Family and Friends Forum

Hi.

I believe you're right about not being able to keep your job and the scouts of you stay with your husband which seems very unfair to make you choose but that's what happens!

It must be a really tough time for you especially with your children so young, please make sure you get support through your GP, it's important you can keep going for the kid's.

It'an awful situation for us all but I think I'm lucky that my children are adults and a wonderful comfort and support to me, you need people like that around you.

Be kind to yourself xx

I’m so sorry. Like Tracey my kids are grown up. But there will be those of us with young children who will be able to advise you. Lots of love xx

Its really difficult being the innocent partner as our lives are changed so much by our partners actuons. I think if you dont work with children your job should be ok. The scout leader would need to be given up, not because you have done anything wrong but i would imagine a close association with a sex offender would not be appropriate. Its such a confusing time, its 4 months since the kbock for me, things are better now but i still feel disappointed abd confused. Child services are hard to work out. My partner is being investigated for sexual communication with a minor. We are very lucky that i can supervise him and he is allowed to be at home just not sleep here. We have a cin plan and risk assessments have been carried out, we work fully with child services. My understanding is they wont be in our lives forever but it depends what happens. Upon conviction they will either hand responsibilty to me, there is a possibility he can live at home supervised by me or they could change it to child protection. Unfortunatly i think there are no answers yet, take it one step at a time, concentrate on the now. I often get carried away asking about what happens in the future but until everyone has more information they cannot give you an answer. Its hard not knowing what the future brings but take it one step at a time.

I'm not got anything to really help you sorry. We got knock in July but my husband was arrested for for activity with a under a 16. He is still on bail not been charged yet. I am not allowed to supervise but I am hoping in future they will see I can protect my children an will allow me to as if possible I wud an so do the kids want him to return home xx

Confused and lonely. I work for the nhs as well not with children. I was forced to tell my manager s the police came to my work place to inform me of the arrest. They actually esculated my situation up to see if i could keep working (i can). However if i were to have gotten back into a relationship with him i would have lost my job.

As for living together. My daughter was 11 months when the knock came (shes 20 months now) and again i was informed that he could never live with me again and that if i decided to continue in a relationship of any form my child would be seen as at risk and she would be taken off me.

As horrible as it seems they will adjust to him not being at home. My daughter looked for him in the beginning but now she doesnt and shes happy. You need to think about what is best for you but be aware that things cant go back to how they wetre no matter how much we all wish it could

Speak to the stop it now helpline when they are next open, they are great for advice and very suppirtive no matter what. Remember everyones lives are different and each situation is different. I used to look for hope and positive stories etc but i found it doesnt help. Its early days for you, keep talking, keep asking questions and stay strong. I feel for me its been a very long journey in four months and will still have a very long way left to go. It depends what risk he poses as to the level of contact and chances of being able to stay as a family. For us my partner is accessed as low risk to our kids. Are you able to speak to work? Scouts? I know i couldnt talk to anyone to start with but thats different now i find it all much easier to talk about. Honestly the stop it now helpline are the best ones to speak to, they offer so much support and advice.

Confused and loney they did i had multiple meetings with my boss who was very supportive and she was honest with me. Because my role is caring and adults that come into hospital are vunerable she needed to make sure that the health board were happy for me to continue to do so.

Because he had accessed indecent images (and at this stage they were unaware just how bad it is) they were questioning my character. As the nmc states that you have to be of good character to be on the register and by staying with him i would have been deemed not to be.

Also this was confirmed to my ex by the police when he had to sign onto the sex offenders register. They told him due to my job if we were ever to resume a relationship I would lose my job and be struck off the register (which has happened to somebody that works in the trust that i am in) and he was also told that our daughter would be taken into care for the same reason.

Its a really difficult situation because we didnt do anything wrong. They were good with me staying in contact with him to arrange domestic things but i was very honest with my boss from the word go about me doing so. At the moment its hard for you to make a decision because its so raw but i know for me there was no decision to make. I worked hard to get where i am and i need that secruity of my job to provide for my daughter. She has been the driving force in every decision ive made since the knock. So i chose to leave him and am in the middle of a divorce. But i will say you need to do what is right for you and your family. I hate the fact that we are forced to make difficult and life changing decisions because of what they did

Dear ConfusedandLonely,

Thank you for your post, and to everyone else for the replies in this thread. In addition to wishing you well at what must be an enormously difficult time, I wanted to add a couple of things. First, families are, in some circumstances, able to live together in the longer term. However, there is very often a period of time when the person who has offended has to live outside the family home while assessments are undertaken. It can also take a long time for the safeguarding agencies to reach a conclusion about the final outcome, not least because the criminal proceedings can take many months, and these usually need to be completed first. But, for those people who do want to live as a family, there is hope, provided they can demonstrate to all the professionals involved that any children in the family are not at risk of being harmed.

With regard to the issue of employment, I would encourage you to seek legal advice, possibly via the relevant trade union. Through our work on the Helpline, we are very familiar with the serious difficulties created for spouses/partners, in terms of their employment, by their partner's offending. Often the issue at play concerns organisational reputation / public confidence. This commonly arises when someone works for the NHS, a school or within a charitable setting, and decisions are often made on a case by case basis, for example, depending on the partner's role within the organisation. This is why it is so important to get some fair, informed advice. That aside, the human injustice of being so adversley affected as a result of someone's else's behaviour needs to be acknowledged.

