Terrified of losing my kids

[wishingstaar12]

Looking for advice from other mums, particularly anyone who has been through social work involvement and a Children's Hearing in Scotland. ❤️

I'm sorry this is such a long post, but I'm really struggling at the moment and could do with some honest advice from people who might understand what I'm going through.

I'm a mum to two girls, and social work have been involved with our family for some time. We have a Children's Hearing coming up on the 20th, and I'm absolutely terrified about what might happen.

At a recent Team Around the Child meeting, I found the discussion very difficult. I felt that the focus was mainly on everything that isn't going well, rather than acknowledging the things I've been trying to improve. My social worker has now told me that they intend to recommend that both girls live with their dad.

I've been a single parent for the majority of my girls' lives. Before social work became involved, their dad saw them approximately twice a month and offered very little practical support. He refused to help when I was struggling, so the day-to-day responsibility for raising the girls, managing the household and meeting their needs fell on me.

As far as I'm aware, no assessment of their dad has been carried out, despite social work now recommending that the girls live with him. This concerns me, particularly given his historically limited involvement in their day-to-day lives. I feel that both parents' circumstances, their ability to meet the girls' needs and the practicalities of such a significant change should be properly considered.

I understand that circumstances can change and that the focus has to be on what is best for the girls. I'm not trying to suggest their dad shouldn't be considered, but I do feel that the history of who has actually cared for them and whether a proper assessment has taken place are important factors. As well as other factors, like him smoking both cigarettes and drugs in the house while the children are there. Also he still lives at home with his mum, and the girls don't have a bedroom there. The social worker bought him a bunk bed for the girls when they're at his but he put it in his bedroom and the youngest (6) sleeps in there with him and my eldest (14) sleeps on a blow up bed I the living room. The room that was meant to be for the girls is used as his smoking room..

One of the main concerns social work have raised is the condition of my home. I know that the housework and keeping on top of the home environment are things I struggle with. I'm not trying to deny that there are problems or make excuses for them. I know things need to improve, and I'm trying to address them.

I strongly suspect I have undiagnosed ADHD, which I believe could be contributing to my difficulties with organisation, motivation, routines and managing everyday tasks. I'm not formally diagnosed or receiving treatment for ADHD at the moment, but I'm actively looking into getting assessed privately as i cant get an assessment through NHS.

My mental health has also been a struggle. I have anxiety and depression, and the ongoing social work involvement and fear of losing my children have put me under an enormous amount of pressure. I'm trying to manage my mental health, engage with professionals and make improvements while dealing with everything that is happening.

My older daughter has severe anxiety and has struggled to attend school for a long time. She has been out of school for approximately two years, and this is not a straightforward situation where I can simply insist she goes in and everything will be fine. I've been trying to work with the people involved to find a way forward for her.

My younger daughter had been attending school regularly until she became unwell recently. I've been working with the school around arrangements to help her attend, including adjustments to make things easier for her.

I have been attending meetings and hearings, engaging with professionals and trying to make improvements at home and with the girls' routines. I'm not saying everything is perfect, because it isn't. I know there are things I need to work on, and I'm willing to do that. What I find difficult is feeling that the progress I'm making is being overlooked and that the focus is always on what I'm getting wrong.

My girls are my whole world. I've been their main carer for years, and the thought of them being removed from my care is devastating. I want to do whatever I reasonably can to make things better for them and for our home. I'm not claiming to be a perfect parent, but I love my children and want the opportunity to address the concerns and get the right support.

I've also been trying desperately to get legal advice before the hearing on the 20th, but so far I've been unsuccessful. I've contacted solicitors and tried to find someone who can help with Children's Hearings and legal aid, but I've had no luck securing advice or representation. I'm now facing a hearing that could have a huge impact on our family without having managed to get proper legal advice.

I'm not looking for people to tell me I'm perfect or that social work are automatically wrong. I want honest, constructive advice from people who understand how difficult these situations can be.

I'm frightened, overwhelmed and trying my best to find a way forward for my girls. I know I have things to work on, and I want to work on them, but I also want to make sure the full picture is being considered.

Please be kind. I'm already struggling enough, and I'm genuinely just looking for advice, support and some guidance about what I can do next. Thank you to anyone who takes the time to read this. ❤️

Presumably your kids go to school and you go to work.

