How this sick story all began - The first signs!
When I stayed in the women's shelter with my 2 oldest kids, we had the last "stop" in our own private little house on the area of the women's shelter. So we did not have to be in a group anymore. This gave me a little bit more peace at mind, and also more freedom. I could have a sleepover guest 1 night a week, and I was allowed to stay somewhere else in the weekend also with the kids. This was also the time that my kids were introduced to my boyfriend (the father of my youngest child now, so their little sister) to them and we started to spend time, to see if they got along. Before this period to them he was just a friend of their mother, and they never were around us during the relationship.
I was pleased to see that the kids enjoyed his company when he was around us during the day. The had fun, and my little boy was looking up to him, even that much that he made the mistake sometimes to call him daddy. Of course I told him this is not daddy, and we told him to call him by his name. But for a child that age, it said a lot to me about that he felt like he was the daddy-figure he could count on in his life. His own father didn't want him, and it was clear that he felt this during those first years.
After a while my son suddenly started to have weird behavior, like picking on belts, and after a few weeks my daughter was acting in a sexual way to her little brother. My boyfriend was the first to notice, I saw it happening too. We talked about it when they were a sleep, and discussed that this was something we had to keep an eye on. It felt strange to see, and I was actually a bit in doubt how I should respond to this in the best way. A few times I got angry at her, and afterwards I thought about that this was not the solution. But at that point things were still not too big, and I actually thought it was just a coincidence.
We noticed this behaviour every time after they had been to their father in the weekend
I wrote down the things that happened and I also made a few recordings of conversations with the kids while I addressed this behavior. And then there was this one time that I was putting the kids in the shower, and forgot the towels, I walked around the corner, came back and saw my daughter with her head at her brothers private parts. At this moment I was in shock, and I could just cry because this was not normal behavior. Of course you have the steps in a child's life when they start having a bit of sexual behavior, but this did not feel normal to me anymore.
I took her little brother out of the shower, and then I dried her off, I told her to wait until I had put her brother to bed. And then I wanted to have a conversation with her. She started crying and said she would not do it anymore. I got nothing out of her, and it also felt useless to keep trying because of her age. She was around the age of 5 at the time and her brother about 2,5 years of age.
Time to confront their father, to see if he had noticed this behavior too
Their father and I were actually not on speaking terms at that time, because he had been fighting again a few weeks ago, starting the hassle during a conversation at the CPS office against me. But I knew as soon as I would address this to the social workers from the women's shelter where we still lived at that time, this would get out of our hands, so I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, and address this to him. I asked him to come a bit earlier the next day when we would have a conversation at the women's shelter with my caseworker. This way we could have a chat in private before this started. He would not agree at first, but I told him that there was something I needed to discuss with him about the kids, that was worrying to me. And as we both are their parents I thought he should here this from me before I would discuss this with the social worker and caseworker. This seemed the right step to take, because at that time I had no clue about where this behavior was coming from. And this also gave me the change to see his reaction when I addressed this point of concern.
I confronted him with the behavior we noticed, and his reaction was weird to me. I told them when it happened and that it was after his weekends. He then told me that the kids were staying at his parents house those weeks. This was the first time I heard that, because I thought every other weekend they were at his house. I asked him if he had noticed weird behavior also, and he said he didn't. I told him we both should have an eye on this, and let each other know when we would notice anything out of ordinary. He agreed, and that was that.
After this we had the conversation with the social worker and case worker, and and the end of this, he did a weird thing. He was not happy with how the conversation had turned out, so he tried to make me look like a sneaky parent or something. He said at the end: "This is just as weird as you inviting me to come over at your house right before this meeting" So I looked at him, and said: "This was because we needed to discuss something as parents, I explained this to you, and you agreed". I had put my own feelings of not trusting him aside, trying to handle this in the best way for the kids. Because I knew I couldn't trust him, and I knew he would keep playing games, but this was about a big issue, abnormal sexual behavior**. And he still is the father, and at that point I was still hoping one day he would finally see that we had to deal with these things together.
A few weeks later I got really worried, and reached out to him again
I don't want to get into detail about what we saw, and what my daughter did, but we both got goosebumps because we did not believe that that was my daughter. We recorded what happened, and we saw multiple personalities appearing in my daughter. I have never seen this before in my life, and maybe if we didn't record it, and maybe if my boyfriend wasn't there I wouldn't have believed this, but we saw her switching within at least 5 different personalities. This was worrying to me, a lot. I send a whats-app to her father, and told him if you care, come over and see for yourself how she is acting. You need to see it with your own eyes, and this is really worrying me, because she was acting in a sexual way as if she was acting for a movie. My little 5 year old! You really don't want to see this behavior in your little child. This time he responded with the words: "I have no time, going to work now". And that was it, again I told him this was important because this is behavior that is not normal and it would be good if he would see this with his own eyes too. But he didn't come, and he didn't care, obviously.