Please do call the Stop it Now! Helpline on 0808 1000 900 to talk things through if you think that would be helpful. We are not legal (or employment) experts, but talking to us may help you feel clearer about your next steps.

Best wishes to you, and everyone, and thanks again for you post.

What wonderful, calm advice Lucy. Such a refreshing attitude. There’s definitely a need for employment legal advice in situations like this. There are legal precedents around this and things change frequently.

I just wanted to say that SS responses all seem so different. Don’t know whether that is because of different ages of children or whether charges been brought. My partner is in the home, not been asked to supervise contact but children on CP plan. He has not been charged - police suspect 5 cat c images. I don’t know whether this outcome is because I immediately got a family solicitor and also partner immediately went to see a forensic psychologist who wrote report saying no concerns. SS were not happy we had that report and tried to play it down but I think it has had some bearing in how they have behaved.

Big sigh, how did you find the forensic psychologist? Was that through the solicitor. We have been discussing this but unsure how to find one that we can be sure is worth the money.

When i say worth the money, i mean as in child services, court etc will except it as an expert opinion.

Hi Maria. Found the person through google. This is when it gets really frustrating as I can’t tell you anything in case it identifies me! The person we used has had their evidence/ reports used in court before. The difficulty before the charge stage is making sure the therapist has info from the police and/ or social worker so that when the report is not believed (apparently SS don’t like any report which says no concerns) then at least your partner can say that the therapist came to their conclusion knowing the info that everyone else has got.

what I am finding is that “professionals” keep working outside their professional knowledge - so SWs who are not trained to make assessments on risk on this type of crime are going ahead and making risk assessments. And so the only way we can challenge is to pay for other professionals to make assessments. Just sitting back and letting everyone else make decisions based on their own prejudice would make life unbearbable and would make a difficult situation even worse. I am lucky in that we can afford expert opinion - I know not everyone else can - figuring that we won’t be going on holiday this year so spending holiday money on this instead.

The report was really thorough and also really helped me understand the “why” question. It looked past the allegations and looked at protective factors and positive things. I would recommend it - but it’s not cheap and SS still considering whether they believe it or not - I get the feeling that they don’t like that my partner went and had this report done. And they certainly don’t like the summary that there are no concerns of him contact offending or reoffending via internet

Big Sigh you did the right thing, you were proactive, taking the initiative yourselves.

A couple of observations if I may:

They don’t like it because they didn’t have any say in the expert you chose. They (SS) like to be the driver in these situations, they feel very uncomfortable when service users start ‘framing’ the assessments. Yes they’ll want one of their own no doubt, but you or your family solicitor must be happy with who they chose. I know, as an insider, that many of these people/assessors rely on local authorities for their money so don’t want to go against their narrative. Believe me, they use the same independents, ones that don’t challenge.

If anyone else is thinking about getting any assessments done before a decision is made to charge be very careful that the alleged offender doesnt say anything that may incriminate them. Men (it’s generally men) day all sorts when they are under pressure, feel so terribly guilty for their legal porn use and want to make things better for their families. Prosecutors can and will use anything to support their case including privately instructed assessments. Why would someone say something that may incriminate themselves if they haven’t done anything you might say? Just look at all the false confessions of very serious offences including murder that have been later overturned on appeal.

I am not defending anyone who knowingly searches for illegal child images, this is a different matter. Although I wish there was greater understanding of why they do it I abhor the pitchfork waving attitudes around.

Youre right Big Sigh about professionals without any in depth understanding of these offences chipping in with their two pennorth worth. Sadly these people have so much power when making decisions. So on the flip side you are prepared.

I know this because I was involved in decision making in all sorts of cases with very little knowledge of the offence. I thought I new but knowing what I know now I didn’t have a clue.

Apologies for the appalling spelling! It’s nigh on impossible to reply on your phone.

Thank you. I think will take some research to look for someone who is considered an expert. Our social worker did a risk assessment and said he posed no risk but now we have a new social worker they so far are unwilling to give me the paperwork of this or say it is missing. It does seem to be an area that causes issues for child services, i can imagine they dislike people like us who do our own research and seek help from other sources. I guess they have a very difficult job and perhaps have little expertise in this area.

Hi Jaded - always appreciate your input. Just to say my partner showed his solicitor before it got given to SS. The therapist was also very open to reframing sentences which meant that the truth was still told but didn’t sound alarmist.

I had heard heard about SS only wanting their experts but now if they get their own they will need to explain why they feel the need to do so and call the current therapist a liar!

Aaah Big Sigh but they’ll never call the therapist a liar, they’ll just offer a different opinion and possibly question the methods used. But you’re an astute woman and prepared for it. As you say the responses are unpredictable, you could have someone who has a different approach, I hope you do and I wish you the best of luck with the police investigation.

Maria, they have to, by law, provide you with copies of any reports/assessments about you and your family. Insist on it. If they say it’s lost there will be copies on the computer. I’m not saying to get into wrangles with them but it’s your right to have copies of these documents. They may have to redact any third party information but I guess you can live with that.