4yo being silly - CPS called on us by school

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Our life feels like it's been turned upside over a silly comment my reception aged child said to their teacher that her and my DH have been eating crayons out each others bottoms.

We've ended up with social services knocking on our doors and my DH is being investigated. It is absolute nonsense, she's 4 and says stupid things like this all the time about a variety of people. My DH is being investigated as sexually abusing her now. That's one issue and I'm hoping he's found innocent in their eyes as he's been kicked out the house by then.

But how do I handle comments like this moving forward so it doesn't happen again. She tells lies and imaginary stories that I know aren't true and this time it's ended up with us being in real trouble.

My DH is being investigated as sexually abusing her now. That's one issue and I'm hoping he's found innocent in their eyes as he's been kicked out the house by then.
So you have kicked him out for something else?

Sorry not clear, they told him he has to leave if she's here.
He's completely distraught and a brilliant father. No doubts at all about him.

I think you shouldn’t overthink this.

Firstly it’s only a good thing that this is being taken seriously. We have definitely seen the government let other children down and that’s the worser scenario.

All you can do is await the outcome of the investigation and comply. If they feel no further action is required then that’s fine.

Your daughter naturally will face consequences and I don’t mean that in a horrible way. I don’t think she should be punished over this. I mean that she will naturally learn boundaries eg her comment led to her speaking to the CPS and explaining more about what she meant. As she matures and gets older, she will learn what not to joke about. I really don’t think you should tell her off or act like she’s a troublemaker because that may put her off reporting real abuse in the future.

Ultimately you may need a birds and bees talk with her and a conversation so she understands what kind of touching is inappropriate. You can’t expect a 4 year old to understand the gravity of their words otherwise

I probably wouldn’t have taken that comment seriously. I wonder if your DD has said something else when questioned.

Last year, DD and her friend (both 5) were playing at the park and they were both saying silly things and laughing. DD’s friend said something about sticking her head up her dad’s bottom and I didn’t take much notice. Later she said “sometimes I suck my daddy’s willy”. She said it twice, so I knew I’d heard her correctly. It seemed a strange thing for a child that age to say.

I did report it and either the police or social services went and spoke to the family. But they accepted it was probably just silly talk and took no further action.

That sounds awful.

is this the only concern the school have had OP? Because that’s the kind of nonsense little kids say all the time- and I hesitate to believe that school would have reported AND SS would have taken this so seriously, without other safeguarding concerns.

Are you in the UK? Social services would not ask a man to leave his home over that comment in any county I know. Eating crayons out of each others bottoms is a silly childish thing to say and not something that would be genuinely considered an allegation in most cases

I am not so sure. Here is a story of Lucy Allan MP (from 18:00 )

That is a very specific thing to say- they are right to investigate it. Keep your mind open OP, there may be more to this.

I promise this is all that was said, it's absolutely ridiculous. I got a call from them yesterday at 4.30pm and they turned up at my house at 6pm. My DH has had to stay with family and not allowed back.

Can I also point out only 2 hours earlier in the day I got a call from the school to say my daughter has been pushed by a student and knocked on her head. So I thought the call to our home was about that.

They only told us this lunch time what my husband was being investigated for and we've both just laughed because it's just something she'd say and can't work out how she's built that up. It's so random. Crayons from a bum? Really?

There are always outliers and exceptions of course, but I have a number of friends and family members who work in childrens services and in teaching, and believe me, they are now SO overwhelmed, the bar is SO high for action to be taken, and there are SO many kids who are not only at risk of harm but clearly are being harmed, that are not being followed up on, that I would be enormously surprised to hear that any local authority had the capacity to allow for this single comment being the trigger. But as I say. There are always outliers and perhaps the OP really is one, and is lucky enough to to live in an area with well resourced childrens services that have time to follow up on single instances of a child talking what sounds like pure nonsense.

Why are you immediately judging this as “pure nonsense” though? It’s a child describing inappropriate things in child terms but that doesn’t immediately make it a lie. The government wouldn’t be upholding due diligence by ignoring this comment, they obviously need to cover their own backs and go in with an open mind eg that the child isn’t immediately branded a liar.

It sounds like you’ve been hellishly unlucky then, OP. The best thing for you to do is to comply with their requests, and trust that truth outs. And of course, you mustn’t blame your daughter.

I work for social services and they absolutely do ask the parent to leave for a comment like this whilst their investigation is ongoing. Usually it is for a night or two until the child has been interviewed and possibly examined. It can be longer if there is a doubt about what is going on or if the social worker is slow off the mark.

i didn’t say it was pure nonsense. I said that it sounds like pure nonsense- which in isolation of course it does. It sounds exactly like the pure nonsense kids come out with all the time. My friends daughter told me that for lunch at nursery she had “poo sandwiches and wee for drink”. I didn’t call ofsted, because in context (of the child attending a professional nursery setting, rigged with cctv cameras, and photographic evidence of her eating a plate of lasagne at lunch in her journal) it is clearly a child talking nonsense.

What a waste of taxpayer money. For one single comment that's obviously childish nonsense, really? I could understand it if there was other concerns too, but for this one comment it seems ridiculous.

and yet it's enough for one staff member to trigger the procedure. So far, her husband has been kicked out of the house and I really hope that social services will drop the case instead of starting full machine. I am very sorry for OP

It's a horrendous thing to go through but ultimately a good thing. Social services will have to investigate hundreds of cases that ultimately turn out be nothing if they're going to prevent the next little Arthur or Star or Victoria.

In my experience abused children never come out and just say they're abused. Catching them is like putting together a jigsaw made of tiny pieces each one seeming completely insignificant on its own. In many cases one of the jigsaw pieces is completely innocuous things they've said but sometimes it will belie a truth. What will likely happen next is someone who is trained to deal with this will question your daughter to see what the craic is. Hopefully very quickly it will all have turned out to be a storm in a tea cup.

@harrumphh it seems like a waste of taxpayer money but I've seen two cases of quite serious neglect and abuse uncovered from someone being curious about a stupid comment a kid made.

It's awful for families but I suppose on balance they'd prefer to unfortunately remove some innocent people from their home for a couple of days than risk allowing even one child to remain in their home with an abuser after they've inadvertently told on them.

This makes me really sad.
My friend‘s daughter said exactly the same thing at the same age. It was immediately escalated and she was examined. She had been sexually abused by her father.

It’s is far better this ‚nonsense‘ is taken seriously otherwise I dread to think how many children would be let down.

SS can’t do right for doing wrong. Some of the comments on this thread make me seethe and sad in equal measure.

I also think this is awful situation for op and a waste of taxpayer's money. There should be a better way of determining any safeguarding issues in a case like that. Much faster, discreet, without causing so much stress on the family.
The child should've been gently questioned further at school, and if felt absolutely necessary, examined by a school nurse/ paediatrician.
All these lengthy, delayed, costly processes are not in the best interest of any child.

@MaggieBsBoat reading your comment makes me sad and change my opinion on this.
But still think, something quicker and more efficient needs to be put in place than for SS opening a case based on one sentence.

You have no choice but to go through the process. Your child will be interviewed, as will he and they will probably want to visit your home. They need to make sure she is safe.
If she is indeed just spouting silly 4 year old rubbish, you will need to have a good talk with her.

Your friend's daughter also said her parents were eating crayons out of each others' bottoms? I can't imagine you're telling the truth there, unless there's some kids' YouTube video where they joke about it or something and that's where the kids are getting it from.

If it's not true then it will all be cleared up. But if it were me I'd look at it like I'm glad these things are taken seriously.