shuteye

53 Cold, in Cádiz

54 Brand with a

paw print in its

logo

55 Love handles,

so to speak

56 Works-by-itself

setting

57 Old stories

58 Relay race

segments

59 Spending limit

62 Sign of summer

LA TIMES CROSSWORD By Roland Huget

MONDAY’S LA TIMES SOLUTION

© 2020 Tribune Content Agency, LLC. 10/20/20

per week.

Neal is the worrying type, and

in the quiet vacuum of calls, she

began to fear for the families she

had already encountered. Not just

the children, but also the parents

who had worked so hard to get

sober or get a job, to get into a

stable, livable home so they could

regain custody of their kids. Now

the substance abuse programs

were closed and the jobs were

vanishing. The supports that

boosted those families to above

the water line were buckling.

Then Neal started thinking

about the children she hadn’t

met. The ones for whom school is

a safe harbor — where they don’t

fear being hurt, and where teach-

ers might notice a bruise or a head

hung low and think to ask if

everything is okay at home. Edu-

cators are the leading source of

reporting calls to child protective

services agencies across the coun-

try. Like doctors and day-care

workers, they are mandated to

report abuse or neglect if they

suspect it’s happening.

But now teachers weren’t see-

ing those kids, and kids couldn’t

confide in those teachers, and

Neal’s phone wasn’t ringing. She

knew that there were still floors

with broken glass, babies with

broken bones, kids getting hit and

going hungry. She knew it was

happening, but she didn’t know

enough to help.

“The ones we don’t know

about” are the cases that worry

her the most, she says.

“And we may never know. At

least until this is over.”

N

eal, 32, knows what a lot of

people think of child protec-

tive services, or CPS, work-

ers. She grew up hearing it: “Peo-

ple called them kidnappers.”

She also knows the impact a

social worker can make on an-

other person’s life. Like the im-

pact one social worker made on

hers.

Neal got pregnant at 14. She

found out during the week of her

freshman orientation for high

school. Her parents insisted Neal

take full responsibility for her

INVESTIGATOR FROM C1 child. Once her daughter, Hailey,

was born, Neal would bring her

along on babysitting gigs so she

could earn money for diapers and

formula. Hailey went to a day-

care center at the school, and Neal

was forced to enroll in a child

development program for teen

moms.

The class was led by Maria

Sutka, a school social worker

whom Neal still thinks of as an

angel. Neal would confide in Sut-

ka about mean comments from

peers, struggles with her parents,

fears that she was failing Hailey.

“She didn’t judge you. She didn’t

make you feel less-than,” Neal

says in a phone interview. “You

could come to her saying some-

thing horrific, you know, and she

would always try to turn it into a

positive situation. ‘What can we

do to make this better?’ ”

After 10 years of part-time

work and part-time school, Neal

became the first in her family to

graduate from college and ap-

plied to work for the CPS office in

Monroe County, 45 minutes south

of Detroit, hoping she could be

the one to ask others: “What can

we do to make this better?”

For 2^1 / 2 years she tried to do that

every day. Then came the corona-

virus. She was told to work re-

motely — only a few investigators

from her office were still making

home visits. Finally, in July, Neal

was issued protective gear and

cleared to go back out into the

field.

“There was so much depres-

sion,” she says. “I had some fami-

lies that were just barely hanging

on.”

The cases she sees now are

often severe — situations that

have spiraled so out of control

that neighbors or relatives call to

report them. Small children left

home alone for hours. Kids with

special needs wandering the

streets. Parents overdosing or

pulling weapons on each other.

Babies born with drugs in their

system.

One pattern that has jumped

out: “A lot of parents sleeping all

day. A lot of kids were struggling

with that. You knock on the door

and the little one answers,” she

says. No job for the parents, no

school for the kids, no need for

bedtimes or alarm clocks.

“There’s no structure.... And I

think the scary part is the kids

were accepting that and thinking

it was normal.”

