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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Calling the police on your child

69 replies

Royalsighness · 08/06/2015 08:31

Just saw something on the news about calling the police when involved in domestic Incidents with your teenager, and abuse from children to parents.

I was wondering what other people's opinions on this was? Or if they had ever been in a position where they had to do this or have considered it. I'd never really heard of it before.

OP posts:
ghostyslovesheep · 08/06/2015 10:10

I think you need to walk a mile in peoples shoes OP and step back from the idea that it's down to lax parenting

I once had to restrain my daughter to stop he hurting her sister - all 3 kids ended up on the CPR as I was investigated for physical abuse - it was awful

we are not talking about naughty kids and bad parenting here

BarbarianMum · 08/06/2015 10:13

My parents did it for my brother once. He was a violent drug addict and a teenager. All the other times they just gave him money, watched him steal things or got hurt Sad

grannytomine · 08/06/2015 10:14

I've never had to do it, although with 4 grown up children I do remember how explosive teenagers can be. Fortunately it never got to that point. The only person I know who has done it did it because of MH issues following drug use. The teenager was taken to a psych ward for 4 or 5 days. Thankfully it wasn't an experience he wanted to repeat and he seems to have been fine since. I hate it when people defend cannabis use as "harmless" as it can be devestating for some.

BarbarianMum · 08/06/2015 10:14

^^Well, that's not great either if you think about it. Sorry for you. Sad

DixieNormas · 08/06/2015 10:16

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BarbarianMum · 08/06/2015 10:17

Cannabis for us too - that harmless recreational drug Hmm Although later it was heroin which was worse.

DixieNormas · 08/06/2015 10:19

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

DixieNormas · 08/06/2015 10:22

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Tinklewinkle · 08/06/2015 10:27

Yes, it was cannabis for our foster child too. The cannabis that social services wanted me to turn a blind eye too, allow it in my house and not make a big deal out of.

I called the police, then once I refused to drop the charges and allow them to come back and live here, I was suspended from fostering and subjected to months of investigations for restraining them because I stepped in and removed our foster child's hands from my 12 year old daughter's throat.

You couldn't make it up

wannabestressfree · 08/06/2015 10:37

I had to after having a knife out to my throat by my mentally ill son. The police were wonderful and went and found him and had him sectioned. He has no criminal record.

DixieNormas · 08/06/2015 10:41

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

kissmethere · 08/06/2015 10:42

**Royal yes me too, it's not how we were raised. However my eldest brother was hiding a serious drug problem and had been sneaky and caused trouble when my dad was at work. Trust me this was not the norm in our house.
Sometimes there are issues aside from how children are being raised.

Tinklewinkle · 08/06/2015 10:49

People just don't seem to realise how much harm cannibis can do to teens

Totally agree. Our young persons social worker just didn't see the problem. It's 'only' cannabis. "It calms them down" "it's not heroin"

The only people to take it seriously was the police and the youth court when they were arrested after being caught with cannabis. Even them, when we were sitting in the court, the social worker still kept saying "it's only a bit of cannabis"

Well our young person went from calm and fairly affable, working hard at college and behaving well, to someone who stole anything that wasn't nailed down, anxious and aggressive and dropped out of college

Welshmaenad · 08/06/2015 11:18

When working in a DV support service I had a number of clients on my caseload who were being supported due to DV from teenage children. People think it's just an intimate partner issue, and it's not.

Original poster
Royalsighness · 08/06/2015 11:20

Sorry, I dont think I was clear in what I said in my post, I was too scared of my parents to hit them, they didn't exactly raise me to be to respectful to hit them, I was just fearful of hitting them.

I really don't understand how some people find everything on mumsnet antagonistic, I just wanted to see what other people's view on this was.

OP posts:
DecaffCoffeeAndRollupsPlease · 08/06/2015 11:23

My dd was removed from my house by armed police after smashing up my whole house and then threatening me with a big knife while I had locked myself in my room, and she was kicking the door down. When the police arrived she slashed up her arms and had to be cared for by paramedics before she could be taken away.

I have placed her in foster care and last week decided to stop contact for a while after she smashed up my car within 20 mins of picking her up. Cars, tvs, walls, furniture, my head - all been battered by her.

Another one using cannabis. Total switch from close family to fear and stress.

