To allow these kids to be taken into care?

[RebelFromTheWaistDown]

Long story. I hope you can make some sense of this.

I have 2DDs age 18 and19 I have brought up alone since they were toddlers.
Their father has come in and out of their lives as he pleased and is now married with 2 DS's age 4 and 7.

DD1(19yo) has recently started a new job after a few months of unemployment. She got a call yesterday morning from her father's wife (SM) who was in tears as she was about to get on a plane to visit relatives abroad for 2 weeks, she had left her children at school to be collected by their father and he had left home and was unable to be contacted. He had told his wife that he would not be there for the kids so she had better come home. DD tried to contact him but he is also ignoring her.

DD asked her boss if she could leave work earlier to collect the children from the after school club and get the key from a neighbour to take the kids home. This is costing DD in wages as well as bus fare for a 15 mile journey to their house.

SM asked DD to take care of her DCs for the 2 weeks while she was away. DD said she would leave work early to collect them Tuesday (yesterday) and Wednesday but she would not be able to get them this Thursday as she is going to see Erasure in concert with me. Also it is half term next week and DD is worried about jeopardising her new job. SM told her that if her father had not returned home by this Thursday that she would get an emergency flight home.

DD1 has now roped in DD2(18) who is due to return home from uni this Thursday to stay with the DCs on Thursday night while we go to the concert. She has also arranged for the DCs to stay at my sister's house (the DCs have never met her) on Friday night as DD2 has a job over here too. Now the SM is saying she can't get a flight home until Sunday or Monday.

My DDs are very upset and stressed in this situation that they cannot cope with. I have pleaded with DD to contact Social Services to tell them the DCs have been abandoned. She has now done this but has told them she is looking after the DCs because she doesn't want them taken into care. I have asked her why she is so worried about that - she is obviously unable to cope with them herself. She says it is because the DCs were not born in this country. I don't understand what that has got to do with it!

I have not seen DD face to face yet. All my contact with DD has been by phone as I work long hours. I will see her tomorrow. I think she would be best to let SS take over. AIBU?

I think both the parents sound as bad as each other! I can believe the mother got on the plane in the first place!

If the OP jumps in now to the extent of losing pay, losing job security, losing out on an event she has paid for and making care of her own son she would simply be facilitating her XH's fuckwittery. That IMHO would be worse for the poor boys in the log run.

This man would see it as further vindication of his actions, probably triggering several repeats. He will think 'I can do what I want everyone else will take responsibility.

I think this: "oh the OP should have done it all" comes from some kind of place which says that women should serve men.

The OP doesn't have any obligation to do anythign. As it happens, I think she's been very supportive of her DD's choice to look after their brothers, she's let them get on with it and hasn't butted in, her DP has helped while she's carried on doing all the other work she's got, like her paid job and her other child.

Some people just can't bear to see women not picking up shit after men. They feel the natural order is being disturbed or something.

So you wouldn't get on the plane, Windingmeup? Really? Do you think your DH is such a shit, that he would abandon his children? Really? Why are you married to him then?

So you wouldn't get on the plane, Windingmeup? Really? Do you think your DH is such a shit, that he would abandon his children? Really? Why are you married to him then?

Because " . . . in tears as she was about to get on a plane to visit relatives abroad for 2 weeks, she had left her children at school to be collected by their father and he had left home and was unable to be contacted. He had told his wife that he would not be there for the kids so she had better come home."

She knew he wasn't going to look after his kids, he told her himself but she still got on the plane. The man is a waste of space to do that but she is irresponsible as well. She got on the plane and left the country hoping he would rise to his responsibilities even though he had told her he would not. That is abandonment!

I am not sure why you are saying my DH is a shit! What's my DH got to do with it? He would never do anything of the sort!

Exactly, Windingmeup.

OP, your daughters are fantastic, but warn them that this will become a regular occurrence; there needs to be some sort of come-back on both of the parents, so despite your dds excellence, you all need to let the school/ss deal with it next time.

My point is that you know your DH wouldn't do anything of the sort. So you would get on the plane because you know that even if he said he wouldn't be there to pick up the kids, he would still be there afterwards as arranged.

The only reason you wouldn't get on the plane, is if you suspected that your DH would really carry out his threat. And as you say, your DH would never do anything like that, so it would be safe for you to get on the plane.

Presumably, the woman in this situation also thought like you - that although her DH might threaten it in the heat of an argument, in reality he would never do that. Now she's found he would, she's divorcing him. Seems like a good plan to me.

I think it is abandonment, if you think your DH will carry out that threat.

It is not abandonment, if you think he's just being an arse but will behave like a proper father when the chips are down.

All of you here, presumably think that your DH's would behave like proper fathers in this situation, even if they had threatened not to.

I imagine that this woman was also labouring under that delusion - that her DH would behave as a proper father. It's only if she knew he wouldn't, that it's abandonment. (And I'm not ruling out that she knew, but I wouldn't assume it - it's not unreasonable to assume that you're married to a man who may behave like a total arse in an argument, but when it comes to the crunch, is a decent, caring father and partner. Once you find out he isn't, it's easy to say with hindsight, that you shouldn't have assumed he was.)

"I think this: "oh the OP should have done it all" comes from some kind of place which says that women should serve men."

Not in my case it doesn't, Wooooooooooooopity.

Where does it come from then?

It all seems to have been dealt with satisfactorily for all concerned (except the children, the SM, the sisters, the OP, etc. )

As satisfactorily as such a situation can be dealt with. And yet there are people here bitching that the OP wasn't as involved as they'd like. As long as the DC's are looked after competently and reasonably, why should it be by the OP? Where does this wish to have her do more of it, when she has a job and a child of her own to look after, and her DP has made himself available to help, come from? It just strikes me as very odd.

