2 year old left for whole weekend!

[redrobin]

just heard on the radio that some feckless mothr left her 2 year old alone for the whole weekend while she went to stay with her boyfriend! appara police found the toddler in a dirty vest and nappy crying for help. being charged with neglect, cruelty etc. God help us. She should be neutered!!

oooh well said georgie!!!!

stitch-maybe nobody actually knew it was happening?

georgie, i am not defending her. i am questioning why she is the only one being blamed

bollocks stitch, what is she blind deaf and dumb too?

yes-well said georgie!

No-one is defending this woman that I can see.

I just happen to not believe in capital or corporal punishment. So comments of "hang her" and "leave her in a room with me for 5 mins" certainly dont make me feel superior, rather more they make my stomach turn.

diva, if they didnt, then that is even worse!

a child is not born in a vacuum. most kids are born in hospitals where records are kept. most people dont live on remote islands by themselves so no one notices they are pregnant. if no one knew thiswas happening, then that make sit even worse. that a tiny baby should be suffering so, without anyone being aware of it?
did she live in a massive detached house, with acres of garden all round so the neighbour couldnt hear him crying?
it makes me want to cry.

Because he was her child, not the farking neighbour's downstairs that's why!! Not the grandparents', or the GP's, or the social worker's child either. Hers.

And as an aside, presumably, when water started coming through their ceiling, it was the neighbours that raised the alarm.

If she was so depressed etc etc etc, how did she manage to function to pull boyfriend and get her shit together for a weekend at his place?

Oh, this is the internet equivalent of banging my head against a wall. I'm going to lurk now.

really fd? so is you should drop dead, then no one should care for your kids? because there birth parent is gone? is that what you are advocating?
just because you have finally done it, a you say, doesnt mean that evryone has the inner strentgh that you have.
this woman may be an evil evil person. but she does not live in a vacuum. that is what we need to remember

Stitch - I'm sure, that if the GP's are in the picture then they are all asking themselves the same question and blaming themselves. I don't think they should face criminal charges (as you seem to be suggesting) because as far as I can see they have not committed a criminal act. The "mother" has and has also been deemed fit to stand trial and has been found guilty of several charges of neglect and cruelty. She must therefore face the consequences of her actions.

I am sure, however, that there is much hand-wringing and wails of, "Oh if only we'd known," but the fact of the matter is there are places to go for help. If she'd wanted to abandon her child there are better ways to do it (police station or whatever) than just leaving him alone in the flat over the weekend.

Agree stitch. It's a sad state of affairs that there is no-one else in this persons life that cares much either - immediate family, friends, hv's etc.

yes, georgie, but we have established that she wa a crap, unfit mother. therefore, other people should have stepped up and shown there humanity.
or are you advocating that we leave a lost and hurt little child alone on the streets because we are not their parents? do we not have a moral responsiblity to at least alert proper authorities who can find someone to care for the child properl?y

no?

vvv, thank you for putting that so succintly. and dryad.
no. obviously legal charges will only be brought against themother. but, unless people learn from this, then no amount of handwringing, and discussing of this is going to be of any use.

Stitch - if anything happens to FDI we had better hope that the other birth parent doesn't get custody as he is a cock of the highest order (sorry FDI - did you get my MSN's btw?)

I have help around me from family and friends because I ask for it. If this woman didn't ask, or was hostile to her extended family and/or ostracised from her neighbours then it's very likely she wouldn't have had that help.

At the end of the day, we're not designed to bring children up in a vacuum, in nuclear families. We're designed to have an extended family around us to help with childcare - if this woman was depressed she could have seen her GP, she could have asked social services for help, she could have been in touch with her parents or her IL's or whoever. I do find it difficult to believe that there was no-one in her life she could have confided in if she was struggling. What about the friend she claimed was supposed to be babysitting? I do think she needs to face up to the consequences of her actions - she obviously isn't mentally ill as she's been deemed fit to stand trial. As Divstrop said - sometimes people just leave their kids. It happens.

Yes, yes, obviously that is what I think, how clever you are to understand me so completely. Hurt, lost little children should be left on the streets. They could be redeployed as chimney sweeps, or sent down mines.

It doesn't seem to have occurred to you that there may have been no signs, no signals, just a silly selfish bitch who couldn't be bothered anymore. That makes lots of people angry, including me. Why don't you join us, it must be lonely on that pedestal.

And just as an aside, if you think the state is the catch all, caring, suitable replacement parent ideal for this situation, then you obviously have little experience of what really happens to children in care (and yes, I did note that you work in this area).

A lost and hurt child alone on the streets is very different to a child who is with their mother though Stitch. Because if you think a mother is not coping and you offer to help, as a neighbour, or friend then you run the risk of judging them! And we couldn't have that, could we?

Look - i agree with you, fwiw! I also think it's a sad state of affairs when a child is left in such appalling conditions because friends and neighbours or whoever felt that they couldn't intervene! But that's the society we live in now - people live their own lives, in their own little boxes, and we leave other people alone because, well, it's just what we do. Do you know your neighbours well enough to go round and make sure they're coping? Because I know both sides very well - and i'm fairly sure they've heard me not coping very well at all and screaming and sobbing at ds when i've been in the throes of PND, and yet we meet up for a glass of wine, or we go into the others' garden for a barbeque, and does it get mentioned? Of course not. They wouldn't want to offend me, of course!

I think the defining issue in this case though is that evidence presented in the trial indicated that the child had experienced some level of neglect for at least a year.

One whole year.

