Previous child protection

[Davies0121]

3 years ago, myself and my partner had a very silly drunken fight which resulted in our child going on a child protection plan.
We worked with them and complied with everything, 6 months later case closed.

We are now pregnant again and worrying if anything will happen?
We obviously are aware we will have to inform the midwife of it (highly embarrassing for us and very daunting) but worried what will happen next.
We have never had an incident since and never would. Was a very silly mistake and lesson very much so learnt.

Any help or advice from similar situations would be very grateful

I think she will make a referral to social care and they will look at what happened last time and make a decision if they need to become involved again based on the history and your current situation and if there are any new worries.

Ps when you tell the midwife I wouldn't say it was a silly mistake as it sounds like you are minimising what happened and I am sure that isn't what you mean to do.

If it was a one off with no other reported incidents since then nothing will happen. Don’t worry, relax and enjoy your pregnancy.

If it was a one off incident they will have to look into it but it will be returned as a closed case and nothing more said/done.
Open and honest os the best way to be.
Enjoy the pregnancy ☺️

I've had something similar. Ss was still involved but wrapping things up to close the case. Told midwive at booking appointment. Ss rang me up later to say congrats and that was it. They will have a relook and see if yous need any help.

Are you sure you went on a child protection plan? Child protection plan would indicate it was more than a silly argument so if it was a child protection plan don’t down play it’s seriousness.

However I’d check what it was before you tell the MW, ie child in need plan (CIN) early help, etc

I also wouldn’t have any concerns unless a new born baby was a trigger factor last time to the arguement? Just be open and honest

Replying as a whole as I don’t know how these threads work.

It was definitely a child protection plan, there was an awful lot of inconsistencies in the case which lead to our social worker being sacked. Child protection was needed as the said child was present in the room.
It wasn’t ‘silly’ back 3 years ago, was a very agressive fight. We can see it as silly now as everything was heightened at the time under the influence of alcohol and it did get out of hand. We would never dream of behaving in that way or even let history repeat itself.
I have no issues with social phoning/visiting as it was a complete one off, the whole meeting board had agreed that this was the case too as neither have ever been arrested etc before. Not known to the police prior to this at all. I just have a a lot of anxieties surrounding the way the social worker was with us, very unprofessional and manipulative. We had a fantastic solicitor too after being told we did not need one 😬

I think it's worrying that you describe it as a 'silly argument' that was also an aggressive fight that was in front of your child. You are totally minimising the huge impact that this would have had on your poor child who had to witness this event.

In fairness, nobody but op knows the details here so we don’t know what ‘impact’ this would have had on the DC, if any at all!
If everything is as you have described op then I’d say be honest with midwife and then relax and enjoy your pregnancy.

An aggressive fight in front of the child WILL have an impact. That is a fact. Domestic abuse impacts on babies in the womb. A small child would be terrified to see parents fighting in the same room and also could have been directly physically harmed hence the child protection plan.

I haven’t once said it was a ‘silly arguement’
It was serious at the time, however 3.5 years later we have acknowledged it was a ‘silly fight’ something we would never even argument about now let alone fight.

Further risk of emotional harm was the reasoning for the child protection.

Future risk*

How did the police and social services get involved? Children witnessing violence and aggressive arguments does impact them. The two people you love and trust the most in the world beating the shit out of each other, what could be scarier to a little one?

We are aware of the impacts it has on children.
They were alerted because the police were phoned? They then contacted children’s services. A month later we went to conference, child protection was put in place. We did everything they asked. After 6 months said child was off the plan and case was closed.

I’ll add, at the time the little one was 16 weeks old.

I suspect as it all started when you had a young baby then they will be more concerned about the impact of another baby.

Young babies are affected by domestic abuse.

I think most of you have missed the point here?
We are fully aware of the impacts it has etc. We sat through 6 gruelling months of it.
We would never ever have a repeat of that incident. It’s not in our nature at all. It was a mistake we made years ago under the influence of alcohol. Social services and every other party involved acknowledged it was a mistake that would never be repeated.
The point of the post was to know what to expect at our appointment not get a third degree on things we already know and have over come.

They will make a referral to social care because of previous child protection plan. Their safeguarding team will make a decision whether the issue is resolved, or whether you would benefit from a new assessment as a family. If you can show the steps you've made to make sure this wouldn't happen again, then even if there is a new assessment it should be closed, although if they are still unhappy they could do a new meeting to decide if the new baby needs to be subject to a child in need or child protection plan. I doubt it would get beyond family assessment stage if you are no longer drinking and this was a single incident. They may be concerned enough to continue the process if there is still aggression or alcohol in the relationship.

The midwife won't necessarily refer to social care.

What will likely happen is that the midwife will take the details from you. She will then contact social care and check those details correspond. She will then create some sort of record of previous social care involvement and the details. That will be kept confidentially within the hospital. The midwife will usually inform the safeguarding lead, may refer to specialist midwife to see if they feel enhanced midwifery care would be of benefit to you.

If the midwife has concerns she may re-refer. Or she may be advised to by the safeguarding lead.

Thank you to the last two replies. Exactly what I was hoping for.

I attended the freedom course and my husband attended building better relationships and also kaleidoscope, kaleidoscope had stopped the meetings after a few session as thought it wasn’t necessary as we did not drink on a regular basis (not at all since the incident).
There really is no issues surrounding any of the concerns they may point out and I do still have all the paperwork I could perhaps present to the midwife in order for her to get the full picture of what actually happened and when it was closed.

There was never any issues with our parenting etc, was just purely to safeguard our child at the time due to what happened.
Thank you for your comments.

That's exactly what they will want to see, that you have made positive steps and done the courses.

They might reopen and reassess. If they do, don't fight them or get defensive. They are looking out for your children.

Make sure you don't minimize at all. Take responsibility. You need to be clear that this time, there will be no drinking while in charge of a baby.

Update.

I went to see my midwife today and explained to her, she said I didn’t have to inform her of the ins and outs of what happened as it’s our data protection, however she will phone them just to confirm it was case closed in 2018 and nothing will come of it.
Feeling a lot less anxious about it all now. Thank you for all your replies x

Good stuff OP. Glad for you and all the best with the baby :)