Social services..

[Lucas28]

apologise if this message is abit long.
I have 6 children, all aged between 12 and 6. My 8 year old son has always proved a little difficult for me to handle. His behaviour at home is really defiante. Everything is a chore, he doesn't get on well with his siblings because of his behaviour either. Alot of the time it sounds really silly but just things like he won't get dressed won't brush his teeth won't go in the bath without screaming, we take them on holiday or days out very regular and sometimes he won't join in. He poos all over my house, on the carpets, on teddy bears, wipes it on the curtains. He's pooed on my sofa. In 2021 he went through a stage of not eating, it was the time of covid and no doctor wanted to know they brushed it under the carpet because he was healthy. The school referred us to the social services who came out, did an assement on us and left.
His behaviour has got better over the years, sometimes he does revert back to his old ways. However the oast few months he has started the eating thing again, he steals food at school. The safe guardin teacher gives him spare and also he is allowed to go to her at school if he is hungry, which he has been doing every day. He then comes home and refuses to eat for me. He will pick at his tea, say it is spicy and then later on we find banana peels, crisp packets ect all hidden in his room. He steals money, he's stolen my wedding rings, car keys. Eventually he returns them or admits he has stolen them but this is something I have raised with the teachers and the safe guarding teacher and the senco teacher too.
In July I broke down at school and told the safe guarding teacher I was struggling as every day for a few weeks he has been very difficult. She made a plan with my child who when she asked why he doesn't eat at home he openly told her "I like to upset my mum" he had previously told other teachers this too and about his stealing.
I never heard anything after July. We had a great summer, we went on holiday, we did lots of days out and majority of the time my son joined in and really enjoyed the holidays with us. His eating wasn't brilliant but he wasn't poorly and he was eating enough for me to not be concerned about. However he is quite small for his age. He has been weighted and measured at school and always done back the perfect BMI. Iv mentioned to a few professionals before about his height all who have said "every child grows differently and as long as he is healthy" - he is never at the doctor & has about 3 days off school his whole life apart from when schools had bubbles ect in COVID.
However on the 26th September I attended school to drop my 4 youngest off and my 8 year old didn't want to go he was drying sayin he didn't want to see the teachers they keep asking him questions and he's upset by it, so I approached reception and asked to speak to the teacher in question. I wasn't nasty or anything I just wanted to clear things with her as we hadn't spoken since July really.
I was then asked to go into a room where 2 social workers were waiting for me, apparently they had attended my house twice that week... Once at half past 4 but we were out at football and once at half 8am but I was on the school run. She asked me a few questions and then about 15 minutes later the police turned up and arrested me for child neglect. The social worker was even gob smacked.
The accusations made against me by my son were that I dont feed him tea, I bath him in a cold bath (something I have never heard from anyone) and that I make him sleep on a sofa.
I was released on bail and so was my husband but as a result the children have gone into foster care.
It's been 3 weeks and 2 days, no social worker has shown me any reports. Iv seen my children once for an hour and a half. They mentioned on the second say they would apply for an interm court order but I haven't heard anything since. When I did see my children and the social worker she said to us all "this is just a temporary measure whilst the police do their investigations"
I have spoken to 2 of my children on the phone once. 2 of them twice.
My little boy who made these allegations has told us and the social worker he wants to come home but obviously now they have to take what he has said very serious.
He has had a medical at the hospital which said he had no marks broken bones or any signs of physical abuse. Nor has he made any allegations, yet the school have said they believe he is physically abused. They said he is quite small for his age. They took bloods and these came back he is slightly anemic so now on iron supplements. The report says he is happy, chatty, doesn't look unwell, his nails teeth clothes and hair are all in great condition.
I know everyone says it but we are genuinely a very nice family, absolutely noone we have spoken to can believe what has happened. everyone including the school compliment us on our kids appearance their manners.. they are around several other people like dance teachers, gymnastics teachers and football coaches, swimming instructors. Taekwondo instructors... All who have never raised a concern about any of my children.
Has anyone been in a similar situation to me?

