My children told the school I neglect and hit them

[Charliechaplin1988]

I got a call from a social worker after an argument with my daughter over her buss pass being lost again . They went to both my daughters who said they were scared of me and I wasn’t looking after them correctly (I am mid divorce and they are a bit older and I will say my standards have droppee ) but noyhing I can’t fix like more effort at dinner time and more effort with making sure they’ve taken the right equipment . Mt children were removed from me that day and given to my parents and are now being interviewed by police over claims I assult them ! I have pulled them apart and whacked their legs when they were going hell for leather on each other but I can’t believe it’s got here. We are so incredibly close and having them away from me is breaking me. Will I get them back ? I’m their only parent ?!! We’ve been together just us for 11 years as they weren’t close to their step dad and I feel like I’m dying inside. There’s much work I neee to do but everyone is agasijt me ( apart from my children ) who I saw at the weekend and still adore their mother as they have no gravity of the situation ) I’m so so scared

You sound like you know things have slipped v badly. I would be apologising to the kids in front social services if possible. No minimising. No excuses. Just a heartfelt “sorry for everything that has gone wrong”. Then I would be listening. Really listening to what your children tell you.
if they are scared of you, they are scared of you. Is it because you are shouting at them, threatening them, out of control in some way (other than the hitting which is clearly not good). In my experience living in a tense household with an unpredictable adult is a v frightening thing for a child or teen.
Once you know exactly what they feel and think, you need to address each aspect of your parenting that is not up to scratch. Ask for help and advice from the professionals. There may be parenting classes nearby where you can get help and support. There may be online courses. If the drinking is an issue (and it sounds like it is) get rid of the alcohol and go teetotal. You may be close to losing your children. This will ruin your life and probably theirs.
Put together a tangible plan with action points to be a better more present parent. Apologise to your parents. Ask for support. Be prepared to hear some difficult home truths.
it sounds as if you are taking this extremely seriously and you are right to do so. Take ownership of your behaviour. Show obvious improvements. Cut the wallowing, histrionics and listen to how you speak to your children.
You can turn this around but you need to step up and grow up and put your children first.

I admire your courage in posting on here- but in reality your children aren’t “ babies” any more , and no matter how great a mum you were in the past , currently they are BOTH scared of you, feel neglected and continuously get sent into school with no or the wrong equipment whilst you ( at your own admission) “ wallow”. It does sound like you are minimising the effect this is having on your children - who absolutely would not be removed for one leg smack. I think you need to try and focus on getting yourself back to your old self ( whether that requires meds or therapy or whatever) whilst you are showing determined intent to make the home better for your children ( parenting classes etc). Social services will only be interested in what is best for the children , and unfortunately won’t be particularly interested in excuses. There will have almost certainly been a trail of “ issues” before social services acted ( eg school saying clothes were dirty, children hungry, not getting into school on time , being without lunch pack or lunch money, being emotionally exhausted/ anxious, tired at school etc etc. Not saying all of those apply, but it isn’t a one slap and social services swoop in ; sadly they are way too overwhelmed for that ).

Depends where OP lives, illegal in Wales and Scotland.

Hope you are ok OP there are some absolute saints on here bashing you. You are human and recognise you’ve dropped the ball big time. I hope your meeting went ok. I guess it’s best to just be honest with anyone whos involved now and explain how you’ve been struggling. I would be surprised if your children didn’t come home. Social services try so hard to keep families together and hopefully will work with you. Good luck.

Social workers and courts take a child focussed approach. So do everything you can to get them back by focussing on their needs. Your divorce and mental health are part of the context. Contact GP, review meds, show yoh are taking action. Read up on the negative impact of physical snacking and show remorse and that it was a one off due to handling the situation badly on that occasion.
plan a 2 week rota of meals around kid’s favourites involving them in the divisions and involving them in the cooking. Show this to the social workers on next meeting. Show willing and show that you will step up. Also show the kids that. Apologise to them for not handling things better. I know it’s hard. Divorce is so hard on you and kids. If you do everything you can to put it right I would imagine they will sort it out with you and restore the kids back with you. Stay strong, stay smart, stay child focussed. Hugs x

If what you have presented is the truth it comes as across as complete overreach by the authorities. There doesn’t seem to be immediate danger.

meanwhile children that are being sexually abused, starved, tortured go under the radar. There doesn’t seem to be anything going on which needed immediate removal and couldn’t have been through supervision and support.

