NH DCYF director says some cases are hard to forget

The heroin epidemic is posing a new challenge to the New Hampshire Division of Children, Youth and Families, and sometimes the cases are hard to forget.

One case in particular stays with Director Lorraine Bartlett the most.

On a Friday in 2015, employees did significant sleep safety training with the parents of a newborn. They went over nursing, had the parents show them the crib, and told them not to take the baby in the bed with them.

The dad told DCYF he wasn't using and the mom was on methadone maintenance. That weekend, Super Bowl Sunday of 2015, they went to friends' homes. Dad was intoxicated, said Bartlett, and mom decided to use. Bartlett said she took the baby to bed with her.

"When dad went to check on them later that night, the baby was dead. It was two weeks old," said Bartlett.

She said it's these type of situations that wear on her staff.

"You come back and ask yourself, 'what else could I have done'? There really was nothing else you could have done," said Bartlett.

Bartlett said they have no control over the actual decisions parents make other than the training and engagement they do with the parents.

"We do the best we can every single day," she said.

For more on the heroin epidemic and the challenges it poses to NH DCYF, watch FOX25 News at 10. 

Cox Media Group