DH's work is making me think the unthinkable.

[OrmRenewed]

DH is a teacher in a school for children with behavioural problems.

I rang him this afternoon. He said he'd had a pig of a day and sounded really down but he wouldn't talk about it in front of the DC. When I got home he told me about a boy of 15 with behavioural problems and learning difficulties that he teachers who had a meltdown in the classroom and DH had to take him out of the class. He is being taken from his respite care which he has loved to a permanent home and he was pissed off about it. "They can't do it Mr W, they just can't! They can't make me go!" angry and tearful. DH was near to tears when he told me this. This boy has been causing very disruptive and angry all week

Boys mother has OCD and learning difficulties. He's her 5th child and all of his siblings have been taken into care.

Don't tell me I'm the only one who thinks outrageously un-PC things about this boy's mum and why she has had 5 kids .

Please don't be too harsh. I know it's an awful thing to even think.

My school is not even a PRU it is a normal comp

Some of the parents make me very angry ... thinking un-PC stuff about them ... every day

No it's not Orm.
It's when you see the consequences of it, you want to scream "why?".
Not fair on the children. So not fair.

But the obvious answer is so unacceptable.

She has OCD and learning difficulties herself, she might have ended up with 5 children...you don't know anything about her cicumstances to make you think your 'un PC things'

What is your unacceptable obvious answer? I'm sorry that it isn't obvious enough to me that I have to ask...?

I am thinking more outrageous things about the man who knew about her OCD and learning difficulties and who didn't wear a condom anyway.

Have a back-rub, OrmRenewed.

Even as a parent, it's eye-opening. I'll never forget finding out about a horrible case of abuse in one of my children's classes, at the same time as another child (in a very caring home) died. It just seemed to throw the awfulness of neglect and abuse, when having children is such a privilege, into horrible relief.

I have to say, I think I cope by thinking a lot about the safety net. That's people like your dh, and teachers, and the various points of intervention, and I just hope, and try and (I guess politically) support that safety net.

I was going to post my mawkish hippy response, but it is very mawkish. It starts off from the premiss that life is a precious gift, and a good thing. But I think we all know that a significant number of these children are marked for life by these experiences. so it is a bit twee.

It's lovely that you care (we all should) but I also hope that lots of good things press upon you this weekend, and pull you away from the (possible) stomach-full-of-stones feeling these things can leave one with.

Thanks animula. I do keep thinking about him and about my eldest who is nearly the same age and how much I love him . Some of the children have inadequate parents and dreadful home lives and getting away from them is the best thing that can happen. DH doesn't let it get to him usually.

My un-PC thoughts is that she shouldn't have been allowed to have kids. And no, I don't blame her in the slightest, I don't blame anyone as such, it's just a tragic situation that has produced 5 more people with similar problems and a horrible start in life.

Of course the father of her DC might also have had learning difficulties. Who knows?

Someone very close to me went into social care because she felt the kids and their parents needed much more understanding. Twenty years on she's still as affectionate as ever with some really challenging kids but she thinks the unspeakable about the parents who keep on having children and then leave them running wild all hours of the night like pack dogs. You're not alone.

I work with some mothers with learning difficulties and, in my experience, these individuals need support. In the same way we need support as parents, but we, as people in the mainstream find that support more easy to come by. We (generally) are able to make friends and develop relationships, but parents with LD's have spent their whole lives being excluded and dealing with the fact that society does not approve of or respect them.

More could be done to support these parents. Not just each child having an allocated social worker which is sometimes necessary but costly and often ineffective. I'm talking about support from their peers. By that I mean, more people being available to mentor these Mums (they are Mums to their kids whether society approves or not), more people including these parents at the school gates/toddler groups, having a non judgemental influence to help them with the pitfalls of parenting we all struggle with. Often in these families situations get so extreme they have their chilren removed such as hygiene/nutrition/headlice etc. Particularly those who have multiple kids, often some who also have children with LDs, often profound LD's. IME the parents are trying very hard, but the lack of support and the stigma of asking for help when their kids are on the CP register prevents them from doing so.

My suggestion - reach out and offer the hand of friendship and swap numbers and then Mum with a LD may call you and ask how to get her kids to eat peas/remove headlice instead of asking her sw who must record this forever.

Also orm, your DH sound amazing! And so do you. I just see it from the other end in my job.

Thankyou.

I think we all have a filter that we wear so that we don't have to think too much about the sort of lives that some children live. It would send you crazy . DH's just slipped a bit last week

sulky - if I knew the mother I might well do that. I'm not a perfect parent, I can't be too judgy about others.

My experience is that Mums with LDs can often do very well.
If they love their kids but just don't have the intelligence to parent, they can often learn the basics.
That coupled with love will be okay.

It's the parents who don't care at all about their kids, that are the most difficult.

Well I don't know what sort of parent she was so I can't comment but to have 5 DC taken away she must have had problems

The boy had a good day at the new home, and then a day of majorly testing boundaries on Sunday and an unsettled day at school today. Poor bloody kid.