DF put my baby at risk. What now?

[Aeonium]

I’ve had a massive falling out with DF. Over 20 years ago he left me and DM to become a live-in carer for his sister who is severely mentally disabled. Since then we’ve made our peace and I visit with DS. However several months ago when DS was born we argued because he kept whinging that I should give his sister “a turn” with the baby. I did let her hold DS once but I was hovering nearby because she has a history of being unpredictable and violent, and I told her not to kiss him because she has scabs, sores and weeping abscesses all over including on her mouth and face. She ignored me (understandable due to her disability) and when I stopped her trying to kiss DS she lost her temper and tried to throw him on the floor. So I said I didn’t feel comfortable letting her hold DS again. I know it seems mean but I have to put DS’s safety first. DF appeared to accept this and hasn’t mentioned it again.

A couple of days ago I arrived at DF’s house desperate for the loo and handed him DS (which I never do, I always put him on the floor with his toys). As soon as DF was left unsupervised holding DS he immediately handed him to his sister and let her kiss and cuddle him. I freaked out when I saw (I was out of the room for literally 30 seconds and came back to ask DF where the loo roll was). I grabbed DS, yelled at DF and stormed out.

DF refuses to apologise. He doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong. But he’s handed my baby to someone who’s unpredictable and has violent outbursts, who wouldn’t understand about things like not covering a baby’s face or dropping him, against my explicit wishes, while I was out of the room and not supervising. Also she’s being treated by a dermatologist because they don’t know what’s causing some of her skin lesions. Nobody knows if they’re infectious because nobody knows what they are. Other lesions could be herpes or anything, I don’t know.

I feel sympathy for her condition but I don’t think it’s healthy or pleasant for DS to be touching sores and abscesses. DF said “but she’s disabled”, which has been a lifelong excuse for her to be allowed to do whatever she wants. I don’t see why her being disabled means she has to be allowed to touch sores against my baby. And I appreciate that she just wants to cuddle the baby but he’s not a doll, and she might not mean to hurt him but that doesn’t mean she wouldn’t.

DF is now not speaking to me and I don’t know what to do. DM thinks I should forgive and forget because he’s old and could die at any time, I don’t want to deprive DS and his grandad of knowing each other, and I shouldn’t create a regrettable rift. But I’m deeply upset and I don’t trust him with DS any more.

@LegoPiecesEverywhere - I am so sorry - I misread your post, and leapt to a conclusion. Huge apologies for any offence.

Is your DM, who wants you to forgive and forget, doing regular visits herself? She declined to be your aunt's carer many years ago, for very valid reasons, and divorced her DH. She should be leading by example, not passing the guilt down the line.
This is such a desperately sad situation for all concerned, but you are right to put your DS first, in a situation with many vulnerabilities, he is the most vulnerable of all.

Devilishpyjamas Helping at a club for people with learning disabilities doesn’t give insight into the situation now (post austerity) or the situation for those with distressed behaviours (which the OP has said her aunt has)."

I know my knowledge us very limited. I was only trying to be supportive of OP this situation is long term so before austerity. There might be help/have been help. I am not saying accessing help is easy at all.

The picture may vary in different places. I am not trying to say it is easy at all.

The way your aunt is surely your father can see he is not caring for her.

If your aunt were a dog or cat the RSPCA would be prosecuting.

I know a family who had a similar dilemma. Although the mother was still alive.

All the family never considered residential care. Like the ops gm they didn't want the relative going into the care system.

But as time went on it became clear

Stupid fat fingers.

As time went on it became clear that they didn't have the energy or time to give him what he needed. He started to put not only himself but other family members in danger.

They have put him in a home and someone is there every day. His day to day needs are met and he still has family around each day.

In the end you have to do what is best for the aunt and not cleaning her, over feeding her and giving her no stimulation is not caring

Can I just add what an amazing person he is to practically give up his life to look after his sister

No he isn’t amazing; leaving your wife and daughter to care for your sister is quite a strange thing to do. If he hadn’t done that, his sister might actually have a life in a residential setting, where her health and care needs would have been addressed by professional staff.
omg you are totally disillusion about how as a country we care for these people all the nhs run services have gone it"s social services and local council funded to private companies in the community . Untrained staff , financial abuse and general neglect the list is endless .These professional staff you are on about are anybody and they are paid minimum wage and have no interest in the care profession it's just money .