Horrendous and a living nightmare for you and your husband and your children.

Over the years I've read on Facebook about people having their children seized by Social Services in similar circumstances to you and it's absolutely chilling how the power they have to destroy families over nothing.

This could have been resolved in a couple of days not weeks.

I'm horrified and saddened for you op. I hope you get your children back home soon and have some legal recourse to compensate for this terrible time.

I've name changed for this because it is very very outing,

My daughter behaved very similar to your child, smearing poo, falling out with siblings ect. She really struggled at school though and her behaviour was a lot worse at school than at home. We have had social involvement on and off over the years because whenever DD got overwhelmed at school she would claim that I had been hitting her, not feeding her, didnt have a duvet ect. Esculated to her saying teachers were also hitting her.

We had a brilliant social worker who could confirm some things were not true like food and duvet ect.

In July I took her tablet off her and she ran away to the local park and said toa random family she had ran away because I'd been throwing knives at her. They rang the police.

I ran all over the estate looking for her and when I got to the park to look there for her the police were there. They took DD & I went back to my house. They were trying to get hold of our social worker to confirm that DD had a history of allegations, they did leave it a good hour before they arrested me so I know they did try.

But I was arrested, I honestly cant even remember what they said to me i was in such shock. My children went and stayed with my mum for 40 days. I was never asked to sign a section 20, why were you? Did you not have family able to take the children? I did not seek any legal advice

Social couldnt move forward with a plan as we were waiting for bail conditions so their hands were kind of tied. They were very positive about me which definetly helped. They told me all the way through there was no evidence and it was just my word against DD's.

Police didnt do much until I emailed them asking them what I could do to change the bail conditions so my son was able to come home ( social had said my son could come home if I was able to have someone supervise us 24/7 at home until bail was dropped but not my daughter ) ( my daughter made allegations, my son did not )

My children came home 17 days after I started speaking to the police. They were really nice to me to be honest.

I had a lot of evidence to show my daughter had a history of making allegations about not just me, but other people and other proffesionals. And a lot where some things had happened..... but not to her, she had heard things and put herself in the story.

My dd has never liked being called a liar and it is on our social notes months ago that she will stick to her lies until she she feels comfortable telling the truth. She kept saying worse and worse things whilst she stayed at my mums and was adamant she wanted to make a statement to the police.

In the end, the police decided not to interview her as they said they didnt believe it was the best course of action for our family and that they thought it would do more damage than good.

I will add that I have ADHD and a few days after I was arrested I was diagnosed with ASD and my DD has been on the ND waiting list for some time. Thanks to the arrest my social worker was able to get her bumped up to the top of the ND waiting list and she has the final part of her assessment in November

My daughter has had medicals in the past and has had no Mark's or bruises, our attendance was not great at school because of the undiagnosed ND and struggling with mornings and my house was an absolute bomb site when the police came. It was so messy.

And right now I'm snuggled in bed with both my kids

Good luck OP x

The police who were investigating it were really nice. They came to my house after I emailed to have a chat with me and give me their email address to send things over. They were very reassuring when they visited and said although they couldnt predict what the outcome was going to be, that it could potentially be somthing they could speak to their sergent about and say that they didnt think criminal charges was appropriate for our family

I didnt email things over straight away and a few days later he rang and said he was going on leave soon so he wanted to get this sorted for me before he went. When I emailed he emailed back and said thanks and hopefully they could find a solution to what had happened

Whilst all this was going on I was incredibly down and went to my GP as I just genuinely didnt want to be here. I was advised to go to hospital and said I didnt want To. I just wanted some antidepressents. This was on a Friday evening.

On the Monday the police showed up and I absolutely crapped myself as I wasnt expecting them. Then I heard them radioing through that there was no answer & talking about forcing entry. They had just come to see if I was okay. The kids were home 10 days after that.

