Hi there, I’m hoping to get some advice from you all. It’s a very complex situation that I’m currently going through with my children’s father.
He had access to the kids every second weekend until April this year when I received a phone call from the police saying my 8 year old had to phone an ambulance for her dad as the kids had found him unresponsive. He was charged with child neglect…I’ve still not heard of the outcome of the case. The police said he was definitely under the influence of something. Turns out to be a heroin addiction and is currently going through treatment. I also have an understanding of potential other substance abuse, prescription drugs and alcohol.
After the incident, social work came out and spoke to me but closed the case as I told them there would be no unsupervised contact.
He hasn’t seen them since the incident but has had irregular phone calls whenever he decides and I monitor these calls carefully, however there is a definite apparent decline in his drug treatment and I can now tell (I wasn’t able to before) when he is under the influence of something.
Recently I’ve been thinking that because there has been no outcome of the charges, there’s no social work protection and no court orders that he still has full parental rights, this bothers me massively as if something was to happen to me…they would go straight to him.
Granted he most likely wouldn’t have them for long however it would probably be an already traumatic situation for the kids and my family and the last thing I would want is for them to be put through any court battles etc.
Is there anyway that I can have his rights taken away? If not is there anyway I can have something in place so the kids are 100% not placed in his care? Legally what can I do?
Any advice would be amazing. Thank you 🙏🏻🙏🏻