Otoh DevilishPyjamas is right (and no doubt knows more than most of us) about the ghastly state of post-austerity care.

Otoh it wasn't austerity times when the OP's df used to smack her and tell her she was a selfish little girl: May's government can't be blamed for that. Yes, children got smacked when they misbehaved but the guilt-tripping was unnecessary and the sense that her needs didn't matter under the circumstances. Children need to feel they matter to their parents- however distressing the situation of some other person in the family.

Please can I share one more thing that I think is vaguely relative?

I'm not in the situation some are in on this thread with responsibilities but I am an adopter and I do know that post adoption support varies wildly. I am very very lucky to have had a lot of support. I had to ask for it and I had to wait, but I got it.

I know that in some other parts of the country the support is not as forthcoming.

I share this because I think if you are in an area where there is little support for anyone struggling to care for anyone else, for any reason, hearing that things differ in different parts of the country can be:
a) a total pain in the arse
b) a light that says this might happen there so could it happen here!

In other word when people here that there are some provisions in other places then it may inspire people to search/to push etc.

I absolutely do not know what is available for carers of young adults or older adults, but I do still strongly believe there should be support and provision for everyone who is caring full time for another person. But I do know my comments may have come across as unfeeling, so I am very sorry about that.

people hear

I do think it makes him damaged not evil and for that I would try and find my way through the anger
Thanks, this is a really helpful perspective.

Is there the opportunity for you to see him with the baby outside of their home setting?
No. He’s with my aunt 24/7. He orders groceries online, if he has to go anywhere he takes her in the car/wheelchair. He won’t accept respite care - he doesn’t trust them to look after her after previous incidents which Gran reminded us of again and again. She was adamant that my aunt must be cared for at home and DF is totally brainwashed.

So your Mum missed your wedding?
No, DM took my aunt to the church while DF did photos and aisle walking. Then DF resumed care after the service.

The state doesn’t just hand over cash for people to go and be cared for by sweet kind people in a loving environment
This. At best she’d be neglected, at worst she’d suffer physical abuse. She would not be pandered to like she has been at home. Her tantrums would no doubt be controlled with physical force or possibly sedatives. It’s unsurprising that Gran was so insistent about keeping her care in the family. DF can’t even send her to a support service or “club” for a break because she has violent tendencies and doesn’t mix well with other attendees.

Is your DM, who wants you to forgive and forget, doing regular visits herself?
No she hasn’t seen DF or his sister for 20 years (excluding my wedding day when she was polite for my benefit). She does want me to make peace with DF for my own peace of mind though. He’s still my father.

A doll is a good suggestion but my aunt has never accepted substitutes. She wants to have what you’ve got because you’ve got it. Because it’s yours. Gran used to say she wants to be like you because she knows she’s not. It’s quite sad really.

DF is still not sorry. I do feel I need to make peace with him for my own sake. My aunt is a late riser so I’m thinking I might start visiting very early and not let my baby out of my sight for a second. I won’t trust DF again.

I actually live in an area with good support for learning disabilities. That’s the frightening thing. We have a CCG and LA who don’t like people being out of country and a few providers who can meet the needs of people with complex needs (hate that term but there we go). Some areas have no providers. Many CCG’s/LA’s are not particularly interested in developing community support. That’s why my son is ‘only’ spending a year and a bit in Hospital (fingers crossed) and not a decade plus. Because we live in a good area

Yesterday’s Sky news news.sky.com/story/line-18-victorian-social-care-system-is-failing-the-vulnerable-11540609?fbclid=IwAR2nlp3yt2HtbLoLGsrqxOlaUh5LHlG3iViPTrkGh_xizJytn4LdL5qAKfU It is a valid fear that people have. I have lost count of the number of people who have told me they can’t believe it has happened to us (by which they mean I am well resourced and capable is standing my ground with agencies and fighting effectively for ds1 - we were still utterly powerless to prevent what has happened to him).

Visiting early sounds good. I’m not sure what to suggest with your aunt. She isn’t being given the support around her to cope if anything happens to your father The reality is there may not be much although I do wonder whether it is worth dropping the idea of direct payments in his direction because it would be a tiny number of hours and he would be in control of who was employed (direct payments are a PITA and take quite a bit of energy to get & administer though - so probably not something he’s going to want at this stage. May be worth mentioning if he ever starts to look for some sort of extra support).