OP you are a single parent. Yes stop drinking and think about therapy but don’t fall for the crap from the domestic warriors in here who thinks anything less than 7 home cooked meals a week equals neglect. Two parents here and we rarely cook during the week. (Call SS!).

how old are your children - they should be helping . If they can’t cook peel potatoes or veg. Load dishwasher, help fold clothes, hoover.

i suggest you also ask for family counselling so their behaviour is addressed.

Can we all just remember before berating the OP that everyone as a parent gets to the end of their tether occasionally. I know this does not make smacking a child acceptable but it IS NOT totally illegal in England. The law states it is illegal to do so on purpose but not if it is to effect dicipline. Which is a grey area.

I was brought up in a generation that was smacked at home and had chalk rubbers thrown at us in school and where my brother had his hands whacked with a ruler by teachers, a time where a police officer could drag you home by the ear. If they could still do this Im sure a lot of louts out there now would think twice about their behaviour.
We had a LOT more respect for our elders and for authority, even if that was born out of fear. What we did not do was was go bawling to whoever to accuse those teachers, police and parents of abuse. We still loved our parents too.
The OP admits to failings but think about what she has gone through bringing up her children alone for 11 years, going through relationship issues and probably more.
Some of the posters on here must be oh so perfect given the replies, and have had such lovely upbringings with gentle patient parents who never had issue, well good for them. I for one symapthise with her and am sorry she now has tow the line with an over zealous system that does a great job sometimes but a system that also victimises normal loving parents because they are soft targets.

And dont get me started on SS across the counties in their total failure to protect the children of the now outed rape gangs. They refused to get involved in this and we are berating a mum on here who has had a hard time.
Hang your heads in shame.

I think maybe your kids thought we will teach her, tell the teacher and she will ring mom and tell her off, but it's gone further than they expected. Or they really didn't want to go home to you because of the way youve been with them. Has there been other instances that have scared them? Whatever it is I think you need to be honest and straight with SS and accept any help your offered. If DC are allowed back I'd imagine SS will be keeping a close eye on you for a while.
I hope things work out for you all. In future, go into a room and punch a pillow or scream when they're misbehaving, that way nobody gets hurt or reported.

It sounds like you needed this intervention. It’s never okay to hit, smack, whack or whatever people want to call it. It’s a sign of the parent losing control rather than any effective way of handling poor behaviour. I know it’s hard but see if as a positive a fresh start with the help and support you need.

Social services are under pressure to NOT take children from families.
IMO children know when they are not safe,not being cared for,and frightened of a parent.
Home should be a safe place where children can relax.In all honesty,in your heart of hearts, is that true of your children’s home with You?

It takes a lot for SS to remove your children. Please don’t minimize what’s happened if you want them back. If you’ve been told not to be alone with them why are they sleeping in bed with you at your parents?

Its really quite interesting how attitudes towards punishment of children has changed over the years. Of course, I hope that the OP and her children are helped by Social Services and manage to have a loving relationship in the future.

I've spent almost 28 years trying to pretend that I'm sad about my father dying when I was 20 yrs old. I'm surrounded by work colleagues who have lost their father's due to illness. One only 2 years ago. I even feel that I have to act sad around my relatives. Because surely, that's normal right ? To be sad about a dead parent.

In actual fact, my father was extremely violent towards me. I got dragged across the room, thrown on the sofa and beaten violently as a teen just for asking why we couldn't go abroad on holiday like my friends. I also got the slipper, belt, bath brush as did my younger brother. I wish I'd spoken about the abuse to my teachers at school in the 80s. I was born in 75. I doubt Social Services would have come knocking as smacking was acceptable in the 70s and 80s.

As a grown up woman, I still feel really angry at the abuse I got as a child/teen. I wish I'd rung the police but only very public landline in the house back then. Where was my mother you might ask. Well, she was the verbally abusive one and is still alive. But lives 120 miles away from me.

People are being so horrible to the OP.

