My children are most likely victims of parental estrangement

It is hard to think about the fact that parental estrangement is caused by the so called child "protectors" of the governments. You would think they will do anything to prevent one parent to keep the children away from the other parent, right? Unfortunately, I can tell from experience that this is not the case.

I never took the children away from the father, he could not see them when I had a so called code red in the shelter for 2 weeks, but that was due to their rules. All the time after this became a code green, he had visitation rights. I even let him go to the first day of school with us when my daughter started kindergarten. The school thought this was weird, as I was in a shelter, but as he had visitation rights, I thought he should be there to support her. The day was not about me, it was our daughters special day. It came to a point where I didn't let him take the children, though. This was after he had been violent several times again, with them being there. I had the advice from the previous guardian from CPS that if I ever had the idea he was a risk around the children, it was my duty to make sure they were safe and if this meant not giving them to him, I should not give them, period.

Unfortunately the next guardian was a different kind of person, she did not agree that I didn't give them to the father, because she did not know of any violence. She just didn't do her job before starting at our case, and she was always wrongly informed, actually. But back to the parental estrangement part. I did not take them to estrange them from the father, I only demanded that the visitations were under supervision, so he could not get violent. But this took 9 months or something due to a waiting list. In the meanwhile he had phone calls weekly with our daughter only, because in court he did not ask for calls with our son. He "forgot" and the judge was not giving him calls with the boy, as he didn't ask for it.

Then a short while later it became clear that we were about to get evicted, because they weren't planning on paying our welfare before the eviction date (and they were already 3 months behind, due to a rejection that was invalid). And then of course CPS came to interfere, all of the sudden it was not important anymore that the father was violent, and that there even was a court order for him not being allowed to see the children until further notice! And that he only had rights to call with our daughter, not our son. No, the only important thing was that the children should be taken from me, the mother and the first thing they proposed to me as a solution was: letting them stay with the father! Can you believe this? Nothing mattered anymore, everything was forgotten, just like a while before about the sexual abuse part (see other post). Nobody wanted to hear about it anymore, they were only focusing on my handing over the children.

I had no other choice to agree with the children staying at their grandmother (fathers mother) during the time we would have no house. Otherwise CPS would have took them and put them in foster care, so this seemed like my only option. The father said during these conversations that I could see them every day, and go to the park with them or something, he was even willing (what a good guy he is, isn't he?) to bring them every day to me. He even said the children belong to their mother, and I want them to get back to her as soon as possible. So I let him repeat this with all these witnesses in the room. This was unfortunately (like I expected) all nonsense. The day before eviction day they picked up the children, which was really hard for me, of course, and I cried my eyes out when they left. His mother promised me to let the children call me somewhere in the evening the next day, and she didn't. His mother was the one promising me!

A few days later I had a quiet moment (because those are not there all the time when you just lost your home) and I called the children. This moment it was clear that the father started his game to keep them away from me. He said: you were supposed to call them that day! You didn't and now you just assume you can speak to them? That nice friendly man that was willing to bring them to me every day, was nowhere to be found anymore! No empathy of course, not understanding that me talking to the children would light up my day. No, he started a big fight on the phone with my children standing next to him.

This went on and on until the point I was nervous to even call them again, because I didn't want the children to be his neighborhood when he started to fight. After a few weeks I proposed to get the children the next day to go swimming somewhere, he said no I don't trust you yet, etc.. The next day I found out (while it was 30 degrees) he had cut our gasoline line from the car. Now I understood what he didn't trust. This could have gone terribly wrong, especially with the car standing in the sun all day, and someone throwing a cigarette nearby the leaking gasoline line.

Then we had a period that we stayed at my mothers house, we had a few weeks break because I could not take it anymore living there. And we had another option for a few weeks finally, because the welfare was now finally payed for the previous 6 months. I did not hesitate and we left for a break. As soon as we were back, we heard the father was there to pay a visit with the children, and when my mother said I would have loved to see them, he said: well that's not possible as she is not here now. Like he was even planning on doing so. So when I came back I knew my children who I missed for months already had been there in the house, but he did this on purpose when we weren't staying there. Everyone around me (like my mother) kept thinking he had good intentions, because he was playing that game in their faces, like he was intending on letting me see them, but hey, I wasn't there!

Maybe the most painful example of him cutting the ties with me, is when my daughter had her birthday and I send gifts to my mothers house. She would have the children at her place that weekend, and I thought this is perfect, she can give them. What she did instead was, asking him permission to give the gifts on my behalf! And guess what he said? No, she couldn't because he thought this would shaken up things in the children's mind. So I was now not even allowed to see or speak to them, but sending a gift was also out of the question! This was really really painful to me, and actually I cut the ties with my mother from then, as I believe that she should have acted like MY mother and for the children she should have taken one for the team. As in she should have taken him being mad afterwards, and then apologize it wouldn't happen again. But she didn't. And now I only let her friend know sometimes how we are doing, but my mother doesn't add any positive value to my life.

Not only does my ex estrange the children from me, he also made sure there is another daughter (me) that cut of the ties with her mother.. He is a true blessing for society, as you can see!
I can only hope the children will not be that damaged in the future that they need years of therapy for this part he did to us.
It happens all under the supervision of CPS, they are such a blessing in disguise.

AnoukNox

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