I do feel I need to make peace with him for my own sake

I hope you can, either that or I hope you can make peace with the situation, especially if after you've tried all that might work that relationship with your dad doesn't work out.

Could you wear the baby in a wrap or something?

I haven't read the full thread.

Is she receiving any support from her social worker/key worker.

I ask as I work with adults with learning disabilities myself. For a woman to put on that much weight and become diabetic is a massive red flag, and would be seen as neglect due to it impacting on her health.

I assume she lacks capacity also?

Residential may be the best option for her, if she were assessed it may be decided in her best interest.

As regards to your baby, I wouldn't allow contact, it's a massive safe guarding issue. It doesnt look as though you can trust your dad either.

I think early visits are a good idea, your Dad can actually ENJOY your child too rather than having to just deal with your aunt.

I think you might just have to let it go, not forgive or forget but put it on the shelf and move past it. He can't see what he's done because if he accepts he's wrong then his whole life since he left is wrong too and he left the woman he loves and his child for nothing.

I recently lost my dad. While it was in the past, for a good decade from my early teens he prioritised a seriously ill relative to the extent of putting us at risk. Nothing to the extent of what you've been through. What an awful message, to hit you for wanting to keep your possessions safe.

Anyway, our situation ended when the relative died. I always knew he'd make the same choices again though. I just didn't deal with it. I wish I had. I wish id made peace with who he was - and like your dad I accept that he was very damaged - and what that meant for his relationship with me. In amongst the grief (I really did love him) I'm left with anger and disappointment I can never resolve.

What I'm trying to say is take time to consider before rebuilding bridges. Come to terms with the limits of what he offers as a father. Really accept that you can never trust him. Mourn the father you should have had. Then, if you want to continue a relationship do it on your terms. Don't accept the unacceptable.

For your ds, protect him from the situations you endured as a child.

I think you might just have to let it go, not forgive or forget but put it on the shelf and move past it. He can't see what he's done because if he accepts he's wrong then his whole life since he left is wrong too and he left the woman he loves and his child for nothing

Sums it up perfectly!

I live very close to an excellent care facility. I have occasionally chatted to the staff and residents who live there.

Not all care facilities are bad places.

However as one chat with the manager revealed they do not take anyone with violent tendencies.

I had commented about how everyone seemed to get on with everyone else and how friendly everyone was.

I was told they filter potential residents and only once made an error and were mortified that they had to make the call to the family to collect someone they had said they would care for.

The issue is that your gm by allowing your aunt to do as she pleases and allowing her to tantrum and be violent when she doesn’t get her own way has made it almost impossible to go to a good residential home and will if your df dies end up in a care facility that will probably keep her drugged up to control her.

I don’t think your gm and by default your df have been very kind and have not thought of the future

OP, I think you are right to put the safety needs of your baby first every time.

Sadly it sounds like your father was conditioned to make the choice he did before you were even born. What a waste, what a shame. For you and your mother, and also for him and his sister.

But I think sadly, you need to remember that he’s made that choice, and he’s not going to change that choice now, when he’s spent a lifetime going down that road. So don’t expose your own heart to any more hurt by asking your father to choose all over again, because it sounds like your father is a very stunted, limited man, who cannot now change the decision he made a lifetime ago.

If you can, I’d try and find a way of connecting with him that avoids butting against the big choice he made, to avoid the tension and upset, and risk to your baby it may bring. Visiting for a short period in the early morning sounds like a great idea. This is about you getting some pleasure out of engaging with your dad, and seeing him be a grandpa.

Think about what it’s bringing to your life ultimately. That may sound selfish, but I think it might stop you slipping into ‘duty’ mode or losing sight of the big picture, which is about the bonds of family being a good thing, and finding a way to experience that bond with your dad, in the way he can do it, without expecting more or putting pressure on that bond...

Another voice just saying that I agree with all the horrrible and stark reality that has been painted here about our social care system, which the government has mismanaged for years (successive governments that is), and then really strangled to the point of dying over the last few years.