But I think she did support them.

(I presume she gave them a few tips on how the washing machine might work )

My suggestion that she should take the day off work and help her DD out was not from a view that woman should help out men, but that parents should help their children in a crisis situation, and your repsonsibilities as a parent don't end when your DCs hit 18.

The father wasn't going to help his young DCs, so he obviously wasn't there to help his grown DCs, the other parent to the DD who was struggling was the OP who for some reason has a job that means she can't ever ask to take a day off work, or else she didn't want to help her DD.

Her DD's were not in a crisis situation though.

There was no need for her to take the day off work.

The OP doesn't mention that her DD's expected her to, so I don't really think it's reasonable for randoms on the interweb to.

Fair enough that people were putting forward different suggestions at that stage.

But it's the fact that everything's been sorted and people are still bitching at her that it wasn't organised along those lines, that I find odd. It's that picking at someone and wanting to find fault that I just can't get to grips with tbh.

Please report this situation to the SS I hate to think of them being abandoned again :(

Here, here to everything woooopity has said.

For those who think OP is cold or unhelpful, she had a 14 hour shift in a hospital to get to today. Meaning she has no doubt paid for and arranged child care for her young DS. Not all jobs are easy to just take the day off for. Pretty sure it'd be quite difficult to find someone to cover a 14 hour shift on a Friday at the last minute!

It's just NOT that simple that she was refusing to help, IMO

I'm sure OP probably felt an obligation to her work colleagues and her patients, above all else, also her bank manager, mortgage company, nursery, credit card companies, utility companies, DS, DD's, DP etc etc in choosing to go to her job rather than run around after two strange kids. Perhaps if DDs weren't coping so well, she would have done more, but was happily able to keep well enough out of it, if you discount the emotional turmoil she has no doubt been through this week with her DDs.

And it sets a precedent, how many more times would she be having to bail these kids out (though knobhead ex HAS been bailed out, I'm sure it makes NO difference to him whatsoever WHO did the bailing, DD1, DD2, OP, OP's DP, OP's DSis, he got bailed out, his life carried on the way he wanted it to without a thought for ANYONE else)

There's no doubt about it, Op and DD have had a bit of a bashing from some here.

What I'm not clear on is what happens now? Prodigal father returns when he's good and ready and the childreen are handed over?

Will social services be involved? Will the police not want to pursue abandonment charges? What will happen when the mother gets her flight home (maybe she won't now, though, and stay for the intended period if Daddy has stepped in. Can't see it though)

Hurry up and finish your shift, OP! :)

well said boasting! - personally there is no fucking way i would hand over those children now, their parents have proved wholly untrustworthy and i would be calling the police as we speak (actually, i would have done so days ago!) as to the suggestion that the op 'should have done more', im astonished, why the hell should she have done anything else? so far her entire family are rallying round and helping the children of her EX husband, the whole family HAVE supported the daughters and the children are well cared for - these feckless wonders have got off bloody lightly as far as i can see!

I agree that Rebel has come in for some completely unjustified criticism. Accused of being cold and unfeeling FFS .

And she has been supportive. She and her daughters looked after the wee boys!

I think woooopity has it spot on.

As for the so called father...boo-hooing down the phone to his teenage daughter after abandoning his kids? Absolute fucking scum.

It's very telling that some people focus more on OP's conduct than his.

The OP and her DDs cannot keep the kids. They have no choice but to hand them back.

I think calling the police would have been a huge mistake. Yep it may have taught the parents a lesson but it would have been bloody awful for the kids.

Have you ever seen small children loaded into a police car because the SS have had to call them in to remove them?

Its horrible and should be avoided unless absolutly necessary and in this case it wasnt.

Anyone can report what has happened to SS but the children are being cared for, the mother is on holiday and the father was supposed to look after them but didnt.

Its not a high priority case and I really doubt it would be accepted by SS. Round here it wouldnt meet the referall criteria.

How is it a person can just fuck off when they feel like it, come back when they are good and ready and never mind their kids for a few days and not face any recriminations when they get back?!?

Perhaps I'll try it.

I wouldn't get away with it though, I''d be in the Daily Mail!!

Oh I suspect there'll be plenty of recriminations Boasting...

I hope so! I really do!

I never once hoped those kids would be taken into care but I bloody did hope SS and the law would get involved to boot these fucking tossers up the arse!

Pretty sure DDs won't hold any weight wrt 'disciplining' their father and SM, even if they DID have a go. Which they might be too soft or scared to do.

DD's pleas for the father to return didn't hold any weight. Pretty sure a phonecall from the local constabulary asking Mr. Knobhead to pop in to the nearest station would have added a little impetus in getting his arse back home to sort out all 4 of his kids.

I don't believe the father either. If the wife's trip was pre-arranged, then he should have known that it was his job to collect his own children. Probably a control-freak who thought that his dw would have to cancel her trip on his say-so OR that his exw would have to step in. And why didn't he answer his phone. Surely his dd's number would have come up. If any of my boys ever rang me, it wouldn't take me 3 days to phone them back!

FWIW, nobody can ever figure out my dishwasher if I am not there. If my Mum/MIL is left in charge of the dc's, I come home to find that they "couldn't get it to start". Perhaps that washing machine is similar?

I've just got home from work. The DCs are now in the care of their father. I have DD2 with me now so I'm going to catch up a bit more on what went on today then I will update. Thanks for your input everyone - it really has helped ME a lot!