to wonder if contact is always in the best interests of the child

[paddleduck]

Before I start I should say, I have no first hand experience, obviously do not know these people personally and accept my opinion may be unreasonable given the above.

Yesterday I took my dc to a soft play with some friends. While there a set of grandparents came in, closely followed by a couple and another boy of school age. The grandad was carrying a little girl of about 3 or 4 who was hysterical. She looked petrified and was clinging to her grandpa with white hands. She couldn't breathe for her sobs and she was drenched in her own tears. She just kept screaming 'I want to go home' 'no no no' and whenever the man from the couple approaches her, she begins screaming 'no please.. go away.. Don't want you!'

I found it so difficult to listen to her sobs, it really made my heart ache for her. Her grandparents kept cuddling her and talking softly, periodically trying to put her down and encourage her to engage with this couple. The woman part of said couple just kept standing around with her hands in her pockets rolling her eyes and huffing, man kept doing silly faces etc trying to engage little girl.

Any who, my friend visits this softplay weekly and said she'd explain when we left.

Friend explains that it is 'contact' .. The man is her dad. Woman is new wife and school child is new wife's son from previous relationship. Older couple are paternal grandparents. Dad was violent and hurt the little girls mum, so they have split and grandparents meet with the dad for supervised contact weekly. She says this softplay scenario happens every week for around 8 months now, with the little girl being distraught at every visit. - she knows this because the mother of the little girl is her aunties life long friend.

I found the whole thing so upsetting to watch and haven't stopped thinking of that little girl. The more I consider the situation the more I feel that after so long of these awful contact sessions, it would be in the child's best interests for the dad to leave her alone. To remain contactable for when she is older, if she wants to.. but that if a child finds being in your presence that distressing then that's not good to keep putting g her through that. I understand how difficult that would be as a parent. . But I almost felt it was selfish of him to keep pushing her like that. Long term she will anticipate the meetings with anxiety and they may never make progress like this? Of course he could have just not been a violent partner in the first place and my disgust over knowing what he's done makes me want to say he doesn't deserve access.. but if he's getting it someone obviously deems him not a risk to the little girl right? And presumably he has PR

Anyway. . Am I bu to think he should walk away?

here's a link about how abusive men parent.

I agree herecomes, you would not do that for any other adult, why relax the safeguards just because the adult us tge child's parent!

Totally agree herecomes.

It isn't a position that I can understand either. Surely the only place a rapist belongs is prison, not as caregiver to a child.

If a woman had conceived a child through rape, say by being dragged behind a bush walking home from work at night, held a knife to your throat, beat you up, I don't think that anyone would suggest contact with the 'father'. However if you are raped and beaten by your partner or husband is is somehow seen as slightly less horrific, not quite as bad, he can still be a good dad.

I think it shows the frightening tolerance we have to rape by somebody you know and DV.

When both your children and your ex-partner (the non-resident or 'absent' parent) wish to see each other, and this can be arranged safely and without major problems, this is likely to benefit everyone concerned. However, in many cases, your safety and that of your children may be a serious concern.

So, what Women's Aid are saying is that safe contact is beneficial, but securing safe contact is difficult. Yup, I can see that.

Would any of you be happy to hand your children over to the care of a teacher or nursery worker who had raped and beaten someone? No? I think not. But as it's these childtens father it's ok? No. It's not is it?

That's not safe contact though, is it? Indirect and supervised contact is "safe". Far safer, say, than placing the child in the care of a professional childcarer who is violent away from work, but against whom no allegations have been made? DV crosses all professions, so it is more than likely that there are childcarers across the uk are abusive towards their own partners. Unless/until that is reported, are the children who they care for at work at risk?

Wakey this does not always happen does it! Chikdren are having unsupervised contact ordered, despite NRP having a history of violence or abuse and a criminal record for domestic violence! Yes supervised contact is physically safe, but the child may have witnessed violence and abuse from this parent and may be shit scared of them.

But WakeyCakey, supervised contact is given with the view to eventually become unsupervised after a period of time.

I would also be interested to know how many abusive parents actually stick to and commit to the contact long term. And also how safe it actually is.

You would assume that contact supervised would be safe, however children suffer prolonged emotional abuse at supervised contact it is detrimental to them.

Emotional abuse could be in the form of bringing presents for one sibling and not another. Criticising a child for what they are wearing. Ignoring the child during contact or favouring one sibling over another leaving the child feeling rejected. Telling the children inappropriate things such as they are going to take them to live with them, or telling the child to be naughty for their caregiver.

These factors are not enough to stop the contact in the eyes of the courts, social services, and CAFCASS, I can tell you that for an absolute fact.

Supervised contact is not safe.

I agree with you OP. I also think abused women are put in impossible positions. If they stay with their violent partner then they may face removal of their children for failing to protect them. But if they leave the partner then the courts may order them to hand the children over regularly to the same violent man.

