Advise please

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Lilmc
Posts: 2
Joined: Thu Oct 19, 2017 9:31 am

Advise please

Post by Lilmc » Fri Oct 20, 2017 7:58 am

Hi I was wondering if anyone had any advise or been in a similar situation.

Me and my then partner of 9 years had an incident which ended up in me calling the police and him being arrested. It was quiet a serious assault and the police pressed charges without me giving a statement.

Well time has passed and social service have been involved with us he is getting supervised visits with out daughter at his parents house and I have been attending the freedom project.

I was wondering if anyone had been allowed to get back into a relationship and social services not be involved anymore.

We are getting on better now and the incident was a one off. Obviously I would not renter the relationship if this would jeopardise my daughter being with me.

I'm not sure who to ask or what to do i just want us to be family again.

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Suzie, FRG Adviser
Posts: 4207
Joined: Mon Jul 04, 2011 2:57 pm

Re: Advise please

Post by Suzie, FRG Adviser » Mon Oct 23, 2017 3:58 pm

Dear Lilmc

Welcome to the Parents’ Discussion Board and thank you for your post.

I am sorry to hear that you have suffered domestic violence in the form of a serious assault. You behaved responsibly by calling the police and since then you have been attending the Freedom Project which I hope is useful to you and is helping you to learn more about domestic violence and how to keep yourself and your daughter safe. You are clearly focused on your daughter’s welfare and are very clear that although your relationship with your ex-partner has improved and, if possible, you would like to be together as a family again, you would not do so if this put you at risk of losing care of your daughter. You are right to be aware that if you and your ex-partner resumed a relationship this could result in children’s services being concerned that she could be at risk of being exposed to domestic violence again.

It is positive that you are seeking advice and that you and your ex-partner are cooperating with children’s services including supervised contact between father and daughter at his parents’ home. You don’t say whether this is as part of a child in need plan or whether it is at the level of a child protection plan which would mean that your daughter has been assessed to be at continuing risk of serious harm. I am also not sure what happened in relation to the criminal process or whether your ex-partner has undertaken any work (such as taking part in a domestic violence perpetrators’ programme) to take responsibility for his behaviour, to learn how to behave differently and to think about how the domestic violence may have impacted on his daughter.

It is very hard to say if you will be able to be together as a family again as this will depend on what is different now and how or if the risk of harm has been reduced. You mention that the incident was a one off. Professionals may be concerned that domestic violence is not usually a one off and is more likely to be a pattern of behaviour. This is something which you might find it helpful to talk through with the specialist domestic violence workers at the Freedom Project. Do have a look at our FAQs for mothers on domestic violence as they explore some of the dilemmas you are struggling with too.

If your ex-partner has not yet undertaken a specialist programme then that would be a good place for him to start. The Respect website would be the best place for him to find out more about perpetrators’ programmes.

It might be a good idea to check with the social worker what their expectations or concerns would be should you and your ex-partner reconcile in the future. In some parts of the country there are specialist services which work with all members of a family (the victim, child and perpetrator) either separately or together to address domestic violence and promote safe plans for families but there is variation in what is available and also what may be offered or not will depend on the level of risk identified. As your ex-partner cannot currently see his daughter unless he is supervised this indicates that the risks are current. However, there should always be a process for reviewing progress when you are working with children’s services so it would be a good idea to check what this and when the situation will be reviewed so you are a bit clearer about the situation.

I hope this is helpful. Your daughter remains in your care which shows that you have protected her and you clearly want to continue to do so but you have questions about what happens next. It is important that you are safe too in order to keep her safe so do keep engaging with services.

Please do post again if you need to or call Family Rights Group’s Freephone advice line on 0808 801 0366 Mon- Fri 9.30 – 3.00 if you would like to speak to an adviser.

Best wishes

Suzie

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