If OPs kids aren’t going to school and seeing no one else then that is detrimental to their wellbeing and social development.

I don’t think you understood my comment. I’m a good parent with no friends. I haven’t said whether or not I think anything op does is detrimental to their wellbeing. I Just said the op having no friends is irrelevant and not the issue here.

Worst parents I know are alcoholics and drug users with LOADS of friends.

Bringing up her (the op) having no friends was an irrelevant shitty comment

OP how are you today?

I volunteer for Citizens Advice and here are some links to organisations that might help you
Family Rights Group - Free, independent and confidential advice for parents, kinship carers, relatives and friends of children who are involved with children’s services in England or need their help. We support families to work with social workers and understand the law, their rights and options.

Coram Family Lives - provides targeted early intervention and crisis support to families

Support Through Court

Families In Care

Family Action - Family Action is here for any family in need and anyone without family support.

Do those organisations also cover Scotland @caffeineanddryshampoo?

Ahh sorry I didn't read the glaringly obvious bit in the orignal post that says in Scotland. I suggest the OP contacts their local Cits Advice as they will be able to suggest any help available.
Useful links in Scotland from Family Rights page

Citizens Advice Scotland - Children who are looked after by the local authority

Scottish Child Law Centre - Provide free and confidential legal advice to protect children’s rights across Scotland. Every advice enquiry to the national advice service is answered by a qualified solicitor. If you live in Govanhill, free in person advice and follow up support is also now available via weekly community clinic.

I just hope that the OP is still around to read these paints and benefit from the advice. Sadly she hasn’t posted since early yesterday afternoon.

Gently I think you’re making this personal, when it’s not about you.

That poster was showing nothing but support for OP.

If OP does not work and has no family, then she must be incredibly lonely with no friends.

As that poster said, she made friends at work or the school gates.

It is not healthy for none of them to not go out and socialise in any way.

It’s painting a picture where they all basically have no structure, don’t need to wake up and get changed, no social lives, no education, no ambitions and are stuck in the home 24 hours a day - and the home is still unkempt - that isn’t healthy.

I'm not merely suggesting it, I am stating with confidence that yes, given that ADHD is a spectrum disorder, severe cases can indeed be more debilitating (i.e. can cause greater functional impairment) than some cases of MS and Parkinson's, and this is even more true if combined with severe depression and anxiety. Government welfare data backs this up as does the reported lived experience of disabled people themselves. Ultimately, severe ADHD entails serious and pervasive functional impairment regardless of effort and is therefore rightly recognised as a disability by health authorities internationally (milder ADHD is more accurately seen as a manageable condition). There have been cases of severe ADHD being mistaken for brain injury and dementia and of brain injury and dementia being mistaken for severe ADHD.

To repeat, this means that you cannot overcome severe ADHD with effort, willpower or better organisation strategies because a severe neuro-chemical impairment is almost entirely unresponsive to any of these things (even though there is evidence that milder ADHD is responsive in this way which is consistent with what you and others report - human beings have only a small degree of psychological control over their neurological state). With severe ADHD, help from others will almost always be required if medication isn't effective.

I have in no way suggested that there is any acceptable justification for child neglect and have previously made it clear that I think the authorities are rightly involved here. Somebody who cannot look after themselves or their children due to disability, however, is not the same as someone who just isn't trying hard enough and the case of someone who is possibly struggling with an undiagnosed and unaddressed disability is complex. It very much sounds like the OP has repeatedly tried to solve the problem by trying harder but that this hasn't worked - which is what you'd expect with severe unmedicated ADHD. That said we do not have all the information and can only go on what the OP has said.

OP - you may not still be reading but I'm thinking about you and your kids. I hope that whatever is decided, your family get the best outcome in these difficult circumstances.

I didn't say that there was any excuse for child neglect or that the authorities were not right to get involved here. It sounds like they should be involved as of course children's needs have to be met. My objection is to the repeated insistence that severe ADHD can be overcome with a better attitude/more effort/self-discipline. Especially when this insistence comes from people who do not experience disabling impairment in the areas being discussed to any significant degree, even if some of them have ADHD.

Have you ever lost someone to Parkinsons? It is a horror I would not wish on my worst enemy. I'd take adhd over it any day all day.

