Need to tell the children what their dad did
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Hi,
my kids dad was arrested January 2024.
he pled guilty sept 2024.
social care have been involved on and off throughout.
my children have now expressed they are worried about what their dad did and feel like secrets are being kept (which wasn't my intention and now feel awful).
We have been advised to tell the kids the truth, in an appropriate way, on Wednesday.
I was wondering if anyone had any advice or would mind sharing their experiences?
They are 12 and 10.
I've also been advised to keep my eldests phone at home (he usually takes it to school) so his dad can't contact him before we have had a chance to talk. What do I tell him the reason for needing it to stay home?
im so done with all this.
my kids dad was arrested January 2024.
he pled guilty sept 2024.
social care have been involved on and off throughout.
my children have now expressed they are worried about what their dad did and feel like secrets are being kept (which wasn't my intention and now feel awful).
We have been advised to tell the kids the truth, in an appropriate way, on Wednesday.
I was wondering if anyone had any advice or would mind sharing their experiences?
They are 12 and 10.
I've also been advised to keep my eldests phone at home (he usually takes it to school) so his dad can't contact him before we have had a chance to talk. What do I tell him the reason for needing it to stay home?
im so done with all this.
Hi,
Because they have expressed concern that secrets have been kept from them it's especially important to be truthful with them. Do they have a support network of trusted adults who know what has happened and can be there if they have any questions?
It's not clear from your post who has recommended that your eldests phone be kept at home or why it's important that dad can't contact him specifically until after you've had the chat with him. Has their dad been sentenced? What does contact look like at the moment? xxx
Because they have expressed concern that secrets have been kept from them it's especially important to be truthful with them. Do they have a support network of trusted adults who know what has happened and can be there if they have any questions?
It's not clear from your post who has recommended that your eldests phone be kept at home or why it's important that dad can't contact him specifically until after you've had the chat with him. Has their dad been sentenced? What does contact look like at the moment? xxx
Thank you for your reply.
their dad has a suspended sentence and needs supervised contact. He's currently been having them every other weekend with his mum or new partner supervising but the social worker doesn't believe he is leaving the house while the kids sleep (court ordered that he has to).
Social worker is visiting him on Wednesday morning and letting him know the children will be getting told that evening. She has advised I keep his phone home so he doesn't come out of school to texts off his dad as he has been known to manipulate situations to his advantage.
after Wednesday, the social worked will advise the court that contact needs to be decreased to just one day visit every two weeks as he hasn't been sticking to the previous court ordered supervision.
their dad has a suspended sentence and needs supervised contact. He's currently been having them every other weekend with his mum or new partner supervising but the social worker doesn't believe he is leaving the house while the kids sleep (court ordered that he has to).
Social worker is visiting him on Wednesday morning and letting him know the children will be getting told that evening. She has advised I keep his phone home so he doesn't come out of school to texts off his dad as he has been known to manipulate situations to his advantage.
after Wednesday, the social worked will advise the court that contact needs to be decreased to just one day visit every two weeks as he hasn't been sticking to the previous court ordered supervision.
Does he have a SHPO? It's unusual that they've allowed him to continue to be able to text your eldest as this could be classed as unsupervised contact.
It possibly would have been better if you could all agree what to tell the children ahead of Wednesday and both parents be there when they are told. I've been advised, by a specialist in this area, to do this when the time comes to tell my daughter.
In terms of the sw not believing that he leaves at night is that because he leaves after the children go to bed and return before they wake up and the children have said that dad doesn't leave? Do you trust his mom? It's really hard if the relationship and family dynamics weren't great before the arrest but I don't believe there are many grandmothers who would risk their relationship with their grandchildren for the sake of sending their son to sleep elsewhere for a few hours. Hopefully if the sw wants to pursue this she isn't just going on the fact that she doesn't trust him and is basing it on facts xxx
It possibly would have been better if you could all agree what to tell the children ahead of Wednesday and both parents be there when they are told. I've been advised, by a specialist in this area, to do this when the time comes to tell my daughter.
In terms of the sw not believing that he leaves at night is that because he leaves after the children go to bed and return before they wake up and the children have said that dad doesn't leave? Do you trust his mom? It's really hard if the relationship and family dynamics weren't great before the arrest but I don't believe there are many grandmothers who would risk their relationship with their grandchildren for the sake of sending their son to sleep elsewhere for a few hours. Hopefully if the sw wants to pursue this she isn't just going on the fact that she doesn't trust him and is basing it on facts xxx
He does have a shpo yes. He can text so long as I regularly check the phones, which I do.
the children have said that they don't hear him leave or come back. And my daughter has said she's gone into the bedroom early and he's been in bed in his pyjamas.
his mum isn't the supervisor overnight - he goes to his gfs house and she stays at his house with the children. Or that's what's supposed to happen.
there have been a few occasions where the children have said that nanny or dads gf hasn't been around now.
honestly it's all so messy. I haven't been with him for a long time and we were very minimal contact before he was arrested anyway. Only civil for the kids benefit.
he is dead against the kids knowing what he has done so that's why the social worker has recommended telling the kids before he has a chance to speak to them.
the children have said that they don't hear him leave or come back. And my daughter has said she's gone into the bedroom early and he's been in bed in his pyjamas.
his mum isn't the supervisor overnight - he goes to his gfs house and she stays at his house with the children. Or that's what's supposed to happen.
there have been a few occasions where the children have said that nanny or dads gf hasn't been around now.
honestly it's all so messy. I haven't been with him for a long time and we were very minimal contact before he was arrested anyway. Only civil for the kids benefit.
he is dead against the kids knowing what he has done so that's why the social worker has recommended telling the kids before he has a chance to speak to them.
