Wednesday, October 19, 2005
While we were fighting to keep our family together and faced the horrible feelings that we had no control over this situation, we were surrounded by family and friends around the clock. They were all disgusted, angry, frustrated, confused and could do nothing to ease the pain that Pat and I were going through. Him and I were constantly crying, shaking inside, and just plain helpless.
When we got to the hospital, our daughter had to lay in a cold room for roughly 8 hours being regularly dosed with demoral for her pain. They couldn't put a cast on her because of the swelling but they also couldn't put her in a more comfortable room because there weren't any available. This pained us because we could do nothing to help her. Nor ourselves.
While she was in this room, the hospital social worker came in and so began the whole story. In between questions, hubby and I were placing calls to family. We had our 6 month old baby who was tired and there was no where for her to sleep and we weren't about to leave our oldest alone in the hospital...my parents offered to keep our baby for as long as need be. Thanks mom and dad!
Pat and I understood the concern that the social workers had and do appreciate that they are looking out for the child. However, in this case, the worker we had refused to do anything because the weekend was upon us. She wouldn't listen to the pediatrician, she wouldn't listen to family, she firmly believed that I broke my daughters leg and she was going to find out how I did it.
With her second birthday just days away and a foster home secured for our daughter, it was important for me to have a party for her at the hospital because Pat and I had no idea when we may see her again. We only knew that we were not allowed to know where she would be or for how long. They wouldn't give us any answers. They refused to put her in the care of the grandparents, they refused all of it. But we went ahead with the party.
Her room was so full of family and friends that they were standing in the hallway of the hospital. All Pat and I could do was cry. People around us were crying and no one could understand why this social worker was so hell bent on taking our daughter. The party was more like a funeral than anything. This occured on a Friday night. They were going to put her in a foster home at 7:00 Saturday morning.
I don't know how many times I was questioned, I don't know how many winks of sleep I got but I do know that every single nurse that tended to our daughter did not believe that either my husband or myself had hurt that little girl. And they said they had seen a lot and that there was no way that we would hurt that little girl. They said that we showed that little girl more love....
At about 6:30 am on Saturday morning, Pat and I were hovering around our daughter's bed crying and saying nothing. The phone rang. It was the social worker for the state. She said that she hadn't slept much the night before because she felt like she was making a mistake with this case. She had requested that our daughter be moved to Pat's parents house. We were allowed to be there but couldn't be alone with her at all. She was to stay there until the investigation was done which she didn't know how long that would be.
Pat and I were overjoyed! Our baby wasn't going into the arms of a stranger and we were able to know where she would be AND to stay there. We cried, laughed, and phoned his mom immediately.
A showing of our home was requested by the social worker for the day after our daughter's birthday. We were more than happy to oblige.
During the showing, I was with the worker and Pat was with the cop who accompanied her. Once she saw the room, her and I went upstairs and sat and talked. She asked if I had any photos of our daughter. I pulled out 2 photo albums of our oldest and one of our youngest, all of them full of about 300 photos of each kid. She paged through them both, looked me in the eye and said, "I made a really big mistake, there is no abuse in this home! I don't know what I was thinking." She said that we could bring our daughter home and didn't need to be supervised any longer.
Of course this may sound like a happy ending but in reality, it took 6 more weeks for them to make 2 minute phone call to tell us that they have decided that there was no abuse. We could live our life. And the emotional scars this has left are irreparable.
There are some burning questions that will always be unanswered for us. We saw an x-ray of the leg. A spiral fracture is a twisted bone, her leg had a clean break, diagnal with no twist. When we asked the bone specialist how it was considered a spiral when it was a clean break, his reply was "they're the same thing" and snubbed us.
How did she break her leg? We think maybe she may have fallen off of the ledge in her bedroom? We would like to get her hypnotised some day to find out.
Why is it when I asked the cop why he flat out told me I hurt this child he said that I was so emotionally screwed up and crying so much that I don't remember things right? That I was just making that up.
Why was it that while we were being raked through the coals, a 17-month old baby was kicked to death and down a flight of stairs by a woman's boyfriend and this occurred AFTER the social services placed the child back in the home? Why are children constantly placed back into dangerous situations yet our home nor our past never had a single blemish and we were treated like common criminals?
I can grant room for errors in judgement. I haven't nor will I ever forget this. There are times when I will have a moment where I will refuse to take one of my children to the doctor out of fear that I will be interrogated for a bruise. Or one of my kids will get a leg stuck in a chair and pretend they are hurt and I begin to shake and cry and can't breathe. Innocent until proven guilty...in this case, we were not granted that right.
How did this change us into Conservative/Republican? Well, it made us very aware of government control, very aware of where we are on the food chain in this world. How aggressive the government is. It made us more aware as parents and made us grow up quickly. It made us realize that there is a BIG difference between privelage and right. Having children is a privelage, not a right, loving those children and raising those children is our privelage and teaching them morals, values and respect is our job. That at any given moment, someone can come and take our wee ones out from under our wing without even a whisper.
That it changed our political views may not make sense to some but for us, this began our change.
Written by louie0768 .
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