I need to report this...right? Who to?

[Helpwithdilemaquick]

I'll just state the facts I definitely know, I'm so torn here.

I have a friend, she has 3 dds. Dad was abusive to her and it went through court, he was convicted, no jail time though.

She has quite bad mental health problems, understandably, and SS involvement due to the abuse the girls witnessed.

Her oldest dd wants to see her dad, he is currently seeking supervised contact.

She has told her oldest dd if she sees her dad then she will be put up for adoption.

Oldest dd has various issues due to seeing a lot of the abuse (the youngest 2 were too young to remember anything).

Friend has told the two youngest to hit the oldest on a number of occasions now, not in retaliation for a hit, just if oldest is being hyper and annoying. Imo it's rather than her smacking dd herself she's using the younger ones. The younger girls love this and repeatedly hit the older one for every tiny thing now.

She is an OK mum to the younger girls, the older daughter is treated very differently and it's heartbreaking to see. Friend won't accept criticism or advice, I'm not in any position to take the oldest more than I do for various reasons.

Oldest dd is 9, the other girls are 7 and 6.

I am quite involved in their lives and wish to remain involved to keep an eye on things, it doesn't feel right if I report behind her back then pop over for coffee though.

I don't know what to do for the best here.

@Helpwithdilemaquick FWIW I understood your post to mean that the eldest is different at home because, well, she's terrified. I hope SS step in to help her and the family.

I don’t think you are seeing everything. It’s far worse as the oldest daughter has seen her father abuse her mother but is actively trying to have contact with him which seems to be an act of desperation in trying to get away from the mother and siblings/home life.

Perhaps the older daughter looks like her father and that’s why the mother has turned on and has become an abused herself.

The adoption comment must be terrifying for the child.

Please get the child help.

Yes this needs to be reported. I work withh abused children and vulnerable families and there often ends up being one child who gets the brunt of all the trauma in the family, and even if the original abuser has left (Dad) the abusive behaviour can often get acted out by other children as a way to (unhealthily) process what they've all been through. The best approach though would not be to go behind your friend's back, before reporting, approach her and say 'I'm worried that the other girls hitting her is bad for everyone and it's becoming abusive, maybe we could talk to your SW about how you can handle these stressful situations differently, she might know somewhere that will offer family/parenting support.' I know it's a super hard conversation to have with a friend, and she will be defensive, but if as you say you are the only one there for her, you are risking less by being up front. If you go behind her back she may well cut you out of her life and therefore out of the children's and you very clearly want to be there and support all of them. If she reacts badly, you need to underline that you still feel it needs to be reported, but you'd rather do it with her than without her. She may not talk to you for a short time but I would think that she'd get over it more quickly than if you do it without involving her and she later finds out, all trust will be lost. If you're open and honest she will come to realise that you're trying to help them and she can trust you with the difficult stuff. Xxx

That's exactly what I meant, the mum is at fault absolutely here. The child's behaviour is totally down to the way she is treated. She is the victim here 100%

I do believe this to be the case, she is very like her father, looks and personality wise, and she hero worships her dad a bit at the moment because he's nit there so it's easy to look back with Rose coloured glasses and believe he may come and 'save' her.

Its awful.

Thank you, this is my worry here, that she will cut me out and then noone is there for the girls.

I have said things to her before she doesn't take it well at all, tells me I don't understand etc, today resulted in me telling both the younger ones off in front of friend, she has lost her way so much that she can't see what she is doing is wrong, and I think she's just glad 2/3 of her kids are OK tbh.

I'm heading there in a minute and I will try and have a chat with her. I have older dd this weekend anyway, so if friend doesn't respond to a serious talk this time I'll call NSPCC and report it. I would rather do things the way you suggest, and I will try, if she doesn't respond well then I'll have to take the alternative route, which I hope I don't have to.

OP isn’t saying the child is responsible for her mothers behaviour at all.
She’s saying the child is scared of her mother and acts differently when she’s at home. the mother doesn’t like this, it stresses her out. (perhaps subconsciously realising she’s abusing her child).
i
OP is not blaming the child.