The parents were starting to

think it was normal, too: “A lot of

the parents felt defeated and

didn’t know what tomorrow

holds. Everyone lost their jobs.

You ask, ‘What’s your source of

income?’ Everybody says, ‘Unem-

ployed.’ ‘Unemployed.’ ‘Unem-

ployed.’ Then you say, ‘Do you

have any idea when you go back to

work?’

“No.”

I

n normal times, when she was

assigned a new case, Neal’s

first stop was usually the

school. She’d show her I.D. at the

front office and ask to speak to the

child in question in a private

room.

Neal would tell the child who

she was, that she spoke to lots of

kids for her job and that it was her

turn to talk to them. She’d ask

what they liked doing in school or

what they had eaten for dinner

last night, trying to build a rap-

port. Then she would ask open-

ended questions to try to find out

if the child was in any danger.

When she left, she’d follow up

with the parents.

Once the pandemic hit, there

was no more school or private

rooms. Neal has no choice but to

show up at the child’s home. And

she understands that she is not a

welcome visitor.

“Interviewing the child in the

house is much harder. Because

you can see they feel uncomfort-

able. You can see that they don’t

want to say anything that is bad

about Mom or Dad. You can see

they are hesitant about telling

you things because they may get

in trouble,” she says. Neal usually

tries to take children outside to

talk, but the gaze of prying neigh-

bors can be just as disturbing. “So

you’re unable to get a clear under-

standing of what’s happening in

the house.”

Neal is married with a 2-year-

old son in addition to Hailey, who

is now 18. When she’s assigned a

new case, she goes into mama-

bear mode. But she knows that

most of the time, the parents

involved need her help as much as

the kids.

“As a young parent, I under-

stand what it’s like to be flustered.

I understand what it was like to

not know why my baby was cry-

ing. But I also had a parent who

told me to ‘put that baby in a crib

and walk away,’ ” she says. “But if

you’re in a homeless shelter and

your baby’s crying and everyone

is staring at you because you can’t

make your baby quiet... or you’re

living in a hotel room and you’re

worried about getting kicked out,

I can see how people get flustered

to the point of making a decision

that is wrong. I can see how that

comes about.” A wailing baby is

shaken, a newly sober parent

picks up a needle, a terrible choice

is made in a moment of crisis.

A mentor advised Neal never to

tell people she’s working with that

she understands what they’re go-

ing through. “Because you don’t.

You have no idea what it’s like

unless you’re in their shoes. You

don’t know what it’s like to have

substance abuse issues. You don’t

know what it’s like to live in

poverty,” she says. “I thought I had

it hard. I had a walk in the park

compared to these people.”

O

ver the summer, Neal was

called to investigate a re-

port of neglect. She showed

up at 8 a.m. and a 6-year-old

answered the door, trailed by two

younger siblings. An hour later,

their mother showed up on a bike.

The only job she had been able to

find was one working at night,

when her children were mostly

asleep.

“She was busting her butt, rid-

ing back and forth,” Neal says.

“Doing everything she could.”

The woman had no family help,

no support, no child care. She was

defensive with Neal, scared that

her children could be taken away.

But Neal and her colleagues were

able to get the kids into a free day

care and persuade the mother’s

employer to switch her to day

shifts.

Those are the cases that keep

Neal going — when she’s certain

she’s made life easier for a family.

“I just feel like I’ve accomplished

something,” she says.

But for every moment Neal

feels that sense of accomplish-

ment, there are two when she

wonders what she could have

done better. “With this job, my

decisions affect somebody’s life.

And I don’t take that lightly.”

With so many resources still

unavailable because of pandemic-

related closures, Neal is second-

guessing herself more than ever.

She’ll lie awake at night wonder-

ing about a parent she suspected

of drug use but couldn’t get tested

because testing centers are shut

down.

“Am I going to get a complaint

the next day that this person is

overdosed?” she wonders. “I’m

really worried about the kids —

what they were doing. Are they

going to obtain any of [the

drugs]? And when everybody’s

trapped in a household, tempers

flare up. What are the kids going

to see?”

