I can’t help but stare at the picture of this family swept out to sea. I know what it is like to attempt to parent children from “hard backgrounds.”

And yes, I have often tried to assuage my deep grief about the damage caused by my adopted children by telling myself that we have survived (so far).

None of this is fun to talk about, but I did talk–sometimes unsparingly, because I hoped that if people heard our story they could do something to prevent tragedies like ours.

More than the average mama, I can put myself in the shoes of these mamas, and I have two things to thing to say–

• Why weren’t the children removed from the custody of the Harts in 2011 when there was a child abuse conviction?
• And when a mother chooses to murder her children all the rosy adjectives no longer apply.

Just: a story of the lost and found https://www.amazon.com/dp/1468123459/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_JPNWAbDZT3TR5