To think a lot of posts on this social services Facebook group can’t be entirely truthful?

[TheObstinateHeadstrongGirl]

5 years ago, my DD made a disclosure about a family friend which we reported to the police. As a result we had children’s services involved in our lives and had a horrendous excuse for a social worker who cast doubt of my DD’s experience. FWIW: I know the vast majority of social workers are excellent, sadly we had a very brief experience with a really incompetent one, so I’m not in the “all social workers are evil” camp. I can’t imagine how hard it must be to do that job in a broken country with failing systems.

Anyway, at the time I joined a Facebook support group for those who have children’s services involved to get advice on how to handle everything that was going on. I never left the group, for no particular reason. And for some reason Facebook’s algorithm have been putting the posts on my feed more recently.

Some of the posts are very strange.

Posters claiming they’re on a child protection plan because their relatives are in the army. Or because they have a messy house. Some claim they don’t know why they’re at PLO level (which is a pre-cursor to court action). Loads of posts claiming SS are involved for no reason whatsoever, including pregnant women who look like they’re gonna have their babies removed and they don’t know why. Not all obviously but a large amount claim this.

AIBU to think that children aren’t placed on the child protection register for living in a messy house and there must be more to it?

I think I may be in the group your on about some of the parents are just in complete denial and you can just read through what they are saying to gather the truth.
my child was on a CPP due to my mental health after I tried committing suicide and was sectioned reason was emotional abuse At the time I couldn’t see why as I just wasn’t in the right place.
luckily they were only on it for 6 months and I did have a lovely social worker and I accessed the support with a psychologist and CMHT. My dealing a with adult social services have been hit and miss some amazing SW and some truly neglectful ones.
I also do think we were treated better as we are white in our 40s middle class respectful jobs and could articulate ourselves in the core group and conference

I don't think that information about the guardian can be true, it would never be allowed by the court.

The GAL will be a social worker but they will work for CAFCASS, have a distinct role and duties.

I think @BruhWhy has a great point

"It's denial. They latch on to the most minor issue they're given by the SS to improve and ignore the rest."

Advice like not to grab them turns into "SS told me I was a bad parent because I stopped them running into the road". But it is a nuanced profession, and I don't doubt there are overreaching, unpleasant social workers.

This is a very old show, but I found it really interesting to watch. Following families with social worker involvement, think there are 3 full episodes on YouTube. It shows how they try and have oversight, accountability - multi agency involvement etc. I'm not a social worker so I found it interesting learning more about it. It's obviously quite bleak so content warning for anyone particularly sensitive to neglect -

Another common claim is that hair strand tests (to test for drugs) have come back positive ‘even though I haven’t taken drugs in 4 years and that was only a spliff’

@shopmyfeelings

I know, that's what I thought, and it is something I'm looking into.

It's a complicated situation and there seem to have been multiple instances of procedures not being followed, with evidence to prove it, however, it has been difficult to get these addressed, probably due to lack of resources etc.

But I have no reason to doubt the source of the information and am always wary of blindly accepting things, and so far many things have been confirmed by written evidence.

It's just a bit of a mess really.

That's the same denial of responsibility as you see with criminals caught in the act.

"I wasn't burgling the house, I thought it was my mates house, I got the wrong door" etc. So.... do they usually smash the window of a house their mate lives in and ransack the bedrooms, cupboards and drawers, piling up any laptops and jewellery and pocketing valuables?!

Deny, deny, deny. That's the attitude.

I used to work in a mental health team which supported the safeguarding team when needed (this was in the US). Parents would tell us their houses were messy - we would need to dispose of our clothing and shoes after being in there.

People always talk about Protecting our Children on here as if it proves social services worth. Yet in the first episode, Tiffany and Mike were clearly loving parents who were gaslit by a very , very annoying and patronising SW. The way they talked down to Mike when asking him to "voluntarily" agree to have his son taken into foster care when Tiffany was in hospital for pre eclampsia was horrific. Their flat was very clearly not filthy either, and neither were they drug/ alcohol users .

I remember that programme, just shows you now different peoples standards of cleanliness are, their flat was covered in dog shit and urine. The young boy didn’t even have a bed to sleep in. I wouldn’t have left a dog in his care.

My children (then young teens) were on Child Protection Plans. I could not keep them safe. I really, genuinely and truthfully could not keep them safe. My eldest has autism and serious mental health issues. He MH issues escalated significantly when he was 14. His bevaviour was impossible to manage. We had to get rid of every sharp object, and even lock away thread because he would hurt himself with it. His brother is also neurodiverse and used to attack my eldest because he could not stand the noise, the tension and the chaos. My eldest disclosed this abuse.

My husband (sorry but also ND) tried to manage the situation, but was heavy handed. My management was ineffective. My husband's heavy approach was also disclosed. Social services became involved.

When SS became involved, there was supposed to be partnership working between school (neither child was attending by then), MH services, learning disability services and Children's Social Care. However, due to the focus on child protection, CSC were leading the case.

