Advice need about DS saying we hit him

[Dee4567]

Hi everyone,

My wife could not write this, so I decided to log in for her.
We have a 5.5 year old son, that currently attends SK.

Back in November, he was attending Beaver Scouts, and the "kind" neighbour offered to drive my son, because her son went as well, and I would pick them up. After the fact, we have realized how insane this woman is, and how emotionally abusive she is to her children. I do not make that statement lightly.

So one day we get a call from social services! Concerns about our physical discipline of our son! We do not even physically discipline (spanked a few times long ago, doesn't work!). The accusations were that I strangle my boy, I was mortified, and am traumatized to this day. I cannot sleep the whole night, and I walk the house ... if light comes through the window, I am terrified it is them coming to take my son. The interviewed him, by himself (it is allowed under law here). The case was closed, with "no findings", but like all files, is put in a database for "record keeping". I have never been through such a stressful situation in my life before this happened.

After all this, our son told us this neighbour would not let him out of the car seat, and threatened she was going to take him away from us. We know who it is, because her son bullies our son now, and taunts him by saying, "Your daddy squeezes your neck." He comes home crying. I regret the day we ever met these people. None of the accusations were true. I have no idea why he said it.

I am now on blood pressure meds, and have a slight general anxiety as a result of all this.

Yesterday he told me the teacher "forced him", which after discussing with him, turned out to be that she just held his hand, and because his skin was dry, the skin had a small crack on it. We do use lotion. Anyways, I do not think there is any correlation, he just put both together in his head.

Today, the teacher called, and said our son told everyone in circle time that "Mommy hits me." Of course, there are no marks on him. Wife admits he was throwing a tantrum (which are extreme), and was trying to get his attention, and flicked his cheek with her fingers. I checked when I got home, nothing, I took pictures to be sure. I had a long talk with him, and am confident nothing of substance occurred. I discussed better strategy with my spouse, she felt at the time that she had ran out of options ... Yes, I trust her, but when you have been through what we have ...

We are meeting with the teachers to discuss his behaviour, which has steadily gotten worse since the social services visit back in November, for which I do not understand why it has gotten worse. Maybe it is just coincidence.

I am so terrified social services will be called again, even though there is no abuse. The teacher says she has no concerns, but that does not mean someone else in the room would not make an anonymous report. What I am even more terrified about is that this will continue for years to come!

I have read about other children that say things like this, but when social services have already been involved ... it makes me want to cry. What do I do?

-so worried

Firstly if DS was strangled there would be a mark. My DS told me that his dad was strangling him once. After loads of talking he said "he strangled my risk" (his wrist) and basically what had happened is DS has darted towards a road and his dad had grabbed his wrist to stop him dying. His dad isn't with me and it worried me until I got to the bottom of it.

It is not illegal to smack children, although the I would argue it is wrong. Very wrong. It's only illegal to leave a mark on them, so as long as he was checked for marks and there was none, you should be fine

I feel so sorry for you that this has happened, but I don't think it's surprising that your son's behaviour has got worse since the social services interview. It sounds like this has been an incredibly stressful time for all of you, and that anxiety is bound to have an effect on your son's sense of wellbeing. Your son probably picks up a lot of your tension and your fear about having him "taken away" has probably been reinforced by the crazy neighbour and by the strange people who have interviewed him.

Without wanting to scare you, I would just ask if you've considered seeking legal counsel over this situation? Am I right in thinking that you are not an English national - a few points in your post made me want to ask - if so it might be prudent to seek an advocate as these situations can sometimes get out of hand when local authorities are involved.

A similar thing happened to me when my ds was the same age. He told a teacher that I hit him when I never ever did such a thing. It was also because he had witnessed a neighbour hitting her kids. The welfare teacher called me in and I told them it was not true but it was incredibly stressful. I was so so upset and felt terrible to have been put into that position. All I can say is that nothing happened afterwards, I think they should need a lot more proof but the school said they would keep a record which I remember thinking was terribly unfair. He was otherwise a very happy and well adjusted kid going through a stress patch.