In my opinion DV should be an issue where the presumption of contact shouldn't apply. There should be a presumption of NO contact in DV cases and it should be up to the abusive party to prove they are now 'safe.'

No one who abuses their partner is a good parent, even if they 'only' beat the mother

And supervised contact is usually only ordered in extreme cases where there is evidence of abuse, and with the view to be unsupervised in the long term.

A parent can miss contact, turn up drunk, high on drugs, and contact won't just be stopped.

The abusive parent will be given chance after chance.

These are the harsh facts.

In my friend situation, supervised access was in place. NRP kicked up a stick, told judge he would not like to see dc if supervised access continued, judge backtracked and gave a violent abusive man unsupervised access . Whose best interests did the judge have at heart, not this child's!

'Supervised' contact is a bit of a deceptive phrase anyway. It usually takes place somewhere like a church hall with 20 other families and a few elderly volunteers putting out toys and making cups of tea. They are great places for reintroducing contact for parents where they have been absent but their aren't any welfare concerns, but no good for dealing with the complexities of DV cases, or the inappropriate behaviour that sometimes occurs.

Pyjama you are so right, my friend is going through hell right now, her poor dc even more. Do you work in the system?

Ok, I must have completely misunderstood. I thought the OP was asking whether supervised contact, as she witnessed, was in the best interests of the DC, given how distressed the DC was.

In this particular case, it isn't known if the supervision was court ordered, insisted upon by the mother, or whether there is any expectation that it will move to unsupervised in the future.

WakeyCakey how about this for safe supervised contact. I have seen contact workers turn up with babies and children at contact centres to meet the parent there. And the contact worker hasn't even had any paperwork with them and doesn't even know the children's, often babies names or the circumstances around the situation.

Yes don't want to out myself but I do see this sort of thing day in day out through work.

It's very dad pyjama. Each contact my friends ds tells her of abuse sexual and emotional he's suffered. The police have not got the resources to follow proper procedure, so an officer who he's never seen before interviews him (he clams up as he's only primary school ages) and nothing can be done.

Very bad I meant

Apparently a special officer from the child protection untitled should come several times to build a rapport with the child, so they feel able to give a statement, this is not happening

Agree with Herecomes.
Supervised contact is only a short term soulution. The evidence is there in black and white in the form of ex long criminal record, numerous police ref numbers, numerous reports from the police about how aggressive ex has responded to police intervention. This is a man who frequently uses knives when he loses his temper. Who in their right mind would give a man like my ex contact with a child. Regardless of whether the child wants to see his father or not.
Are judges trained in the areas of dv because they seem to have little knowledge of the de estuarine impact on both the child and adult involved.

Devestating silly typo on phone

Bongobaby - good luck with court, hopefully they will see sense long before you have to risk prison.

As I've mentioned on mn before, after a 5 year court battle I have finally managed to get a no direct contact order after a counselor and 2 psychiatrists testified that even supervised contact was severely harming DS emotionally and the supervised contact center refused to facilitate visits as DS was too distressed. The HV, Beaver and Cub leaders and school had also registered concerns about contact, so basically every adult in DS' life other than cafcass/the courts believed contact was a bad thing, the paternal grandmother even begged her son to stop it during the case and eventually went NC with him as she couldn't stand what he was doing to DS (she still sees DS though not regularly as she lives abroad) SS were involved with his step daughter due to concerns about her welfare whilst in his care and there were various investigations into child abuse (not to do with DS). So yes there absolutely are times when contact is not in the best interests of the child.

Sadly to get to this point I had to break a lot of court orders and he is still allowed to write and has to be consulted on important events in DS' life. The judge did consider reversing residency but thankfully DS' father said he wasn't prepared to have DS more than once a fortnight as it would put too much strain on his latest marriage and their finances which really sums up his commitment to being a father DS still receives a parcel for Christmas and one for his birthday, plus letters once a month if his father remembers he refuses to read the letters and throws them in the bin the second I hand them to him (I do take them out the bin and have a box of unopened letters just in case he ever changes his mind) he hasn't even opened this years presents, they're in the bottom of his wardrobe but when I try to encourage him he just looks at me really crossly and says 'there's nothing he could buy that would make me like him so why bother?'

Unfortunately there is an attitude of any contact being a good thing, whilst I agree that in most cases a child should know both their parents its not always true in every case and there are times when actually they would be far better off without contact, i couldn't possibly say if that's the case with the girl in the OP as I don't know her or enough about her situation but it is certainly true in some cases.

Which all supports the WA case, that it is difficult to ensure safe contact between a child and their violent parent.

It does not support the theory that when safe contact is possible, it is unequivocally detrimental to the child.

Adikia were the counsellors/psychiatrists for you or your dc. Were they NHS ones