Don't see how I could have raised her differently, and until she turned I was complemented on how she was a testament to my caring parenting. So, I've called the police on her quite a few times now, and would again. It's a horrible feeling, confusing, distressing, conflicting, rejection, so many emotions...

Original poster
Royalsighness · 08/06/2015 11:24

I'm sorry but where on earth did I say it was down to lax parenting? My brother spent 80% of his teenage years in YOI up and down the country for petty crimes, smoking cannabis and doing other things, he's out of it now but maybe it was the fear I would go to prison like him that made me behave differently I dont know.

Parenting is hard, parenting of a child with mental health issues must be very difficult, I'm not here to criticise, judge or upset anyone, I just wanted other people's perspective on this? Ok?

OP posts:
Original poster
Royalsighness · 08/06/2015 11:28

and some of you parents in this thread that have had to encounter such terrible situations involving your own children, i can completely understand why you would call the police.

OP posts:
NurNochKurzDieWeltRetten · 08/06/2015 13:52

Royal I think people including me got that from your post at 9.50. You said "I was raised the opposite way" - the problem with MN and all Internet forums/ fb/ texting I guess is that brief comments can be misinterpreted - lots of people do write/ say "I wasn't raised that way" to imply strongly that their superior upbringing has prevented a situation occurring. .. Presumably you actually meant your fear of violence from your parents prevented you being violent and that this was also not an ideal situation! Still if you'd had a 6 ft 4, 12 stone 17 yo brother he might not have been inhibited the same way!

grannytomine · 08/06/2015 14:29

Amazed to get support on the cannabis issue, people normally tell me I am wrong about it. Three of my sons friends ended up in hospital because of it, one has been sectioned and looks like he now has long term serious problems. The other two seem to have realised how closed they came to the point of no return and are doing OK. I just hate the conspiracy of cannabis is harmless. So many young lives are being ruined not to mention the burden it must be placing on the NHS.

sadwidow28 · 08/06/2015 14:45

My Mum called the police on my brother (married so living elsewhere, alcoholic - but could cause a fight in an empty room!) He was very unhappy that my parents had given a safe space to my SIL, 2 children and the dog 2 night's before. He was enraged that my mother had lied when she said on the phone that she didn't know where SIL and children were. He walked into my parents' house to have a talk, saw them there and started to drag my SIL and children out, whilst kicking the dog. (He saw them as his possessions) My Dad (a gentle man) intervened and my brother started to drag my elderly father outside to 'duff him up'.

My mother phoned my BIL first who drove over immediately, tried to intervene calmly but eventually had to wrestle brother to the ground to stop him hitting my parents. When my BIL was sitting on top of my brother, he realised there was no way he was going to calm and shouted to my mother to call the police. Reluctantly, she did.

Police came - very calm and understanding about family disputes and asked parents if they wanted to press charges. "No. We just want him out of the house". They offered my brother the option of going home quietly - either this way or that way. Brother decided to shout verbal abuse at my parents and tried to ram the police officers to get past them and hit someone.

There was no choice then but to put him in the back of the police van and charge him.

My mother said it is one of the saddest days of her life.

AspieAndNT · 08/06/2015 14:57

As yet my 11 year son is manageable but as he is nearly as tall as me there may come a time when he isn't. When he has a melt down he is violent but it tends to be at objects rather than people so far. BUT if it came to it I would call the police.

We try so hard to teach him ways to keep calm and how to deal with his anxiety but ultimately it is down to him. He has taken money from us - not a lot just a couple of pound - BUT it is the principle of it. If it happens again then he will be taken to the police station to see the consequences of his actions.

grannytomine · 08/06/2015 15:03

sadwidow 28 and AspieAndNT, that sounds so sad. It must be hard to deal with both situations. I can't imagine anything worse to be honest.

maxxytoe · 08/06/2015 15:14

My friend rang the police on her son when she found out he'd been involved in the riots here in Manchester a couple of summers ago.
He got sent to prison for 18 months.
He's since turned his life around but struggles to get a job etc due to his past

AspieAndNT · 08/06/2015 15:19

grannytomine - it is hard. I never know what mood he will wake up in, or how he will return home from school. I am never far from my phone in case they ring to say he has absconded or had a meltdown.

BUT ....he is mine and I will do my absolute best to teach him right from wrong and to make him become a decent adult. If that means I have to get the police to chat with him in the hope they get through to him, then I will.

But I hope I never have too.

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