To want to move back to england with my 5 children

[tryingtogohome]

Hi sorry if this is all over the place

I live in Poland with my partner who is Polish and we have 5 boys 15 11 5 3 and 10 months and im pregnant again 25 weeks

I keep thinking about leaving him and going back to England but then i think im being stupid because ive been here so long and dont even know where id start anymore.

I dont really have anybody. No family. I grew up in care and havent spoken to anyone from my past for years and years.

Things have got worse between me and my partner. Hes always saying what a real man should be and boys shouldnt cry and things like that. My 15 year old argues with him constanly (constantly) now and the whole house feels tense all the time.

This is going to sound silly but i keep feeling like this baby is a girl and every time i say it he gets annoyed. Not shouting just annoyed and says he doesnt want a daughter and what would he do with a girl and says hopefully im wrong. Maybe im overreacting but it upsets me more than it should.

I dont know if its hormones.

I keep looking at Doncaster and Rotherham and Sheffield on my phone when everyone is asleep and then crying because i dont even know if my children could go to school there after living here all this time or where we would live.

I know people will say leave if youre unhappy but it isnt that easy when youve got this many children and no money and nowhere to go.

Am i being unreasonable wanting to go back to England or does this sound completly mad after 11 years away

I do speak Polish, not perfectly but enough for day to day things and appointments and schools etc. I didnt when i first came here but i do now.

I dont really have any friends though. I had a couple years ago but not anymore. Everyone sort of drifted away and i dont really go anywhere without the children now.
All of the children are his. They were all born in England apart from the baby who is 10 months. He came early at 31 weeks and was in hospital for a while and thats part of whats panicing me this time because im pregnant again and keep worrying the same thing will happen.

I dont know about passports off the top of my head because my head is all over the place today. The older boys definitely have British passports. I think the younger ones do as well but I'd have to check.

Something happened yesterday that i cant stop thinking about. I went out with the baby and when i got back my partner had shaved my 3 year olds hair off. He had lovely little curls and now half his head is basically shaved. He said it was only hair and he was messing about but my little boy was crying and didnt want anyone looking at him.

Maybe that sounds stupid compared to bigger problems but it really upset me. Hes only 3.

So you take all the kids over to the UK and stay in an Airbnb to give birth at a local hospital?

That seems absolutely insane and actually pretty unfair but thats an aside.

Maybe you need to leverage your DPs family here. If they're in the UK, cant you all travel back to the UK for you to give birth, and then you just refuse to head back to Poland after the birth and get your partnwrs family to apply pressure on him to stay in the UK?
Obviously thats a messy solution but I dont see that you have options.

Women become pregnant by their abusers all the time sometimes it’s the only way to appease them and keep themselves and their children safe. This is ignorant.
not that ops husband is necessarily abusive but he does have some harmful traits for sure.

Op I would focus on trying to make friends now are there any baby groups like pregnancy yoga in Poland?

I also dont understand why you would go through the hassle of having all your births in the UK when your life is in Poland? Im assuming Poland in 2026 is a pretty advanced "first world" country with the health serbice to match?

This is the best advice so far if the children would be happier living in the uk and that’s quite a stretch as all they’ve known is life in Poland

Maybe you could suggest to partner that you all just try coming to England for the year so you can get nhs treatment and have some friends for maternity leave and children can improve their English and decide if they want to do uni in England, then you’ll go back to Poland. And see how you all feel at the end of the year. If the kids are happy and settled he won’t be able to force you to uproot them again.

Agree.

Leave and come home. Bring all your children with you. Go back to your home town and join the council house waiting list- you should be prioritised for housing as a pregnant single mother with a care background. Going to your home town is important as it gives you a local connection which helps with housing.

Call Citizens Advice in the U.K. or email them from Poland but make sure he can’t see your emails/calls.

Agree re calling Women’s Aid.

You’re in an abusive relationship. If you get home you need to be wary of men who will try and get in to your life too soon, potentially as a way of getting to your children.

Do you have any money and do your boys speak English?

A polish friend of mine told me recently that they don’t have a welfare system in Poland. Everyone has to work.

Oh yeah, and how's she supposed to do that?

Magically find the money for 6 airfares and an AirBnb in the UK for an indefinite period of time, sneak 5 kids out in the middle of the night and deal with accusations of kidnapping at some point? Shes pregnant with her sixth child, I doubt she has any money of her own.

Also contact the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office or the British embassy in Poland. Say you’re a British national living in Poland in an abusive relationship and you need help being repatriated. They should help you.

Hope do they all live for the year?

Her repatriation is not the problem. She is free to go. The children, on the other hand, are polish citizens and to remove them without their fathers permission is kidnap

I know someone who did this.

It works if the dad doesn’t fight for a retrieval. Which they often don’t because they realise they will be doing all the child care 24/7

It’s a gamble.

You could come to UK early under cover of the birth, settle in, speak to charities and councils. Then refuse to go back.

Is that kidnapping? I don’t think so because you all agreed to bring them here. It would be him who’s leaving. Not you taking them.

Genuinely curious - what do PPs consider abusive here? OP’s partner is clearly highly unpleasant and not a good partner/father/man/human, but what could be said to be abusive? I may have missed something.

Not sure about that but I like the sound of it.

A quick google says this isn't true, and for parents, the system is a lot more generous than in the UK. Maybe they were just referring to Universal Credit vs the Polish unemployment benefits, which are a bit scanty. You will need to stay in Poland because of his parental rights, but that's not such a bad thing - there will be a lot more opportunities there for your children as the economy is growing fast.

They are still polish citizens. The Hague convention is to prevent mothers allowing her children to visit her exs home country and him refusing to return them. This is the same.

OP gets £800 per month for her 5 children just in child benefit.
Poland pays approx £160 per month per child.

If they are staying in an Airbnb then they only agreed to bring them on holiday. The family residence is in Poland.

Interesting question, I thought the same, he seems to have some ideas about masculinity that come from 1950"s movies and he cut his son"s hair short, apart from that what is he doing? And why would you have six kids with someone who is unpleasant, not a good partner/father/man/human?

Yes but he’s got to convince a U.K. court of that. Travelling to the U.K. so all the kids are born and registered here and continuing to do that shows intent to what?

OP could argue the agreed intent was always to move back to the U.K., he’s going to have to argue no it wasn’t he just wanted to defraud the nhs?

@tryingtogohome Tell him you ought to live close to his mother in England so that you can help her when she's frail. And be close to his family. Just lie.

It’s a good point!

I would be looking for a short term let over summer. If you can get the best of 3 months in and apply to schools then that’s not a holiday. OP comes at 30 weeks. 2 weeks PP is 3 months.

Coming to have your children in uk and then return to Poland each time could actually show as defrauding the NHS. Coming here for free treatment and returning.it doesn’t prove they you are habitually a resident of UK. many people that wee born here and had children here when returning fail the habitual residency test. Coming back is not an automatic right when it comes to claiming benifits and social housing.

It doesn’t matter where they are born or what passport they hold. They are habitually polish residents. They will have a life, schools etc in Poland. A court will consider thst they were here for a holiday with intent to return and she is stopping their return. This will be backed up by friends and her husbands work etc. The courts will send them back and she will lose custody.