That is when everything was interpreted as inadequate parenting.

This was a long time ago, but the only way we could work effectively with CSC was to separate the family. I lived with my (by now psychotic) eldest and my husband struggled to live with a very angry mid-teenage boy.

Intervention and child protection ended when my eldest reached 18 (he had been arrested and sectioned by that time).

Through forums such as FRG, I learnt that many families in which there were complex additional needs were subject to inappropriate interventions from social care. My sons needed the CP Plans, but they needed the other services as well. My parenting was hopelessly inadequate, but how on earth can you parent in the midst of serious and multiple mental health crises? It was simply damage limitation.

Well, that's my story out anyway :)

@ijphoo that sounds hellish, I’m sorry

@ijphoo - that is why we need proper funding of social care and have adequate support instead of the shit show we have at the moment where services are cut left and right. I am so sorry for your experiences.

Why don’t you go back on FB and post a link to this thread on that particular page 😆😆

Actually @TheObstinateHeadstrongGirl what is the name/ link to the FB group?

It's certainly a really good point that any intervention and work needs to be holistic.

A social worker can make recommendations about mental health support but then an adult or child can sit on a 6/12/18 month waiting list or the support they get it's not actually meeting their needs.

A DA survivor could be asked to do DA work and education but then the course isn't being run because of budgets. Or all the courses are full this year.

A child with disabilities needs assessment, specialist education provision, respite for parents and siblings, equipment, care in the home etc but there's no money or they don't meet the threshold.

Social services can't do all the work needed themselves and in isolation.

And this is why, as a social worker, I haven’t commented on the other poster’s information about their interactions with their social worker, as who’s to know what was actually said other that the pp and the SW. There’s always rogues in any profession who act unprofessionally and have their own agenda.

I would however comment on the inaccuracies in the other poster’s post - no CP plan happens in a day, a multi-agency strategy discussion needs to be held first to agree the conference, then a conference is booked with 10 working days, then the professionals there jointly decide. There is definitely no ‘gaslighting’ training - that is so ridiculous that I won’t even try and justify this. Finally, I would be staggered to think any social worker has the time to make 4 visits a week, particularly to a family who ‘do not need it’. I’ve never known any social worker to have the capacity to do this. Goodness, when I was ordered by the court to complete daily visits, this was split within the team and we paid for external agencies to help too. Those bits particularly seem made up for effect.

Did we watch the same programme? The Mother certainly may have loved her child but that isn't enough. They spent months trying to engage the family. The boy didn't have a bed or a toothbrush, there were newspapers over the floor of the flat covered in dog urine and faeces, the child was not being interacted with and didn't have a safe space to play. Multiple professionals met the family and all were deeply concerned. The trigger to the child ultimately going into care was his Dad being unable to keep him fed and hygienic when Mum was in hospital. It was a very sad programme and one can't help but feel desperately sorry for Mum. However, I really struggle to see how you could feel they were loving, adequate parents who were just gaslit by social services.

It's the attitude that is usually the reason for removal. "My house is a mess but I'm drowning due to MH issues please help me" is different to "my house isn't a mess fuck off you social working cunt".

Being introspective and working with authorities will always work better than standing your ground and not accepting help when it's offered.

Sounds harsh?

No it sounds spiteful!

Wow. Some people really are desperate to make their lives full of drama.

@BertyMyrtle , can I ask why if SS only get involved when there are actual evidence of abuse; do SW's compel maternity departments to automatically notify them if either adult parent had been in care as a child ?

Can you not understand how care leavers are likely to feel gaslit by having to justify and prove themselves to SS, and to be told "as you were abused / neglected you're going to do the same thing.'

Being of low intelligence can be a reason for being considered at risk. Many of them would not understand why

I think you've just described a friend of mine but social worker really did try and get her away but she made excuses and social worker said she Justinian strong enough, in her defence they did try and help and I saw it first hand. There was drug and alcoholic abuse as well. They didn't just take her child, she kept allowing him in the house despite knowing what he is like. Trauma bonded I think. She loves her kids and never misses contact.

Social workers don’t only get involved if there’s evidence of abuse, they also get involved if there’s clear criteria for support to prevent abuse from happening.

It’s not about punishing a care leaver, it’s about recognising that care leavers are unlikely to have strong support networks around them, combined with challenging backgrounds, and may need additional help. Don’t forget, if a child has been in care, then it’s a strong likelihood that the Local Authority had been their corporate parent at some point. This would be an extension of the support offered then. Also, not all health authorities automatically refer care leavers who are to become parents to Children’s Services.

It is neither gaslighting nor telling them that they are going to be terrible parents.

Most non care leavers have some input from their own parents when they have children, or from other family members.

Care leavers may well have limited or no contact with their own parents, they may have no extended family, they may have been moved around to different areas of the country and lack broader support networks.

They may not have any suitable models of parenting to draw on.

It would be really shit to just throw them out and tell them to get on with it. They are not being called abusers or neglectful. They are being offered additional support.