My husband is giving up on our 7 year old daughter.

Thank you so much, once again. And yes, I do have hope that my DDs’ relationship will improve as adults.

I’m very glad it’s improved for you and your 2 sisters and that you’re close now. Sadly, my DSis and I were estranged from our DB because of our past, there’s just too much water under the bridge. (My DM keeps trying to change this.)

Sibling relationships can be restored, but not always sadly.

Please don't think you are responsible, you were a victim too, over the years I have seen you strive for the girls, putting their needs first, you're a very intuitive mother, from your experiences. 💐

I'm glad they're doing well. Their relationship might grow as adults with the distance now, none of us know what the future holds, we can only do our best, you're only one person splitting yourself in 4.

It's sad when siblings are overlooked by a needy DC. There is nothing you can do. My Dsis hated me and our youngest Dsis, growing up, we're all very close now, she was overlooked.

Now it is time to look after you. Be kind to yourself.

well they weren't excluded and are now happy sucessful adults. So just stop with your whatabouterty

@EmeraldShamrock000 thank you for your kind words. Yes, it’s been traumatic, and I have to accept a lot of the responsibility, as my mental health has been poor because of my traumatic past. Plus, my DH and I didn’t see how much DD2 was struggling; we could tell that she had anxiety but she seemed to be coping. Until she stopped coping.

At the end of the day, we were so focused on DD1’s needs that we lost sight of how much DD2 was suffering.

Thankfully, she’s doing a lot better with my DSis and her family. DD1 is doing well at her specialist college. So things are better for both of them, but the relationship between them is non-existent now, which is desperately sad considering the fact that they’re birth siblings and we adopted DD2 so that they could grow up together.

I think abandoning their sibling based on the sex of the baby is abusing their emotional wellbeing and showing them that they might be excluded from her lifetime one day, if they cause their DM displeasure.
"Sorry kiddos, it was another girl/boy left it behind at the hospital". 😅
Perfectly normal.👌

@LizzieW1969 I'm sorry to hear that things have reached crisis point. I know that you have been working hard for a long time to help your Daughters. It's very traumatic.
I hope you are doing okay.

This isn’t to say that I don’t have the utmost empathy with families with disabled children who are being pushed to breaking point. I’ve been there. Our family has been torn apart by DD1’s behaviour and additional needs.

Our relationship with DD2 (13) has been completely destroyed, and she’s now living with my DSis and her family, because from her POV we didn’t keep her safe from DD1. Now that she’s away from here, she’s saying that she was always very afraid of her.

So I very much agree that families of disabled children are left very isolated. But what’s needed is more support from the various agencies so they’re not pushed to breaking point. Things would very likely have been very different for our family if we’d had the necessary support.

Anyway, the bottom line is that giving up a baby for adoption has never been a crime, whatever the reasons, although obviously very much frowned upon these days. Whereas abandoning a disabled child in the SS office or at a hospital very much is, it’s child abandonment.

In those circumstances, there absolutely would be an SS investigation into the welfare of all the children in the family.

Her older kids were not abused They were loved and cared for . Don't know why you are even suggesting she's abusing her kids. I know these kids They are verywell brought up.

Plenty of abusive unloving parents keep an immaculate home, tidy DC, it places a shield over abuse.

It's still not ok even if it's a relative that's done it.

Social services probably just decided it was no different than a family splitting up and deciding custody if the father decided to step up and take care of the child.

This isn't comparable to abandoning a disabled child as you're suggesting be done.

It was a close relative of mine actually not a " friend " in quotation marks. And yeah she did get visits from SS but they didn't take the other kids away. She still has the other 3

So why would it be a lie. The child's father took it in the end and brought her up but the mother was not forced to keep the kid.

And if there is no way of looking after all these kids with issues why would SS be taking 3 loved and cared for ones out of an immaculate home who are being well cared for to have to deal with them

Yeah, I don’t believe that happened, sorry.

It is possible someone had a severe case of post natal depression triggered by a baby not being the sex they expected / wanted but there is no way someone just said ‘I’m leaving this baby here, someone else can have him / her; bye.’ No way.

It's really not, I'm surprised your "friend" didn't have a visit from social services to protect her other children from someone who puts themselves before a newborn or their other DC.
How did "friend" explain the situation to the other DC?
Sounds like a porky lie.

It’s not.

I don't get why it's ok to refuse to take a newborn home simply because it's thewrong sex yet be expected to keep a child with disabilities you can't cope with.

It’s not a crime to give a baby up for adoption. My youngest DNephew was given up for adoption by his birth mum, because she was a single mum with older children with additional needs. (He was adopted by my DSis and DBIL.)

But you can be charged with child abandonment for dumping existing children years later in the SS office or a hospital.

Refusing to take your newborn home is not the same as abandoning children you already have because you can’t cope with the disability.

You win the thread for the most ridiculous comment. This is a family in crisis. Put your dislike of men to one side and actually read what OP is saying. To suggest that he’s using a disabled child as an excuse for having an affair is disgusting in the extreme.

So I see But it will lead to people wanting to off load problem kids if they don't get support. As as I pointed out earlier a family member refused to take her newborn home from hospital. SS didn't remove the other 3 kids from her and she was never forced to take the baby back

There are parents all over the country in the same situation. You seem to think a placement outside the home is some sort of magic solution that can just be conjured up, when the reality is that it’s horribly difficult to find placements for children with severe behavioural problems, and many are passed from pillar to post once in the system when their behaviour becomes too much and affects others in the placement facility. The fact is, some parents are left to get on with it in conditions that some here would find unimaginable, and abandoning your child is not an option.

This. So many posters commenting with absolutely no idea of what families like this are facing and how hard support services are to access.

Please don’t advise someone that the way forward with this kind of situation is to parent alone. The father wouldn’t be considered a threat to the child for this kind of comment unless there were other behaviours to support that. The risk assessment is factual, objective and free of the emotion so evident here. The main aim of the authorities and agencies involved with families who have reached the kinds of crisis points OP is clearly experiencing, it to keep the family together wherever possible. Where families split the inevitable result in many cases is that one parent is left with the caring duties and the child often ends up in care when they can no longer cope.

Children under the age of fifteen are not supposed to be put in these placements, but realistically it does happen where there’s no alternatives. Those who haven’t been involved with families who are trying to cope with these types of disabilities have no idea how little resource there is in many areas, and how difficult support is to access.

The thing is, the system pushes you to the bloody limit, ehcps, tribunals, inappropriate schooling, teachers with little to no training in special needs, (gone on for years so senior management haven't a clue either) benefits are often refused by default despite the masses of evidence. The culture of parent blaming for kids, especially ADHD etc are seen as poor parenting for years, unless you are very lucky (and white middle class, married, neuro typical, none disabled) The lack of funding in services doesn't help. Overworked people lose the ability to give a shit. Schools don't follow the law.