Sorry @Grammarnut, but myself and my siblings were all born before 1986 and not one of us was smacked. My father was born in the 1950s and he was never smacked (my mother was a different story, bless her). None of us turned out as bad people, none of us needed to be smacked, we were raised by competent parents who didn’t have to resort to physical violence to raise their children.

You can say what you want but there is no justification for what you did. You lost control of the situation and you took it out on a small person who has little understanding of risk awareness due to their age. It was a you problem, not your kids problem and not societies - you and you alone.

OP - I haven’t been in your situation but I echo what others have said - be as up front and honest as you can and work with SS and the police. Hopefully if the situation is as black and white as you say they will help you all work together so you can be a family again. Get to the doctors, get some support and medication if you need to. Now is the time for you to do what you need to do for your kids. It will be hard, but you can do it.

What do you mean over reach? No immediate danger? The children said their mum hits them and they are scared of her. The response was completely proportionate.

OP I think you need to ask your GP for a medication review. You might need a higher dose or different medication. You’re clearly going through a difficult time.

I disagree

My parents smacked me in the 70s. Was it normal at that time? Yes, I think so

Did it cause long term damage to my relationship wirh them? Sadly, yes

Did I smack my own children? No way, never, having seen the damage it caused

OP, your children told social work they're frightened of you. I really do hope you can repair the relationship, but it won't be easy

And yet strangely enough those of us who were brought up in the days when parents slapped their children aren't the ones massively suffering with mental health issues now. It seems to me the younger generations have been far more damaged.

I think the pile on to posts like this is always really sad. The OP has admitted she’s struggling and sorry but whacking someone’s legs if they’re fighting and serving them spaghetti on toast every night for a month doesn’t constitute abuse. OP I am sorry you are struggling. I don’t know anything about SS and how they will help in this situation but maybe it’s best you all sat down and talked this out as it sounds like there may be some issues with your kids that you haven’t considered

I don’t agree with smacking, but I don’t agree with your analogy either. A man “grounding” his wife would be coercive control. A man banning his wife from seeing friends who he though were toxic for her, giving her a curfew, making her eat “healthy” food she didn’t want to eat, sending to her for her room for arguing, cutting off her pocket money (financial support in adult terms) for misbehaving etc etc would all be unacceptable to. You can’t compare most aspects of parenting with a relationship between two adults.

I think it is a sad situation when a mother cannot stop her secondary school age children from possibly hurting each other.
The children ought to be grateful someone cares enough to impose boundaries that they overstepped. I hope OP has support and love from her friends and family

Can you seriously not think of a single other reason why teens struggle more with their mental health now than they did 40-60 years ago? Are you honestly saying that kids today atruggle because they aren’t hit enough?

How so? Where is your evidence?

It only takes five minutes to learn that all previous generations had serious mental health conditions, they were just covered up or laughed off. The difference is now we discuss things openly and deal with them.

Beating children doesn’t make them grow up to be stable humans, it makes them grow up to think they can’t express any negative emotions because they’ve been told those emotions are wrong.

I just asked my 30 something kids how they felt about how they were diciplined and yes they had an occasional smack when they were acting apallingly or dangerously, their response was " God how did you not beat us regularly and just lock us in our rooms, we were awfull to you" They also said :"god help us if you knew half of what we really got up too"
They are well rounded happy adults.
Lets not forget that kids can be little 💩especially at certain hormonal stages of life who push parents to the utter limits.

To the OP
one day your kids will hopefully apologise to you for making you suffer this and be thankfull for all the happy years you gave them

Dont tarr everyone with the same brush. There is a vast difference between a beating and an occasional smack. Those of us that had the latter do just laugh it off now and be stable humans with a great parent relationship. We had RESPECT.
We have a snowflake generation now. You cant say boo to some of them without them bawling victimisation of some sort. There are 11 year olds threatening parents with SS if they dont get their own way or they scream deprivation if a parent cant afford something they want, there are 13 year olds stabbing other kids etc etc this is a generation gone wrong because of lack of respect, boundaries and discipline because parenting now belongs to the pathetic nanny state. Teachers cant even sit an unhappy child on their knee, nusery workers have to ask a baby to consent to a nappy change......I could go on and on...........The world has gone mad!!