Julia Hollander responds

[emkana]

www.motherstory.co.uk/?cat=9

Because she was obviously a capable mother, just not with a child with SN.

exactly fio and villette. I didn't work for the 2 years pre ds1's dx (nor the 6 years post his dx) and that had nothing to do with disability and everything to do with wnating to be at home initially for him, then ds2 and then ds3.

She also seems to think that people want to get their old life back as a matter of priority. Don't get me wrong, I'd love for it to be easier to find childcare for ds1 etc, but as long as we are able to manage him I'd rather have him at home and make some compromises on what we can and can't do than have him living with a foster carer with us free to do whatever.

but she has used the fact that her other child was having behavioural(sp) problems as one of her reasons.
what samll child doesn't have issues when presented with a new sibling. nt or sn.

Hi 2 shoes,

I can't really say, however they would need to be convinced that both children were at risk of significant harm to pull the two of them.

I reckon they probably didn't feel they had grounds for a care order.

There would have had to be evidence.

It is pretty peverted I know, they didn't however end up taking an order on Imi so I presume they felt there were no grounds, though Imi of course was in hospital and would therefore most likely have been "accomodated" under sec 20 rather a care order.

Very often parents are brow beaten into handing their children into voluntary care by the threat of care proceedings if they do not. At least I have come across a few instances where that has occured.

PS she does seem to have done OK with her other two, she just found the huge demands Immie made on her impossible at that time.

Had there been a proper high input support service available or even the levels of support and respite that a foster carer would get maybe she would have been able to continue to have Immi at home with her.

Er Talies she hasn't actually given any indication that she wanted Immie at home with her. She doesn't seem to feel any sense of loss that Immie isn't living with her (which is where I think she's out of synch with many parents- when ds1 leaves us it will be very reluctantly on our part and genuinely because one person can't do it - or because he could get better educational provision elsewhere - if they keep his school open that's unlikely).

She sees it as an equally acceptable alternative to parents- whereas for many (most perhaps) a pretty much full time fostering arrangement is absolutely not any sort of solution.

Fio
we were advised to seek residential for DS2 when he was just three. . The consultant paed said he would soon be too violent and too much to handle.
he is now 11 and a cutie pie. But it shocked and saddened me even then that it was an option. It honestly hadn't dawned on me that hat sort of provision existed.

BTW When will this silly woman just sod off. She is like Heather Mills for the SN board - poor little me me me .
[grrr]

Most paediatricians know eff all about the daily implications of dealing with kids with SN.
My heart sinks when a family cling to what some paed. had told them, someone who barely knows their child, about language or learning or stuff like that.

The purely medical stuff is of course their area but the rest aint.

I felt so when I read an article the other day in which she was quoting stats about families with disabled children and said that x amount get to breaking point.. "I guess we were one of those".

Breaking point after five months???!!! How can she lump those of us who really do reach breaking point, or come close to it, after many many years.. into a category with her.

ahhh - shopping

Why limit it to paeds?

Most doctors even specialists are not too sure about people with extra needs.

I do remember one paed telling me how a child living here would never do this, never do that, (have you noted how these people will forever tell you what kids can't do, never what they can...)

But anyway this paed announced with the authority of an expert how this child could never be expected to ride a bike.

Now, had we been in awe of experts we might not have taken it further.

Sure enough he was riding his bike within a week of getting it. Made me want to take video him on it and stuff it up the paeds a%%%%

but isn't that perhaps because doctors/specialists' only real experience of people with disabilities is from a textbook pov and when they come across them in their office? How many pediatricians actually spend time with people with disabilities, in their homes, at school, out in the wider community, gaining actual knowledge of their abilities?

You are both dead right.

Please all of you,ignore any sweeping generalisations made so thoughtlessly by (some not all of) these people.

I know one woman who is haunted by the comment of a paed years ago ,telling her her child wouldn't be able to do 'anything much'. She brings it up all the time and has devoted her life to proving him wrong.

Yet I bet he wouldn't even remember saying it.

oh that's sad moondog. I also think when I see the amazing progress my son has made that people who wrote him off, still would, because in their eyes he's nowhere near normal

Back to your earlier point about the internet- the biggest difference for me is that it's now so easy for me to find out what the LA should be providing legally. What their statutory duties are. Making it far easier to complain and point out that they're not meeting their leagl obligations.

And yurt, if you use the internet to download the relevant act and regs, then cut and paste them into your letters.

It can be like watching a bulldog eat wasps....

Each and every one of you parents who is struggling with your SN child should go online and look up the costs of some of these specialist resi units and fostering schemes.

Then start your negociations with SS on the basis of how much you save the LA every single week. Never mind that you would never put your children into care, just look at what you save the state.

Coincidentally, the JH Immi situation is relatively cheap as these things go.

you know not all peads are crap. I have never met one who has written dd off. they have only helped. same with sw's have been lucky to have only had good ones who have been very keen to help.
I do think a lot of this is due to dd's cp being caused at birth. so she was monitred from day one. It was easier for us to get into the "system". she was in a sn nursery at 3 and we had a linkfamily when she was about 4 and due to that she and the fact I could have caused a major disturbance over what happened. she was taken early for school respite.
Sadly what I have noticed is even with a very visible disability like cp. the help on offer changes depending where you live.
my freind lives in a different part of the county.
I get 3 wheelchairs...she gets one
I get pull ups...she can't
I get respite...she battles for hers.
the list goes on.
another person I know has had to battle to get her son accesed for the incontinece service as he goes to a ms school in a different town to where she lives.
crazy or what.

I don't think it is a good ides to cut and paste law from the internet - it won't necessarily tell you what the current law in force is, often it will only tell you what the law was when the statute was enacted.

I find the guidelines often more helpful as the usually state quite clearly how it should be interpreted.

You need to also look out for amending SI's and interpreted case law, if any. You can dig these out of online sources but it's harder work compared to the commercial services that do all the legwork for you - which your average lazy lawyer is likely to use. I agree though that the internet has made legal sources far more readily available and this has benefitted the public interest, but judgement and interpretation are still key to making good use of them - I'm sure you do that but I just meant that in general cutting and pasting is not advisable.

I'd probably cut and past the wrong bit.

Often the Act itself has guidance next to it. I used that yesterday when I had a query about the Mental Capacity Act (not complaint related, work related). That gave me enough info to know the question I had to ask someone more knowledgable than me iyswim. Places like the CAB, IPSEA and even the direct gov type websites can give really handy interpretations and examples of how legal requirements should be interpreted as well.

The guidance is an excellent starting point and it's not likely that the guidance per se will go out of date but generally the older a statute is, the more necessary it will be to look at the wider picture and not just the primary source.