When the bail conditions were dropped the police rang me straight away aswell

It's really scary and its awful OP but if you havnt done anything wrong it will be okay, they have to have proof. You got arrested because it's a safeguarding issue isnt it,

I honestly didnt think I'd get my kids back with what my DD was saying, but she is x

Op i am so sorry. I am sure you are angry stressed broken hearted all at once. I do hope good comes from this and and your son either knocks it off or gets the mental help he needs to knock it off. I will keep you all in my prayers.

Agree. Sadly Police are so snowed under paperwork and new recruits start on job with very little training nowadays, so sometimes don't know what to do/forget to update their boss/victimetc.
Hubs says this

I wouldn't trust either the school or social workers. In your position, I would be secretly recording every verbal conversation and communicate as much as possible in writing (via email). You can then use that recording to type up a transcript of every conversation which is perfectly legitimate.

I would also gather all of your evidence where you've attempted to seek support, such as a subject access request to the GP, school, social services etc. They won't be able to share anything re the suspected abuse but there must be some record somewhere where you have asked for support and discussed your child's difficulties.

Any interviews/meetings with social workers/school, I'd be having my solicitor with me.

Autistic kids can mask so well. And can be highly intelligent. To the untrained eye, they can't possibly be autistic if they're bright and behave differently in other settings. Teachers do make assumptions and judge parents. Some people assume that autistic people are non verbal and/or have learning difficulties etc.

In safeguarding training, the signs of abuse also sound very much like how an autistic child presents.

Don't trust any of the 'professionals'. Going forward, everything in writing. If they insist on a verbal conversation, then follow it up with an email with "this is my understanding of our telephone conversation at X pm today. Detail your version of the conversation. I will assume my understanding is correct unless you respond otherwise via email by x date".

I'd set up a new email addresses just for all of those conversations with the professionals so you have all of that evidence in one place for ease of being able to track back. So, inform SS and the school of your new email address.

It all sounds so traumatic for everyone involved. I hope things are sorted soon.
I have one query. What was the social services involvement in 2021?

Give them 24 hours notice that you plan to revoke your section 20 so that it can go into the court arena and have a judge oversee what is going on.

I was also wondering what the previous involvement with SS in 2021 was about and how that played out.

Having read the thread, a few things stand out to me.

How did they arrange for not one but two social workers to be at the school at drop off time?

How did they manage to find three available foster placements at such short notice?

All children have remained in their usual schools?
Doing their usual after school activities?

it seems like there was already a plan organised, then put in place that you weren’t aware of.

Best practice would’ve been for the children to stay together in their own home, supported by extended family with frequent visits from yourself and their Dad.

If you aren’t allowed unsupervised contact, does your husband have the same conditions?

If not then surely he can ‘supervise’ you . So you can all live together along with an aunt or two to cover the times your husband is at work.

Everything that has been said about your son, the way he presents and behaves, to me, points to ASD & PDA.

The resulting impact has been massive for all of you.
I hope that things will start to get resolved quickly now that you have legal support that is giving dates to expectations.

So I took my child to docs as he had this funny bruise and they decided to get a full survey done as they thought abuse. Obviously found nothing. They must've got the police involved because of the nature of it I suppose in case they needed to emergency take the child. Yes we all moved into my mums (apart from their dad which i found suspicious) as there is 4 adults living there so I could be supervised 24/7. Mum even canceled a holiday for it. I did everything voluntary. It eventually got to child meetings ect and was unanimously agreed that they weren't at risk.

My dd has also made false allegations against my dad (her grandad) I know for a fact it never happened as I was there. Obviously different as we didn't live with him. But while they did their investigations he wasn't allowed to see her. She admitted it pretty soon after that it didn't happen. She has a diagnosis though so maybe that helped.

