Fighting for Support

Last week our social worker made an official request for theraplay for us as a family. To say that the LA were shocked would be an understatement. Apparently, (despite our social worker updating all involved after every meeting and message with or from us) there is absolutely no need for it and it was an absolute no.

After receiving that email our social worker decided that the best thing to do would be to call them and have a chat about it all. From what our social worker told us, it descended into absolute chaos almost immediately. The therapeutic support woman repeatedly spoke over her, wouldn't let her explain our side and said that there was absolutely no reason to believe that Big and Little need any sort of additional support at this time. Our SW said that when she put the phone down, she actually screamed.

Fast forward to this week and the manager of our agency rings up the LA and demands a professionals meeting after having a phone call from the TS woman's manager. That meeting happened on Thursday just before the LAC review.

We were asked to attend after things had been discussed. When we got there it had been decided that the way forwards is to assess the children's attachment type with each of us and either get us to work on what we already have to develop it further or to help us gain new skills that will help us to help them and make it easier for us all overall. That then has the potential to follow on to theraplay. They are also going to do some direct work with Big and Little on life story work, personal space, road sense and stranger danger.

The TS manager has said that she will send us details of some courses that offer a very practical approach to parenting traumatised children.

It all sounds good, if nothing else we are actually being acknowledged. If it wasn't for our agency, i'm not sure how we would have got to this point, they are fighting for us every step of the way.

During the meeting it was noted that Big and Little's social worker wasn't paying attention. In fact, she was looking out of the window and writing a report about something different all together. How the hell can we be expected to work with someone like that??

When we arrived we were told about everything and then we were handed life story books to have a quick look through now and take home. I went through about 10 pages of Big's and pointed out mistakes on each page. Now i have a memory for dates and ages so when it said that BM was x years old when Big was born and i know that she wasn't i flagged it up. Voldemort (as she's more commonly known) instantly snapped "It's right, i worked it out." i held my tongue as much as i could and reasonably quickly responded with, "Well you didn't work it out very well because it's wrong." And you know what, it is!! stupid woman. After that TS said that they would send the originals through on email for us to edit and send back so that they could re print and laminate everything for us.

The LAC review went well, the thing that made us both really happy was how amazing school are. Every single thing we've been telling and have told the LA school then said without prompt or knowing that we'd said it. Our SW is amazed by how fantastic school is. They know what they're doing, they know their stuff and they are doing everything they can to get what they need to help our children thrive.

When we got home that evening we looked at the later life letters and realised that there's at least 1 significant mistake in there and there's definite information missing.

The following evening i started looking through the LSBs to edit them....in short, they are shit. 104 pages between them and 62 pages edited. Some of the main reasons for removal and half of the story are missing. These are documents that have apparently been checked over by multiple professionals that know Big and Little's history. Quite frankly it's disgusting and as a result we've decided to do it ourselves and we will be sending an email detailing our reasoning behind it and slating the LA.

Since the LAC review, Big and Little have been absolutely awful. This is the worst few days for a while now and i am completely and utterly sick of being a Mum tonight. I miss being relaxed, i miss the woman that shouted probably once every 3 or 4 months. I miss quality time with my Wife. I know it'll pass but right now i'm just completely fed up of the stress of having to deal with an entire organisation who refuse to do their jobs unless you pull out the big guns.