In addition to everything else,

Neal is missing her commute

home from the office these days.

It gave her time to process the

trauma of what she had seen and

heard. Now she comes straight

home, feeling gutted. She hugs

her children, thanks God that

they’re safe and that they were

born to her. For a few hours she’ll

attend to their needs, and then,

once they’re asleep, Neal’s mind

returns to the others.

The ones she’s seen. And the

ones she hasn’t.

[email protected]

Concerns over child abuse cases ‘we don’t know about’

ALI LAPETINA FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

Amanda Neal knows firsthand the impact social workers can have

on a person’s life and worries about kids not getting help recently.

Adapted from an

online discussion.

Dear Carolyn:

Am I aunting

badly? I’m in my

early 60s, never

married and

child-free by

choice. I am,

however, blessed with a cluster

of nieces, nephews and

godchildren I adore — 13 in all.

Over the decades I’ve stepped up

when there were practical

considerations — money for a

special school, a place for a

teenager to bunk for a couple of

weeks while she sorted out that

her parents weren’t really

monsters, that sort of thing —

and I’ve always made it a

priority to attend graduations,

special dance recitals, sporting

events and the like.

Taking the kids on fun

getaways has long been my

thing. It gives me one-on-one

time with the particular kid, and

both of us have a great

adventure. Think trips to Spain

and Greece, San Francisco and

Jackson Hole, swimming with

dolphins, a safari. I get to

holidays in the general time

frame and take the family out for

dinner to mark the occasion.

These are joyous times for me.

For a niece’s 16th birthday

recently [pre-covid], I flew her to

meet me in New York City for

Broadway shows, restaurants

and shopping. Afterward, my

sister-in-law was noticeably cool

toward me. When I asked what

the matter was, she snapped that

it would be nice if, once in a

while, I could be bothered to get

her kids a present.

I am angry and shattered. I’ve

always thought being present for

them was the present! Since this

happened, the kids still seem to

want to spend time with me, but

I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve

been a pest all these years,

forcing myself on the kids when

they’d rather have another... I

don’t even know. Hockey stick?

Designer hoodie?

And I’m furious with my

sister-in-law for being so shallow

that she thinks something

wrapped with a bow could ever

compete with time and laughter

and a wonderful experience. The

kids call me “Mame,” and I have

always taken it as a compliment,

but now I wonder if it’s a joke

I’m not in on.

— Deflated

Deflated: Oh this breaks my

heart.

I know there’s probably a

much longer, more thorough,

more uplifting answer to be

written, but I hope I can get the

most accomplished with this:

Your sister-in-law is a butt.

Her being one is not a reason

to rethink your entire self.

You take these kids to Europe!

I want to be your niece.

In fairness, maybe your sister-

in-law was having the worst day

ever and her filter slipped for

just that one moment, just as she

was overtaken by an

overwhelming but fleeting

impulse to be a butt.

Pardon me: to act like one.

In fact, I suggest you assume

that’s why it happened, and keep

being yourself unimpeded, as

best you can, by the self-doubt

her outburst stirred up.

Re: Deflated: Speaking from

unfortunate experience as the

bad actor, perhaps your sister-in-

law felt a momentary twang of

jealousy that you’re the cool,

adventurous auntie. She may

feel like the reliable but boring

cook/therapist/maid/wage-

earner who barely has the

energy to think up the next

meal, much less a grand

adventure.

— Anonymous

Anonymous: Great and

compassionate point. The I-did-

this-bad-thing-myself

perspective is, in my opinion, the

rarest and most useful of all.

And brave. Thanks.

Write to Carolyn Hax at

[email protected]. Get her

column delivered to your inbox each

morning at wapo.st/haxpost.

 Join the discussion live at noon

Fridays at live.washingtonpost.com

Aunt misbehaving on Broadway? Nope.

Carolyn

Hax

NICK GALIFIANAKIS FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

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