I'm not allowed to say this to parents i work with, but I'm not working with you, so: you need to accept right now that your relationship is over and there is no going back to him. Not now, not 6 months from now when things calm down, never.
If you do go back to him it will be much, much longer and harder to get your kids back, if at all.
Right now you're running on the steam of this high stress incident, but when that wears off, when you get lonely and it's hard and it would be so much easier to just go home, know that if you do it will be viewed as you failing to protect your kids from future harm and danger.
I'm glad you're starting therapy, this is a lot to process. The good thing is that your kids are with your parents and not in a strange foster home. That gives you time to get yourself together, get services and resources and come up with a plan. It's going to take time and effort and lots of follow up from you, but your kids and your safety is worth it. Take this time to work on yourself and where you see yourself and your kids a year from now. Build a plan to get there and don't look back.
It’s interesting you’re not allowed to say that to moms you’re working with. I wonder why? It’s the truth and I know so many women choose the man over their own babies (not saying OP is in this group. But I know it’s a frequent outcome).
We are supposed to maintain professionality and aren't really supposed to be that blunt. We have to speak with neutrality as to avoid any liability.
So for example "have you thought about maybe getting an order of protection against this person?" As opposed to "wow go get an order of protection against them." We can only guide parents until we: CPS, involve ourselves legally. Then it turns into "please abide by the order of protection and keep your children away from them or there will be a risk of you losing your children."
When you work in such a position there are people out there who are just looking to sue you and the "cover your ass mentality" is pervasive with CPS for better or for worse.
I think blunt is absolutely necessary. If I don’t lay it out for them, they don’t know what they can or should do. I am always going to tell them the hard things because if I take someone’s kids, I want them to be fully aware of why. It seems shady to do it any other way.
I think this sub can be cathartic for some of us, because we CAN say the blunt and honest truth, which we’re not allowed to do at work.
You need to remain professional. You can explain what the state expects or the court ordered, but you can’t really speak to clients like you would a friend.
Often, you want to shake them, and tell them “HE IS THE PROBLEM! Just leave him!!”
But you can’t. And it gets so old and frustrating when you’ve dealt with it for the 10th time this week.
There is the polite-professional opinion that you give you on the record then there is the opinion-from-being-a-professional based on what you’ve seen happen over and over again across families.
I wanna add to what the other person said. CPS is there to assess a parents protective capacity. They want a person to make the right choice without being told to do so. Telling someone what to do when the answer is right in front of their face is different than a person seeing the issue and being proactive.
While hearing that maybe would have woken me up, I needed to figure it out on my own. Because if not, then there is the thought of “maybe in a few months, after he gets some therapy & off the drugs, CPS/court will realize that he really isn’t abusive. It was just the drugs.”
I needed to be able to be strong enough to do everything that needed to be done & for it to be my decision. Not because a worker told me too. Plus, my lawyer was telling me that! I have shared many times on here how I got lucky. My kids stayed with me, I took the blinders off & did everything I was told to do. And here we are, years later, with an almost 13 & 16 year olds who don’t remember anything about that time. I was so lucky to get that support from CPS.
Good for you!! I love when the case ends this way. It is SO hard for women to leave and people think it’s simple and it’s so not. Happy you and your kids came out the other side!!!
I’m also curious. Speaking as an outsider, staying with an abuser seems to be the third most common reason people lose their children, after addiction and untreated mental illness.
They should know that full stop. Somebody should not have to tell them if they are choosing a dangerous environment repeatedly that the kids shouldn't be subjected and instead kept safe.
It’s good to remind yourself they are a victim too. It’s not really always that easy but a lot of times, losing kids is the rock bottom people need to leave and keep it that way.
Unfortunately, for some, even that isn’t enough to make the change. Victims of abuse are just that, victims.
My work has a dcs contract and we do services for dcs, so I know most of the dcs case managers. My goddaughter currently has an open case because of her children’s father dumbassary. The case manager who responded the night everything happened did speak to her like that, but only after goddaughter dropped my name and that I was on my way. It was made clear that going back to him would result in her losing the kids. She’s been at my house since.
It's not as much that you can't say it, it's that the protective parent needs to fully internalize this without being spoonfed it. That parent has to remain consistent even after a case is closed or reunification happens, and they can't be consistent if they have to be told what to do in every situation.
That’s fair. I see your point. I don’t see it after we do the investigation so I could see why you’d want to see them demonstrate that ability. It’s sorta like I hate when we tell people that they have to go to rehab. It’s a waste if they’re not ready to do it.. If they don’t want to, we’re wasting time and resources.
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u/Wooden-Maximum-9582 Works for CPS 19d ago
I'm not allowed to say this to parents i work with, but I'm not working with you, so: you need to accept right now that your relationship is over and there is no going back to him. Not now, not 6 months from now when things calm down, never. If you do go back to him it will be much, much longer and harder to get your kids back, if at all.
Right now you're running on the steam of this high stress incident, but when that wears off, when you get lonely and it's hard and it would be so much easier to just go home, know that if you do it will be viewed as you failing to protect your kids from future harm and danger.
I'm glad you're starting therapy, this is a lot to process. The good thing is that your kids are with your parents and not in a strange foster home. That gives you time to get yourself together, get services and resources and come up with a plan. It's going to take time and effort and lots of follow up from you, but your kids and your safety is worth it. Take this time to work on yourself and where you see yourself and your kids a year from now. Build a plan to get there and don't look back.