My friend will have yet another child taken off her & don't know what to do to help? UK SS not Christians?

[Isabel]

THE FACTS - please read, and be sympathetic and helpful with your answer - I know it is unbelievable but since the death of Baby P they are still removing more children from parents because they now don't need any proof of abuse - although statistically this has not avoided 1 death

1) Perhaps she should not have got pregnant again - however she came to the realisation it is because she is grieving for the other 2 who have been forcefully removed - not trying to replace them exactly but trying to fill a gaping hole in her life - it's one of the worst things that can happen to a mother, and IS the worst for the children - which has been proved by psychology - why do they not follow their own advice?

2) She has a minor mental health record, with no crime or abuse committed (and no crime or abuse proved) basically she asked for help, stupidly, before she had the children, due to grieving over a miscarriage, and they sectioned her. This is why they were watching the family for years, stressing them all out with meetings etc., causing paranoia but actually real, and she put a couple of feet wrong as I will now explain below, causing them to take the kids straight off her:

3) Her mistakes - due to the death of her partner, she had her hair over her face one day when out with the children. The children were removed for a while and she was sectioned. After this, children returned, she took 20 mins to answer the door one day to a professional. Children then taken for good.
We have been advised by someone from the church to run off to Ireland - where she can take her chances with Irish Social Services who are far less likely to remove child - once they rule her a fit mother perhaps she can send for the other 2 - however don't think there's time. A UK MP actually advised a couple recently to run off to Ireland to escape UK SS.
It has not helped that since they finally took the children, her flat became extremely messy, as she went to pieces, which is completely natural. I have largely cleared her flat but still needs work. At first, she went to several meetings a day like they wanted, but after months of this she is now, to be honest, avoiding them as they are, basically, lying about her and persecuting her. She can't cope with them anymore. It only takes a personality clash with 1 of the hundreds of them.

[Orla C]

I've read your friend's questions, and I don't think you're doing her any favours by helping her. And you might even be endangering her and her child.

[the one]

Social services do not act unless very worried. They rarely make mistakes.

[Friendlydust991]

Having worked in the NHS for 17 years I can safely say that children are never removed from a parent by social services without good reason. She doesn't sound like she is fit to care for her children right now, not that she can't in the future just right now she needs help by the sound of it & the children are safer in an environment where she has limited access not day to day care.

You say your friend was previously sectioned, again nobody is sectioned under the UK Mental Health Act without good reason & as a matter of fact it is very hard for a GP to get a patient that they feel needs to be sectioned the appropriate order for this to be carried out. Running away to Ireland won't solve her problems.

[Space Cadet]

My answer is the pretty much the same this time around as the similar question you already asked, which I answered, which you conveniently deleted. It will not benefit your friend and her situation with the baby she is carrying nor the children she already has that are in care, in ever proving herself a capable mother if she runs off to Ireland.

There have been numerous cases in the last few years here, where children who should have been removed from their abusive parents, weren't. There was one particularly disgusting case about a girl in a traveller family who was repeatedly and systematically physically and sexually abused, who took the courageous step in going to Gardai but because at the time the health system was seperated into regionalised health boards and did not communicate properly with eachother or externally to Gardai, when the traveller family moved from one province to another, there was no follow up. The girl was viciously physically and sexually abused and prevented from going to Gardai, but eventually did and it was dealt with and followed up on and the past contact with Gardai reviewed and investigated as to what happened. Since then, but with as many cases of neglect not getting resolved, things have tightened up in their wake and better rights for children been introduced. There is neglect out there and people today - from what I have seen on various discussion boards and in media - are more likely to report even suspected neglect and abuse which will lead to an investigation and perhaps, where the child's best interests are, removal from the parent(s).

I would urge you to review citizen's information website particularly surrounding Children in Care http://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/bir..._care.html

Look, I can post many links but I don't think you're ever going to take a word of it on board. If you want to help your friend, stop covering for her. She needs REAL help now. You have done a lot in trying to clean up her place, but if she cannot cope with a messy flat, what realistic hope has she got in looking after 2 children and a baby? In all seriousness, what hope has she, if she cannot mentally cope with cleaning up after herself?

