to envolve social services

[Jolyon1972]

My ex husband returned by children from a contact weekend to advise that he had taken the children (DS x2) to his engineering workshop (business) over the weekend as he had some customers dropping cars off. The children were playing unsupervised (13+10) and DS had climbed on to a tractor and grabbed hold of a motorised door - the other DS turned the motor on lifting DS (10) to over 8ft off the ground at which point he fell off on to a concrete floor. He was largely unhurt but I think it could have been very serious. My Ex thinks this is just boys pranks. This week by other DS (13) returns with a burn hand after a workshop accident. Again Ex thinks this is "part of learning". I have an engineering back ground and realise children need to learn but this is beyond reasonable. Am I being over the top in considering making an approach to social services?

Yes - YABVU. you might want to think about long term implications of SS involvement. This seems to be a lack of judgement rather than abuse/neglect. Seems over the top to me and a more adult approach would be to discuss your concerns and ask that he not taken them to his workplace again. SS are at breaking point dealing with actual problems rather than dealing with your difficult conversations.

I agree that contacting SS isn't needed or appropriate.

As well as speaking to your ex, have safety talks with your DSs.

Tbh I'd have a word with your kids and tell them to stop fucking about!!!

Contacting SS sounds more like vengeance against your ex rather than concern for your children's well-being.

Your kids should not be in a workshop unsupervised. Either he has to pay for childcare or you take action because one of them is going to have a serious accident.

yes you would be very UR.

Tbh I'd have a word with your kids and tell them to stop fucking about!!!

This

Although I'd probably I've a word with the ex too and tell him that although the kids are old enough to behave themselves he needs to actually take safety and parenting seriously and stop being a "cool dad" who let's his kids do stupid idiotic and dangerous things.

Using Social services aka children's services to get at your ex partner is very unreasonable.

Why can't you communicate??

I will also add to that as I do work in the field - ss if they see fit to even bother with the case will also look into how you care for the children aswell seeing as you are the main carer

Tbh I'd have a word with your kids and tell them to stop fucking about!!!

This, absolutely. And telling your XH to make sure his kids are aware of safety procedures and to keep a proper eye on them. No need for SS.

YABU to think about contacting SS.

You need to sit down and talk to your kids and their dad, about safety issues and remind them to be much more careful.

They're not babies, so perfectly able to understand I'm sure.

At 13 and 10, your DS' are old enough to be able to understand that they need to be careful in the workshop and not piss about with equipment.

And your Ex needs to explain to them how he expects them to behave. He needs to give them the same health and safety talk that any young apprentice would get before being in the workshop.

Yabu re ss. Serious chat to ds re mucking around. They not babies and should know this by now if no sen.

Thanks. Clearly I'm over reacting and need just to calm down and communicate. There are other issues going on (a history of harassment and physical abuse) which makes communications difficult and I think cause me to over react a bit. So, just breathing and regaining some focus.

Totally over the top. Ss have enough to do as it without following up a complaint about 2 lads who obviously can't behave.

The boys are the problem here. At 10 & 13 they really should know better. Turn your anger to them where it's deserved.

For your own sake if nothing else I'm glad you've realized you're over-reacting because like a PP said SS will look far more in to you as the main carer than your ex, who would walk away from any involvement relatively unscathed. It's the main carer who has to jump through all the hoops, often unfairly but that's the way it is, so by contacting them you're only causing yourself problems not him. Having said all that your ex needs to take safety more far more seriously

You really mustn't involve ss in this - you should be talking both to him and to your dc about this. I would be livid with the 13yr old btw - they are old enough to know better and should be told in no uncertain terms what an appalling situation they could have caused. I have a 10y old and teach 13y olds and would expect to be ale to leave a child of that age without the behaviour you describe ensuing.

I have a friend who involved ss after a fairly incident with her dc and her ex. I won't go into details as it's not my story to tell, but it ruined any chance they had of co-parenting amicably. Her ex was not prevented form seeing his dc - ss didn't find anything worth taking action over, but he couldn't forgive my friend. Both your dc are old enough to be well aware of any action taken, and I also think you should consider how they would view your actions. You could mess up a lot of relationships here. Don't do it.

Don't bother SS with this, absolutely no need.

I would however be severely punishing your dc for behaving so badly and looking at your own and EXH parenting. Tell ExH if they can't behave they need to not go to his place of work.

Has no one noticed there's been a history of physical abuse and harassment?
OP I don't think you're over reacting at all given the history, but I really wouldn't involve SS as they won't do anything and it will make an already difficult situation much worse. I think, given the boys ages, the best bet is to empower them to make better delusions. Good luck, it doesn't sound an easy situation at all x

Delusions? Decisions!! Doh

At 13 and 10 your children are quite old enough to behave themselves and should not be climbing on tractors and so on. They shouldn't need to be watched every minute to make sure they aren't getting up to mischief. They sound badly behaved and quite a handful. You should concentrate on improving their behaviour before involving social services.

Actually, I think it may be more appropriate to involve health and safety - I would have thought there may be rules against children going into areas of garages where there is potentially dangerous machinery. Maybe an initial inquiry about the rules without naming names would be the way to go? Then if your ex thinks he's in danger of calling down a detailed H&S inspection on his head, or even being shut down, he'll think again.

The history of physical abuse would worry me. Who has your ex-husband physically abused?

I would want to be absolutely clear about how these accidents happened, especially if there is any chance that your ex might now be abusing your children.

It might be worth your while to talk to the teacher in charge of safeguarding at your children's schools if you are concerned, not least because your teachers are likely to start notiing the children coming in with burns and bumps (depending on when the school holidays are).

I don't know if SS are the right way to do it but YANBU to do something. You've spoken to your ex, he doesn't care, does someone have to lose a finger before he does?