HVs, GPs, friends, neighbours and family didn't notice this? It went on a whole year, and no-one heard this child crying through hunger, neglect or whatever? The HV didnt bother with checks? I got chased around for regular clinic and development checks by my HV and she had no cause for concern. This is what stitch means. This child had endured this for half it's life and it was only 'discovered' by chance because of a leak into the flat below. That's appalling, you have to admit, surely?

i actually agree with stitch, yes the choice she made was very very very bad and negligent. she deserves to be punished in some way and lose the child and certainly at the very least have parenting lessons and mental assesments before being allowed to start a family again.

you have all agreed in your posts that you dont know the woman in question or her background. im not saying it is anyone elses fault but hers. but i do think that she may not be deserving of all the names she is having thrown at her atm.

it is clear to me that she has a difficult relationship with her extended family, if any relationship at all, as ime as a once single parent if i had left my dd alone some one in my family would have noticed before a weekend. and the childs father is clearly not in the picture or he would have been have in the news baying for blood too.

what if she was all alone with this child, didnt know where she could turn for help and had had this child with her every minute of day for two years?

what if she herself had been neglected badly as a child and just didnt know how to parent properly? as she has never had proper parenting herself.

there is a background to this story that we dont know. i agree she should never have done this and that it is her fault. but do you all really think that she deserves sterilising and beating? or hung? i didnt realise that i was bringing my dc's up in that sort of country. surely the girl deserves help, mentally and socially as well, or even instead of punishment?

No - i totally agree VVV! Look, I'm agreeing with you and Stitch, I've got my agreeing face on!

but...

I am not chased for checks by my HV, despite the fact that I have gone, cap in hand to my GP begging for cognitive behavioural therapy to help with my depression (i haven't had it btw). I do not have to attend clinics. I am monitored by nobody, except dh and my extended family (my parents, IL's etc).

So yes, it's utterly appalling and shocking that nobody noticed, or gave a shit enough to report her for neglect. And it's truly horrific that this child suffered the abuse that he did. But it's not entirely surprising, is it, when you think about the world that we live in, and way that our society actually works.

And it's all very well to say, "Someone should've done something!" but would you? Really? Because I can't put my hand on my heart and say that I would, unless I had real, concrete evidence that this child was suffering in the way he was.

It is appalling, there's no argument there.

But neglect can be very subtle - a child can appear to be fed, clothed and apparently cared for but very few of us know what goes on behind the closed doors of a stranger, and as we live in a free society that's how it should be.

That doesn't excuse what this woman has done. But I find it hard to be as sympathetic as some of you - I can't assume she is depressed or finding it hard to cope necessarily, maybe she is just a shit mum? As sad as it is there are women who just don't give a shit. They might not beat their children or lock them in cupboards but their children aren't cared for in an appropriate way, often due to apathy and ignorance.

I'm not of the hang 'em and skin' em brigade, but stop placing the blame on others for not being a mother to that poor child - he had a mother, she was just crap.

At least by now he should be in a happy caring family.

micci - totally agree that the names being bandied about on here are over the top and ridiculous. Thankfully we are not living in a country where sterlising her and beating her are an option, and i'm sure the people on this thread would not like to live in such a country. Also, hopefully, as well as being punished in prison she will be rehabilitated to the extent that when she comes out she will be a more normal human being, able to cope better. I feel sorry for her, to be honest, because at some point she'll realise what she did and i can think of no worse punishment, tbh.

Yes, I would urban. Because I know that if there was nothing untoward going on, SS would make enquiries, find nothing wrong, and close the case, as it were.

VVV - see, i'm not sure about that. Because unfortunately, SS have been known to go overboard and remove children from homes for reasons best known to themselves when cases of neglect have been reported. So I would have to have clear evidence that there was real harm being done before i reported a mother to SS, because if i'm wrong then there could be a mother hauled up on neglect charges or having her child removed when there's no need.

I certainly don't think that people should be calling for her death but I do stand by my previous point that people like this should be sterilized.

But I do wonder at the need to justify these cases these days. "oh she must have been ill/maybe she had pnd/she needed help not judgement" (not exact quotes but that is so often the suggestion when these cases come to light).

Why can people not accept that there are selfish people out there who are not fit to be parents? Why in the name of God should we be looking to offer these people support and, god forbid, parenting classes so that they might parent their future children better? Future children? you think that if you neglect your child to the extent you will face a custodial sentence you should be able to go on and have more children? Really?

If this was a man would people still be sympathetic? Because I really don?t think they would. Certainly not to the extent of suggesting there may have been mental health issues. But it?s as if people are unable to comprehend how another woman could treat her child in this way, and yet some women just are not good mothers, or didn?t plan to be mothers in the first place and when baby comes along they realize that they still want their old life and baby is just an inconvenience.

As for society playing an active part, well in an ideal world that might happen, but in the world we live in now people live miles away from their extended families, don?t know their neighbours, and you only have to look at posts on here to know what people think of health visitors.

I haven?t seen my hv since ds was 1. I had no need to. I saw the gp when ds had ear infections etc but if this child hadn?t had any illnesses, or if the mother was as neglectful as seems to have been the case she might not have bothered with the gp for illness. And the neighbours.. well if I?m honest I would certainly think twice before reporting a child to social services. What basis would you have really, that the child was crying? 2 year olds cry, it?s what they do. So unless there was actual evidence that the child was being neglected I don?t think I would be looking to report in case they took drastic action and removed a child who actually wasn?t in any danger.

I have little sympathy with her. If she hadn?t wanted a baby she could have had a termination, if she didn?t feel she could go through with a termination she could have given him up for adoption. She could have contacted ss and had him taken into care while she got her act together. Even the most uneducated people have heard of social services. But instead she chose to leave him alone, locked in the kitchen, so she coud have a weekend away. It?s unforgiveable imo, and at the end of the day it doesn?t matter how much you think society was to blame, the buck stopped with her, and she is the one responsible.