NOTE: THIS WAS PUBLISHED ORIGINALLY IN BINAH MAGAZINE'S COLUMN THERAPY: A SNEAK PEEK INSIDE

It is a therapist's worst nightmare.

Mine, at least.

The night before I begin therapy with a client under eighteen, I do not sleep that well.

It is the specter of fear in having to report abuse to child protective services.

Parents, teachers and principals call me to take on their teenager or student as a client. The kid is acting out in all sorts of ways. Rebellious, angry, troublesome. Or withdrawn, depressed, disheveled. And these parents, teachers and principals are worried. “Do something,” they tell me. “Make her better.” Or, “Find the daughter that I used to know. Bring back the student she used to be.”

They tell me their worst fears. “But whatever you do, don't do what Therapist X did last year. You know, because of her, the children were taken out of the ZZZZZ family! Because of Therapist Z, the YYYY teenager left home. Make sure that doesn't happen here, Mindy.”

They want me to promise. And I wish I could.

But I can't.

Here is the truth: People think that Child Protective Services grabs children out of their homes, dumping them in foster care for the slightest pretense. Yeah, right.

I used to work in an agency. Often, my clients were referred to our agency by Child Protective Services (CPS) because of some sort of abuse that had occurred in their home. For the most part, these children remained at home, under supervision of CPS, who left the child in the home, but came into the house to mandate services like therapy and demand of parents to clean out the mold in the refrigerator, make sure the child has adequate food each day and attends school.

A far cry from the snatch and kidnap vision we have of CPS.

A number of times, the director of my agency, after listening to me describe a home situation that concerned me, asked me to call CPS. For those of you who are not aware, there is an option I often exercised that entails calling CPS anonymously, presenting the case in question and asking if this described situation warrants CPS intervention. If yes, as a mandated reporter, I would be required to make a report. If no, then I would obtain the name of the representative I was talking to, the date and time of our conversation, and record in the client's chart the content of our conversation, including the representative's assessment that at this case does not warrant protective services at this time.

In all the years that I have been working as a social worker, I felt disturbed enough to call this anonymous line a handful of times. In all the years, Child Protective Services had always denied me grounds for a mandated report.

What is my point in sharing this with you?

To let you know that when a therapist calls Child Protective Services, and they come in to take away the children, there is a very strong reason that this has occurred!

Yes, it may have happened to the nicest family on your block; yes, you may think that a terrible travesty of justice has occurred; but it will not change one unalterable, inescapable fact: something terrible is suspected and there is adequate grounds for suspicion and the therapist had no choice but to either save the child and potentially destroy herself or to stay silent to protect herself and potentially destroy the child.

It's a horrible choice. It's a no-win legal and moral choice.

But therapists, along with doctors, police officers, licensed teachers and other providers, paid or volunteer, in health care settings, are legally mandated reporters. And mandated reporters who fail to report suspected abuse, or suspicion of the possibility of substantial risk of harm to a child, can face a conviction of a Class A misdemeanor which carries a sentence of up to one year in jail and/or a $1,000 fine, including being additionally sued for monetary damages for harm caused by failure to report, and possible revocation of his practicing license if a complaint is filed to the licensing board.

Whew.

And those of you outside the professional field think this kind of report happens randomly or indiscriminately.

Those of you outside of this field react with horror and disbelief at the actions of an agency or therapist who became a mandated reporter — not because the therapist loves talking on the phone — but because something terrible may have occurred or continues to occur to the child in her care!

I would challenge you to stop a minute and think if any therapist in our communities would be crazy enough to risk the wrath of the community, even her own family members, to risk her parnassah or her standing in the community, to risk being literally run out of town, to make this report if she would not be absolutely sure that it is a matter of life and death either/or physically, emotionally or mentally for her client.

Do you think she is that crazy?

I am definitely not.

And that is why, although ultimately I must make the final decision whether or not I am mandated to legally report, although ultimately I must bear the burden of such a report should it have to be made, I would not make such a move without speaking to a rav who is connected to the child's school, family or greater community.

I have never had to make such a report yet, and I daven that no child should be in that situation that would force me to need to make that call.

But when you hear of a therapist who did make that call, of a child who left home, do me a favor: Instead of raging at the therapist who made the call the protect the child, why not steer your anger at the people in the child's life who have either failed to protect — or have harmed — that child?

(As of today, I have an unpublished number, disconnected email addresses, and have moved to an undisclosed location in the Witness Protection program, and so if you are out to get me, you will find me safe under my covers!)

My book, Therapy, Shmerapy, can be found in bookstores or online