Saturday, March 15, 2014
HBO Documentary: Paycheck to Paycheck Adoption Movie Review
HBO’s documentary, Paycheck to Paycheck: The Life and Times
of Katrina Gilbert, debuts this Monday. According to the film, Katrina is one
of 13 million mothers of young children living in or near poverty. Katrina is a
twenty-something mother of three children. She recently separated from her
husband because of his addiction to pain killers. She is the sole breadwinner
for her family, and works as a Certified Nursing Assistant for just under $9.50
an hour. Even with government support – food stamps and reduced-cost daycare,
Katrina finds it hard to make ends meet; thankfully, her landlord accepts
monthly payments. Katrina is motivated to improve her situation; she tries to
find companionship, and also tries to enroll herself into college, but struggles
accessing financial aid. Katrina has a lot of courage, but faces intimidating
obstacles.
How is This Relevant
to Foster Care?
Many kids who enter foster care are removed from
single-parent homes. Also, many kids who enter foster care come from low-income
families. Katrina works very diligently to keep her family functioning, and she
succeeds. What strikes me in this film, though, is how little room for error
she has. She is often only a few days of missed work away from failing to make
her rent, she has limited or no resources for emergencies, minimal time to
rest, and frequent involvement with government contractors (daycare providers,
etc.). When kids are taken into foster care on charges of neglect – I wonder
how many times neglect has actually occurred, and how many times a family like
Katrina’s has simply been unable to come close enough to societal norms to
avoid being noticed by the child protective services system.
Admittedly, this might not be a fair question. Child
protective services departments are able to offer family preservation services,
and in theory (hopefully in practice), this avoids removing children from their
homes. Once the system is involved, though, the margin of error can become very
small.
Strong Points
This
documentary portrays Katrina as a young, responsible woman facing challenges
with a mixture of hope and discouragement. It normalizes and humanizes an
experience of life which might be unfamiliar to some folks considering foster
care.
Recommendation
Paycheck
to Paycheck isn’t a movie about foster care. It doesn’t even get mentioned. But
– if you’re reading this review, you’ve probably got some interest in foster
care, and I think this documentary would be worth seeing. It’s a good choice
for current or prospective foster parents, who might be helped by understanding
the challenges faced by single, low-income parents.
Questions for Discussion after the movie
What
were the circumstances surrounding how your children came to be in foster care,
or placed for adoption? What is the
backstory of those circumstances?
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