The previous involvement was because my son had just started school properly without COVID restrictions ect & he had lost weight over the summer as this is when his eating habits had started. I actually wanted them to come out because I had tried everything with doctors but because of COVID no-one was particularly interested because he was healthy. However they came out they spoke to all my children. They assessed us, I told them all my worries and concerns. My child said he was happy at home, liked food. His favourite meal was lasagna, he had no worries ect... And so I received the report in the post and they said the case was closed.

The 2 social workers - one is the higher up and one is the person who is a step down from her who she said would take the case after 28 days.

They have remained in their usual schools yes however they haven't been doing their regular activities.

Thankyou, finding it very hard to trust them at all right now.

Aww wow I'm so sorry to hear, things can escalate so quickly can't they. It is actually scary.

After reading your post I will definitely contact the police, particularly the one in charge of my case and ask them what is going off ect.

I'm just so anxious about how long it is taking, of course these things take time but it's hard when you're the one on this end.

Bless you.

It's so scary isn't it.
I'm so nervous about the meeting but at the same time I'm hoping I find some things out.

I really am hoping my aunties can just move here with us as a family as we can have some kind of normal.

This, there's no way it would have gotten all arranged and this far without some warning, my mam was a social worker and the red tape and interviews and classes etc are ridiculous, kids stay in dangerous situations for months and years...

My cousin is a teacher, as is my sister and sister in law they have all said the same thing. It is unheard of. The social even said they were shocked I was arrested. I believe I was arrested because I "threatened" to take my child out of school and they assumed this was because I knew about the social referral and info he had disclosed.

I'm not lying. Honestly have no idea why people think I would come on with false Info what on earth would I be gaining from anyone's advice?.

Which is why I couldn't get my head around why it all escalated so quickly as I said in previous posts I would of assumed some help would of been offered first.

It has happened to more than me, a few people have said on the thread their children were also removed this way.

I have also been told I was falsey arrested. I am telling everything I know. I mean I haven't seen any reports from the school or the police or social so I have no idea what they are saying about me. I can just go on what the social worker has told me since.

They said they were allowed to arrest me for questioning because their "evidence" is the report from the safe guarding guarding teacher.

I believe I was arrested because I "threatened" to take my child out of school and they assumed this was because I knew about the social referral and info he had disclosed.

I don't know if we're saying the same thing but I believe they arrested you because they must have felt you're going to harm your child because of it or that you'd already harmed him, therefore he was in danger. That would be the reason for immediate arrest and not necessarily just because they thought you knew.

Yes they can 🤦‍♀️ the police have the power to remove children if they deem them in danger

And anyone can get arrested without evidence, look at historical abuse ect. Rarely any evidence but people still get arrested and sent to prison

Theres a post on here about a womans ex being sent to prison for assaulting her despite her having no evidence, she thinks it was down to her witness impact statement

They were allowed to arrest you because it's a safe guarding issue. A child had said you had hurt them. So they have to look into it

When my DD said the teacher hit her, despite there being a room full of witnesses/ lado investigation the police still asked me if I wanted to press charges. I said no. But if I'd of said yes they would of arrested the teacher

Yer that's what I was getting at. The social said they came to school because they had attempted to fome to my home twice. Both time so was legitimately not home, they came on the school run and one time I was at football.

Yer one social worker who came to see one day because mine was off work said it flagged because they thought I had found out he had disclosed information to the safe guard which I didn't know at this time, he had told me he didn't want to go to school because the teacher kept takin him from class and asking questions and some other things... So I wanted to question her about it but she obviously got the wrong end of the stick thought I was removing him to "harm" him... Despite the fact 3 of my other children were at the school too. Not sure why they think I would take him to school to then remove him to harm him, if I had any intentions of harming him which I obviously didn't. Why would I take him to school in the first place.

Exactly... When people are arrested it is sometimes because they have been accused of something by someone else. So they will arrest them and question them about what they've been accused off? So they can arrest you. Especially in these circumstances when they think the child is at risk that day.