Family and Friends Forum

Hey I just saw you post what have socail said to you guys is he allowed to see his his and does it have to be supervised I can understand how you are feeling I have been in this situation since 2019 .

People do care about you and your kids, maybe because of your mental health you can't see the wood through the trees at the moment and that's ok, but people do care.

suggestions regarding your mental health so as that it doesnt directly affect your children. Go to the gp see what they can offer, maybe medication or holistic counselling. Count in your head to 5 or 10 before responding to them (particularly when they ask silly questions, we all know they do no matter how old they get), go outside into your garden or something for 5 minutes every hour or so just to breath.

Don't worry your doing great, the circumstances of what you are going through are putting you in a tough position and that's ok that you feel frustrated, overwhelmed, angry, like crap, these feelings help you process. But try to acknowledge the good feelings too like getting up every day and facing it no matter what's coming your way, cooking dinner even though you just feel like ordering out or not eating. Looking after and raising your kids.

I and others on this forum are here to help and make you feel like we care because we do, I'm not just saying that we do honestly care.



sending hugs your way and hope you feel a little better soon xxx

Always hopeful, I think the truth is no one who does not personally know someone who's family ha e been involved in a case like this will care, simply because they have no understanding or appreciation of what the families are going through.

However, there are people who care, and there is support out there from a number of support groups and charities. And there are academics doing research into the impact on families and recommending that the trauma be recognised and support provided. Hopefully some of this will get through to the professionals like social work and they will become more supportive and understanding

I feel the same. Always afraid of saying the wrong thing to SS too.

It is starting to dawn on my of reading posts that we could be in this position of supervised contact for 2 plus years which I just can't comprehend. Silly things like dropping my 18 year old off at uni next Sept will mean I have to drag his 5 year old half brother along too. How do I attend evening meetings at school? As I have told no one yet.

I have signed up for LFF Inform for partners to hopefully get a bit more in person support, and also was recommended the wholehearted programme by the naked truth. I have not started it yet and it does cost money and seems to focussed on healing of partners of sex addicts (betrayal trauma) so not specifically of IIOC impacts. But I have that too so I think / hope it is going to be useful.

I hate this feeling of being constantly annoyed - I often feel like I'm spoiling for a fight when normally I'm quite placid and avoid confrontation. I have all this pent up frustration in side and it mostly stems from the powerlessness I feel......

*have to wait and wait and wait for any contact from the OIC with absolutely no info about anything

*have to bite my tongue when she only bothers to make contact because she wants something, and treats my son casually, ignores valid questions, makes mistakes in her admin etc etc but we daren't complain (or encourage my son to complain) in case she gets worse. I've always been an advocate for my children but have to keep quiet now so the frustration builds up insode.

*despite her good points, have to put up with our SW being scatty about dates for important procedural things, which we have in our diaries and arrange our lives around, but then discover she forgot to put it in her diary so can't do it now. And again we daren't complain in case it backfires.

I could go on but I suspect you all get the point with your own experiences.

How do people deal with all this pent up negative emotion? Ideas welcome!