What you as her friend should actually do, is stop cleaning for her and get her to either take control of her life in getting herself back on her feet by dealing with a) the suicide of her partner b) the past miscarriage that you detailed she previously had in the last question I answered on this that you deleted and c) get herself together psychologically and emotionally through counseling and dealing with the suicide and miscarriage to be capable and able to firstly start to look after herself and secondly prove herself well and fit enough and capable enough of looking after herself to be fit and able and capable to look after 3 children.

If she moves to Ireland, authorities here will find out fairly quickly who she is. Previously you've stated you're both on welfare, so welfare here will want her details incl UK social security number. They will find out who she is. As I previously answered, your friend is not covered for medical expenses in Ireland unless she is prepared to contact the NHS and get the extra documentation and be covered under the NHS for giving birth in another country. That is very possible, IF your friend is prepared to contact the NHS, which you said before she was too afraid to do so because you wanted to run off to Ireland without the NHS knowing. She won't be covered under travel insurance (exclusion for last 12 weeks of pregnancy and not covered for medical expenses related to pregnancy incl emergency incl giving birth) and won't be able to get cover through private medical or specialist insurance as they would be very aware that the NHS, if contacted, would cover her.

You have done a lot for your friend, but she has to want to help herself. You're both looking at situations in clutching at straws. Your friend doesn't need to run off to another country and be in more **** than she already is, as that will forever blacken her name and will be the one action that will mean she will never, ever have access to her children in proving herself unreliable and unstable, likely to run off to another country on a whim. That is how they will see it.

What YOU should be doing is getting real advice from free legal aid / citizen info equivalent (Advice Guide is one) or an organisation that can give you real alternatives and get you help for your friend. Maybe even the Samaritans or other organisations or charities in the UK can help your friend better than you can in your covering for her and preparing her to run away from the problem and actually instead equip her with the right support and the right help that she needs to deal with SS and the NHS, in sorting out her issues and getting over both a suicide and a miscarriage. She needs real, real, real, help. She does not need a friend who is going to entertain a fantasy of running away to another country in an attempt to escape the problems which are still going to be there always, and which she runs the risk of repeating in another country all over again, having several more children who might well either end up neglected, left to look after themselves, because their mother can't cope and even worse, that your friend might turn into such a dysfunctional wreck that she would have no problem with whoever doing whatever they wanted with her children, pedophiles are real in this country, there have been several horrific cases in recent time including a mother who was a willing participant in allowing a neighbour to rape her child for years, with her expressed consent to do whatever they wanted. That could well be your friend for all you, or I or anyone else would know. Now she might not be that bad, but if she never gets the real help she needs NOW and you enable her to run off to Ireland with the help of a church or an MP and your friend has the baby and doesn't look after it, can't cope looking after it or herself, what then? Are you going to be happy to let her sit in her inability to cope, her living in filth, you looking after the baby, looking after your friend, always wondering that that is the best thing for the child, for your friend, for you?

As much as I feel for both you and your friend, she needs to face reality, not be entertained by fantasies of escapism. The sooner she gets the right help she needs, the sooner she will be psychologically healthy and capable to look after herself, the sooner she will be then capable to look after all of her children.

[froggequene]

I think you & your friend are missing the point of attending meetings or seeking interventions - your friend can't do things because other people want her to do them, she needs to recognise she's in difficulties, recognise her condition, learn how to manage it & seek help because she needs it not because she's going through the motions to appease other people

You need to stop enabling her - running away is a romantic notion that will get her & you nowhere, what ails her won't be left behind in the UK it will follow her & she's setting herself up to fall into the same vicious cycle again

[Maxi]

You have asked this many times and it changes from you to your friend........ whoever it is clearly there is evidence or children are never taken away but the parent supported to enable them to manage and the law is very strict on this and is covered by European Law, which also is the same law used in Ireland.... so you/your friend are clearly in need of help, clearly can't cope with their own life let alone children or a new baby and running away, well you/your friends issues will just get worse not better and that means yet another childs life is being put at risk.......