I say this as someone ‘on the inside’, as someone with full mental capacity but sadly physically an illness which takes away a huge amount of daily functionality. The system is only as good as the people that run it, and mine is also a ‘good’ council in so much as it’s spending on social care... but I still have ptsd from my experiences u set their care. It has been seriously suggested that if I can’t make it work with my current situation, they’ll think nothing of putting my child in the foster care system and me in an old people’s home. That’s a viable option for them. Seriously. It would be really expensive and it would kill me, and I think it would break my darling little boy, who’s too big to be put with anyone who would want him for very long, and he’s too sensitive and vulnerable to be able to cope alone, especially without his mummy.

But the system would ruin two lives and no one would blink or stand up and say this is wrong, this is cruel and this is taking away human rights, not meeting needs. But it’s there, as the threat to me, because no one has the interest or inclination to give a shit about the value we both could add we we were allowed. The idea of being under full time ‘carers’ sets off my ptsd big time, as when care agencies picked & managed by the council we’re allowed in my home (vs employed by myself directly), I was horribly abused. I’m ashamed to say how badly abused I was, because I’m not mentally disabled and therefore should have been able to protect myself. But I couldn’t.

The stealing was the least of it, the least harmful in the end. It was the way I was shouted at, I’d be screamed at to get up / move / answer the door etc...whatever they decided I must do. Barking orders became shouting in my face. And the shouting because I was too slooooow, the mimicking, and the accusations, ‘you are just lazy! Get up! Get up! Get a move on, why are you keeping me standing here all day! You are so sloooooow! Why do you walk like that? Ha ha one foot there, there, you look so stupid, stupid’ all whilst I struggled to sodding get up due to, you know, being disabled! And then there was the forcing me to have a shower against my will, because it says so in the diary and it doesn’t matter if I felt to I’ll, I was just being lazy and stupid etc etc. and then there was the laughing at me whilst I was naked in the shower, pointing at my ugly body and laughing, I couldn’t cover up, they’d taken the towel and wouldn’t give it to me... and this is just the things I can talk about.

So, if this is my experience of social care, in a good area, with ‘good’ provision, as a physically disabled adult with no mental disabilities or special needs that mean I am unable to advocate for myself ... so yes, I can well imagine the terror of parents having to hand their non verbal children over to people who you don’t know and who may or may not be abusing the people in their care.

Wellthisisshit I'm so sorry, I know this happens and it's built into the system. Staff stop seeing residents as real people and see them as tasks, lose their humanity. Not all staff, but the decent kind staff are often outnumbered and intimidated by the bad staff. Whistleblowing is pointless as the bad staff group together to deny accusations and then the good staff are destroyed until they have to leave for their own sanity - leaving residents even more exposed to the bad staff. It ALL comes down to the quality of the home managers, but they tend to change frequently through burn out and impossible expectations upon them that have little to do with the actual residents and more to do with endless pointless paperwork. Some places are wonderful. But badly managed places are terrifying.

jesus fucking christ, wellthisisshit. Im so sorry.

I do not think he sounds amazing either. More like selfish to a fault along with being mired in his own fear, obligation and guilt re his sister. He left his wife and child when she was 14 to "care" for her. And he has made a complete hash of it, he has certainly not covered himself in glory here. There are no prizes for martyring yourself as he has done.

This is so true. I do understand how hard it is to have a sibling who is unable to look after themselves. It's heartbreaking and I can understand why your DF feels responsible for her. But it doesn't sound as if he's actually helped her at all with his actions.

My DB is very similar to your aunt in that he's completely incapable of looking after himself. My DM has always put his needs before DSis and me, and this has caused huge resentment.

He could never be trusted to have contact with a baby or young child. This has led to DSis and me not allowing him to be around our DC. He used to shout at them, and bump into them because he never watched where he was going. (There were other issues connected with childhood abuse but they're not relevant here.)

The bottom line is that our DC came first. Your DF should have put you first, not his sister. He didn't have to stay married to your DM (she seems to have made her peace with this), but he let you down at a time when you still needed him. Teenagers still need their parents to put them first and he failed you. You have every right to be angry.

You shouldn't allow him any contact with your DS, unless he's prepared to have contact separate from his sister. I've had to put that condition on my DM having contact with my DDs.

Your situation sounds really tragic, too @WellThisIsShit I'm so sorry.