Agree my brother mid 60s is at end stage Parkinsons now after what has been a difficult and at times horrendous journey. To see a physically fit relatively young man decline to the point where he has carers 5 times a day and is largely unable to do anything for himself is devastating. To minimise that over ADHD is wrong and I have an AUDHD adult son myself so not oblivious to the struggles of ADHD.

I think people who argue ADHD can be as severe as some other illnesses like Parkinson's, have no experience of serious illness

It depends which stage of Parkinson’s a person is at. It’s progressive. My F had it. He was diagnosed in his early 40s and for the first 10 years or so he coped fine on medication (though there were distressing side effects and other things unrelated to it). But after that it became much more debilitating.

So severe ADHD will be more debilitating than early stage Parkinson’s, but it won’t get progressively worse as the person get older.

The two conditions really can’t be compared.

My point was that some cases of ADHD cause greater functional impairment than some cases of Parkinson's (as evidenced by government welfare data) regardless of the level of suffering involved. I was making this point because people were arguing that the impairment caused by ADHD is always minor enough to be overcome with willpower/effort etc when that isn't the case at all. OP is at risk of losing her kids, quite possibly due to the severe functional impairment caused by severe ADHD. Even if the horror of Parkinsons is undeniable, this doesn't mean that ADHD cannot cause devastation in the lives of the people who don't get the mild version.

Sure for early stage Parkinson's. But Parkinson's is a progressive terminal illness so it is crude at best to compare it to ADHD.

The comparison I'm making is purely based on functional impairment. Given both are spectrum conditions, surely you must be able to understand that someone in the earlier stages of Parkinson's who is still able to carry out the basic tasks associated with adequately caring for their children - ie preparing healthy meals, keeping the house clean and tidy, properly managing the family finances etc (and I know of several people with Parkinson's who are single parents and have been able to do these things without help for many years - some people's illness progresses very slowly), is experiencing a lower degree of functional impairment than a hypothetical person who cannot do these things due to severe ADHD (in addition to severe depression and anxiety), to the extent that they may have their children removed from their care (possibly a similar situation to the one the OP is in)?

We aren't talking about emotional distress and suffering - while the possibility of losing your children in this way would cause plenty of that as would the knowledge that you're living with a degenerative disease, it's hard to measure and compare these experiences. And nor are we talking about the physical suffering that comes with later stage Parkinson's. Nobody is denying the awful reality of that. But they are largely irrelevant to the point I'm trying to make about functional impairment which is that severe ADHD causes a far higher degree of functional impairment than many people understand and that posters trying to suggest that the OP's problems with keeping on top of the house work etc can be overcome with greater self-discipline and more effort are misunderstanding the nature and degree of disability caused by severe ADHD. And that it can and does cause greater impairment than some cases of conditions that are generally seen as more serious.

Sorry, didn't see this post before I replied to your previous one.

Parkinson's came into the conversation because someone said they have Parkinson's, MS and CFS but are still able to keep their house relatively clean, tidy and functioning to a reasonable standard. They implied that saying you aren't managing do this because of ADHD/depression/anxiety is therefore an excuse and that the OP should be able to overcome her difficulties with willpower, self-discipline and a better attitude. It's perfectly reasonable to point out that this isn't a fair comparison. Somebody can be living with multiple conditions or illnesses that sound worse on paper or that cause more physical or emotional suffering but that nevertheless do not cause the same level of functional impairment (even if there is significant impairment). It isn't crude to point this out.

I could not agree more

I'd be embarrassed to have made such an uneducated comment. You clearly do not know what watching someone die from Parkinsons is like. There is no possible nonsense you can say to make it comparable. God forbid a love one or yourself gets Parkinsons because I guarantee you will be singing a different tune.

What an incredibly strange reply. Why on earth would I be embarrassed? I can see absolutely no mechanism through which seeing a loved one die of Parkinson's could ever damage my understanding of the degree of functional impairment typically associated with severe ADHD or the fact that some people with earlier stage Parkinson's do not experience the same level of impairment. As evidenced by government welfare data. Much as it would be horrible - and I've seen loved ones die of some awful things ever bit as nasty as Parkinson's, much like most of us who are no longer young.

Have a lovey night. I will not respond to this nonsense again.

I will do thank you - I have no idea why this evidenced backed information is so upsetting to you but I'm genuinely sorry it's causing you distress.

Yes, get a cleaner or even a builder to clean up for you a bit, then social services will have nothing on you by the sound of it