That does sound really tricky to navigate. If you were to say something like you can have your phone back after we have had our conversation after school on Wednesday is that likely to leave him worrying about the conversation all day in school or would he accept that?
Do they know that the conversation will be happening on Wednesday? It's hard to balance not blindsiding them with not wanting to worry them. That's the thing with having someone else (sw) present when you talk to them, it restricts what would be the most natural way to talk to them as their questions arise.
My older children were 17 and 14 at the time of my partners arrest so I was able to be honest with them from the start. He's also not their dad so the dynamics are different. Has the social worker given any advice around the kind of things she thinks would be best to tell them or a loose plan for the conversation? I've had a rule with all my kids that if they ask a question they deserve an honest but age appropriate answer (not specifically about this, just a general rule). Maybe the conversation could be led by your children, they ask questions and you answer them. That way you're not giving them information that they aren't ready for. I'd probably phrase the opening bit like I know you've had some questions about what your dad has done, this is your opportunity to ask them and go from there. Stick to facts without any emotive language so that you're not potentially influencing how they think you want them to feel about the information you're giving them. You can obviously tell them that it's wrong and that's why you and the social worker have put things in place so they can be safe around dad because he made unsafe choices in the past xxx
Do they know that the conversation will be happening on Wednesday? It's hard to balance not blindsiding them with not wanting to worry them. That's the thing with having someone else (sw) present when you talk to them, it restricts what would be the most natural way to talk to them as their questions arise.
My older children were 17 and 14 at the time of my partners arrest so I was able to be honest with them from the start. He's also not their dad so the dynamics are different. Has the social worker given any advice around the kind of things she thinks would be best to tell them or a loose plan for the conversation? I've had a rule with all my kids that if they ask a question they deserve an honest but age appropriate answer (not specifically about this, just a general rule). Maybe the conversation could be led by your children, they ask questions and you answer them. That way you're not giving them information that they aren't ready for. I'd probably phrase the opening bit like I know you've had some questions about what your dad has done, this is your opportunity to ask them and go from there. Stick to facts without any emotive language so that you're not potentially influencing how they think you want them to feel about the information you're giving them. You can obviously tell them that it's wrong and that's why you and the social worker have put things in place so they can be safe around dad because he made unsafe choices in the past xxx
Maybe call the helpline to ask for advice on how to explain in an age appropriate way.
I'm trying to remember what I told my then 12 and 14 year olds at the time of the first arrest. My 14 yo was very mature so I could just tell them outright. With my 12 year old, I think I asked him what pornography was. He did know because we'd had conversations prior about that. I said that grown ups sometimes like to watch other people having sex online. I explained that it's very much an adult thing and not all adults do this. I wanted to emphasise the ADULT in this because I then went on to say, that on the internet, there are some bad grown ups who force children to do things they don't want to in order to record it or photograph it, and often these poor children are forced to this without their clothes on and are forced to be touched in places they shouldn't be. I talked about the pants thing which we'd discussed before. I said that these images are all illegal and I explained that unfortunately their Dad had been arrested because the Police could see what Dad had been looking at it on the internet. I briefly went into the fact that the Police can see illegal things that some people look at. I'm not sure if this helps at all and I'm in no way saying that how I framed this to my child was correct. However, my child seemed to understand. It was incredibly hard and writing this brought me to tears. It's all still really raw for us as my ex, their Dad reoffended and is due sentencing again imminently. I wish you all the very best with this. It's all so incredibly difficult. X
My two are 10 & 13 (they were 8 and 11 at the time of the arrest) and I told them the basics from the start - that their dad was under investigation etc etc, that he claimed X, Y & Z but that I didn't know either way. Then the forensics came back a month or two ago and broadly confirmed his claim (a small number of images in one file from one date, all deleted). I got him to update them, with me present as well. I felt it important that they heard it from him, rather than me being his mouthpiece. In fairness he was willing to tell them. I think by refusing to your X is basically dumping it on you, and potentially engineering a situation where he can then tell them his own face-saving 'version'. If my ex had tried to pull that on me I'd have fought him on contact, and he knew it. So one bit of advice is to fight him on that TBH. He needs to take responsibility and accept that his children have a right to know.
Other than that, I made sure that they knew that certain trusted adults were also in the know, and that they could talk to them if they didn't want to talk to me about things. And I was in touch with the school in both cases (the schools were fab - completely professional & non-judgemental....the head of year at my older son's school had I think dealt with this before). My two don't really want to talk about it - I think it's hard for them to wrap their heads around someone they experience as a loving father having this dreadful secret life (he was cheating online & offline for years, lots of sex chat etc). I'm not pushing, but I've done my best to make sure they feel they can talk about it. If it's any consolation, they are both doing really well, living normal lives, doing all the normal things kids their age do. We haven't had any behavioural issues, mood issues etc.
I'd also promise that going forward they will know everything, and I would stick to that. And I would apologise from not telling them earlier. Kids just know, they really do. Honesty is always the best policy.
Other than that, I made sure that they knew that certain trusted adults were also in the know, and that they could talk to them if they didn't want to talk to me about things. And I was in touch with the school in both cases (the schools were fab - completely professional & non-judgemental....the head of year at my older son's school had I think dealt with this before). My two don't really want to talk about it - I think it's hard for them to wrap their heads around someone they experience as a loving father having this dreadful secret life (he was cheating online & offline for years, lots of sex chat etc). I'm not pushing, but I've done my best to make sure they feel they can talk about it. If it's any consolation, they are both doing really well, living normal lives, doing all the normal things kids their age do. We haven't had any behavioural issues, mood issues etc.
I'd also promise that going forward they will know everything, and I would stick to that. And I would apologise from not telling them earlier. Kids just know, they really do. Honesty is always the best policy.
Wishing you all the best for today xxx
How did it go? Are you ok? xxx