Opinion ID: 2382887
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Physical, Mental and Emotional Health of All Involved.

Text: The testimony established, and the trial judge found, that L.W. is a special needs child. She has been hospitalized for asthma as an inpatient twelve to fourteen times and treated as an outpatient approximately twenty-five times. I.Q. testing places her at the lower end of the borderline range of intelligence, and [L.W.] will require special education throughout her school career. She is also receiving speech therapy and occupational therapy. Caring for her is obviously a challenging task. The evidence at the hearing established that the adoptive parents are well qualified to provide L.W. with the care and supervision which she needs. According to Dr. Van Ost, neither parent suffers from any personality disorder. They have successfully raised a hyperactive biological son of their own; he is now married and gainfully employed. The trial judge found that petitioners are very experienced in caring for children and, after five years with L.W., are comfortable and skilled in caring for her physical, mental, and emotional needs. We discern no reason to question that finding. The biological father's mental health is far more problematical. According to his own expert witness, Dr. Feigenbaum, the father suffers from a brain dysfunction, albeit a minimal one. His conduct and perception of reality have been erratic. A psychological test which was administered to the father resulted in his classification as having a combination of a depressive personality disorder and obsessive personality disorder and a schizoid personality disorder, and that's not quite schizophrenia. [17] The father's own expert also acknowledged that he found the father rigid and inflexible, Pollyannish, grandiose, [18] and deficient in impulse control. Dr. Feigenbaum was of the opinion that, in spite of these problems, the biological father could be educated to address L.W.'s needs. He acknowledged, however, that it would not be a breeze to teach him these tasks, and that to be educated about what would be required to treat a need that [L.W.] would have, he would first have to be accepting of the idea that she actually had the need. The trial judge found that the father was not accepting in this regard: F.W. may have the ability to be an adequate parent to some other child, but he is not a fit parent for this particular child because he denies the existence of her physical and educational limitations. Given his attitude, the Court cannot expect him promptly to recognize an asthma attack by the way she is breathing and take her to the hospital emergency room for care. His denial of her special medical and educational needs, his tendency to procrastinate and think that everything will be all right, and his own need for a consistent daily routine make him inadequate to meet L.W.'s mental, emotional and physical needs. [19]