Parental drug addiction is when a parent abuses drugs to a point where he/she cannot do without it. As a result, it is most likely that children in such a family will note their parents' behavior. This may result in a drug-abusing habit among the children. However, at times, if a child is unwilling to abuse the drug, it may lead to the child despising a parent. Therefore, the best-believed way to deal with it is usually removing the children from home. Nevertheless, removing children from their homes has several disadvantages, both on children's and parents' sides. Herein, the paper will cover the “con” side of this dilemma.
Firstly, removing children from their homes will result in homesickness. This is a case whereby both a child and a parent will be missing each other. As a result, both will spend much of their time thinking about each other. However, on the side of the child, it may result in negative thoughts about a parent. Children will find themselves asking questions about why their parents chose to abuse drugs. It will also contribute to a child's perception of a parent valuing drugs more than them. This may eventually result in hatred between a child and a parent. The reason for hatred may not be the parent abusing drugs, but instead, a child's judgment on his/her parent valuing drugs more than them to the extent that they cannot stop the habit of drug abuse. Thus, resulting in a child being moved out from home. Also, on the parent's side, homesickness may lead to more abuse of drugs. Here, parents will feel lonely, bearing the fact that their children have been removed from home. As a result, parents will tend to abuse drugs in most of their time only because they are missing their children. Hence, it is a bad idea to remove children from their homes when a parent is abusing drugs.
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Secondly, it may lead to psychiatric disorders on a child’s side. This includes Disinhibited social engagement disorder (DSED). This is a situation that arises; let us say a child is below two years of age, is subjected to social neglect. In this case, a child will lack basic emotional necessities for comfort and affection (Parekh & Torres, 2020) . As a result, when a child is moved out from home, he/she will be taken to a relative's place or a caregiving place. A child will start engaging in inappropriate cultural behaviors with unfamiliar elder persons. This will lead to a child having problems relating to both adults and peers. Also, moving out of children may result in adjustment disorder. Parents might be willing to let children move out; however, a child may not be willing. This will lead to the forceful removal of a child from home. This situation will be stressful for a child since a child is not willing to move out. Eventually, when a child grows up, he/she may remember when he/she was forcefully removed from home (Parekh & Torres, 2020) . Thus, it will trigger the occurrence of adjustment disorder as a response to the stressful moment the child faced.
Additionally, when children are removed from home, they might begin engaging in immoral activities and also abusing drugs. In this case, a child will have in mind the notion that no one is there to watch his/her deeds. This mostly happens to children aged 6 to 15 years. A child will end up joining bad groups, either knowingly or unknowingly. However, in these groups, there might be some children who already abuse drugs. Back at home, a child will remember that his/her parents are also drug users. As a result, a child will be tempted to start abusing drugs to get to know how it also feels (Lander, Howsare, & Byrne, 2013) . In this case, the child’s engagement in drug abuse blame will lie on both the side of the parent and also on the side of being removed from home. Perhaps, a child should be left to stay with his/her parents at home (Chaplin et al., 2018). However, the parents are the ones that need to be warned about drug abuse in the eyes of their children. Thus, removing children from home may result in further drug addiction in the family, given that the child will also be abusing drugs.
Lastly, the removal of children from home may result in fading up of the child-parent relationship. When children are less than three years old, it will be straightforward for them to forget about their birth parents when they are removed from home. As a result, parental addiction should be addressed from a different perspective rather than removing children from home. A different perspective may be advantageous to a child and a parent since they will both have time for each other, thus, strengthening the family bond. Also, the fading up of parental relationships in grown-up children may result in a lack of proper guidance. For instance, a child will feel like there is no parent close to him/her. As a result, this type of children will do what they think pleases them the most, even if it is an immoral deed. In most cases, it will result in a child being violent and aggressive in school (Debatewise, 2019). Hence, children should remain in their homes despite parental drug addiction to prevent aggressiveness and violence.
Conclusively, despite the belief that removing children from their homes due to parental drug addiction may be advantageous, it also has disadvantages. As a result, before deciding on what to do, it is always essential to evaluate the possible ramifications of a decision made. A choice that should be made in this case is one that will have advantages on both the child's and parent's side. Thus, removing children from home should not be given an upper hand since it has several disadvantages.
References
Lack of Parental Guidance Is Mainly Responsible for Children Being Violent and Aggressive in School . (2019, November 21). Retrieved from DEBATEWISE: https://debatewise.org/debates/lack-parental-guidance-responsible-children-violent/
Lander, L., Howsare, J., & Byrne, M. (2013, July 27). The Impact of Substance Use Disorders on Families and Children: From Theory to Practice. Soc Work Public Health , 194-205. doi:10.1080/19371918.2013.759005
Parekh, R., & Torres, F. (2020, January). What Is Posttraumatic Stress Disorder? Retrieved from AMERICAN PSYCHIATRIC ASSOCIATION: https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/ptsd/what-is-ptsd
Chaplin, T. M., Turpyn, C. C., Fischer, S., Martelli, A. M., Ross, C. E., Leichtweis, R. N., ... & Sinha, R. (2018). Parenting-focused mindfulness intervention reduces stress and improves parenting in highly stressed mothers of adolescents. Mindfulness , 1-13.