Use the school- ask to talk to the dsl (safeguarding lead) be very clear that you will report if necessary, but would prefer for it to come through school so that you can continue your protective relationship with family.
they will understand. So will ss
alternatively phone ss directly, and ask that they don’t allow details of the report to be known. They will ask much more vague qs of mum, and will in any case speak to dc alone, sometimes at school. But they will need as many details from you as possible.
be aware that you will probably be put down as a protective factor due to the regular support you offer. This can prolong the process, as mum will reference you, ss will be forced to assess that you would step in to alleviate stress, etc.
i don’t say this to stop you- but to point out that the risk analysis is very complex, try not to second guess.

a good safeguarding principle is:
safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility, but no one’s sole responsibility. So each person reports all the details they have to the next person in the chain (in your case either school or ss) and then they in turn pass on, no single person takes responsibility for deciding what info should or shouldn’t be reported- everything just gets written down and passed on.

the threshold is very high, you are right- ss may do nothing, but they will be as distressed by that as you are, they know the implications for the child. The family may ‘work with’ agencies, then get signed off, and you will worry. So will school, so will social services, and very likely the family will be bounced back to ss again, and so on. It is a cycle that will be gone through several times before decisive action can be taken by the courts. Please don’t ever think ss are relaxed about this - they find it as scary as the public do.

You should report it. You can call the NSPCC anonymously here's a link. You can also report online anonymously.
www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/reporting-abuse/report/

If you're worried about being found out by your friend, then when you report it you could make out you're someone from the child's school (parent of friend/teacher?) and you've witnessed the behaviour on the school run or been told about it. OR You can stress to SS that it vital the source or details of the complaint are kept hidden. The SW can instigate a 121 with the girl and the other children (without the mother present) and then say they (the SW) was told about the behaviour that way. I had a next door neighbour who was horrible to her young boy, aggressive, violent, leaving him on his own in the house (aged2/3). A lot of us in the street knew about this but only one neighbour had the balls to report it and I'm so glad she did. I don;t think she (the mother) knew who reported it. Her eldest daughter was removed to her Dad's (she wanted to go) and the boy got help, or at the very least the SS became aware of what she was like and there were interventions. Good luck, you are doing the right thing for all of the children.

This sounds like narcissistic scapegoating vs golden child(ren). Needs reporting.

Social services or NSPCC - who can then refer it on

I would add that, if you know for a fact that the social worker doesn’t speak to the children, then that also needs reporting to their manager.
if you get no joy, no action, then escalate again and again.

@BarnabyRocks are you saying you knew a toddler was being abused violently and left alone and you did nothing? Absolutely abhorrent

OP - I'd call SS asap and stress to them that they need to tread very carefully here with regard to it being you having reported it and potential repercussions for the children

I ended up taking oldest dd home with me last night to diffuse the situation that was happening.

I called sw, and they will try to get out to her today, she's staying here and sw will come here. Its obvious it was me that called so ill probably be ousted from the kids lives now, which I feel sick about. I can only trust sw will do something now.

I told oldest dd if she's frightened or anything she can come to mine at anytime and I will call for help (she lives within a few minutes of my house with no roads to cross).

Friend doesn't know I've called and I won't say anything until after sw speaks to oldest dd. Friend isn't expecting her home until tea time anyway.

Does anyone know what will happen? I can't take dd in, I am starting chemo tomorrow and am really unwell and can't really cope well as it is, if it was a few years ago I would have happily taken her in indefinitely but I just can't, I can't even have her tonight.

Just so worried about all the kids.

Thank you for all the advice. I didn't have anyone to talk to and your advice was much needed .

You’ve done the right thing. You can only trust in the system, hard as that may be. Whatever happens you will know that you made the difficult choices and didn’t stand back and let it carry on. I’m so sorry to hear about you chemo, you sound like a good person in an extremely challenging situation. Hopefully someone will be along with some more concrete advice soon.