After this I decided the inform the caseworker at the shelter this day, and tell her that the father was not responding the way that I hoped. And we also told her what my daughter had been telling during the time we secretly recorded the behavior for ourselves, and as evidence if needed. They got involved now, and she told me that I had to go to the police (because of what my daughter said) to report this, and the evidence was pointing at the direction of her grandfather. But it all was still very unclear what it was about, the only thing I knew for sure that someone had to do something, and take action. After this CPS told the father that they could not go to the grandparents without his supervision, and after two weeks my daughter told me that they had been there anyway. This was reported to them, and he got a warning for this. That was it.
I had a hard time dealing with the fact that somebody was maybe touching my kids in an adult way
Many things happened those next months, I don't want to get into all of it. The main thing is, that the father seemed to find it ok to tell his whole family that I had accused his stepfather (we called him grandfather anyway, even though he is not his real dad) of doing bad things to the kids. While every contact we had, I pointed out with the words, I do not accuse him, based on what I know (because of the info giving by the father and what daughter had been telling) this is the only conclusion I can take, but I hope I am wrong. They always had loved their grandfather, and to me he has always been more than good to them. Never ever had I thought that he would be even capable of these kind of things. I had trusted him with the kids for five years now, and I had a hard time coping with the fact that this was the moment that those things had happened. I could actually not believe it, but CPS and the police and of course the father pushed me to the limit. They needed to hear who to call to the police station, even though I kept saying I don't know if it's correct, because the father doesn't always gives me the correct information about where they are staying.
My gut feeling was alarming at a certain point. The social workers told me my daughter would go to play-therapy specialized in these kinds of things. And because I had my doubts about what happened where, and especially with who, I decided to not go through with the police report until I was certain. I could not deal with the fact, that maybe they would arrest the grandfather, without the poor man being guilty. My gut feeling said I should not continue this road with the police, because if you are pointing at the wrong person, it may turn out that you cannot use any evidence anymore later on if you have more clarity. This was too big a risk for me.
This period was very very emotional, and I cried a lot. Sometimes I could not stop crying. On top of that the father was putting oil the fire by making me feel like the bad person for seeing those symptoms and trying to get to the bottom. Hello, we are talking about our kids, not about a stuffed doll. He really tried to break me during that time. After a few weekends I noticed that they had been with their father (not with his supervision at the grandparents) and that they were acting off again after he returned them home. And me and my boyfriend talked about this, because this was pointing at a total different direction now, because they hadn't been around the grandfather those weekends. I instantly knew that it was good that I had listend to my gut feeling.
Then the summer vacation started, and my kids would have to go to the father for 3 weeks in a row
I was so scared for this moment. I knew he would go to the grandparents also, and he was allowed by CPS to do so. But he had to stay there with them also. But when there is no clarity about the behavior that is worrying you, this is really really hard, to let them go for 3 weeks. I was scared every day that something was going on there, and that my kids would come back with different behavior again. And then the 3 weeks ended. Actually they did not have any signs of sexual behavior anymore. Not once I had noticed anything weird after this. Of course me and my boyfriend were very pleased with this, and we were happy nothing had happened to them, and they came back as 2 happy kids.
But it makes you wonder right? The answer to our questions about how this was possible, and what went wrong where, was coming soon after the summer vacation ended. There was a meeting planned with several CPS workers, social workers and my case worker from the women's shelter in a few weeks. To discuss the behavior and next steps we should take. This was an important meeting..
This meeting was filled with lies and got a weird twist to it
The weird thing was, they were telling lies about the points we discussed a while ago, and they made me look bad. I thought we would discuss the issues with the kids, because this was important! They asked me how the kids were doing after those 3 weeks, and I told them honestly that they came back as 2 happy kids and I did not notice any signs anymore. But to me it would feel assuring that my daughter would go to the play-therapy sessions as planned. The father was now suddenly not agreeing with this, and making a hassle out of this. He found it not necessary to do so, and he had to think about it now? This was odd to me, but he got some time to think about this they said, in the meanwhile they would put her on the (long) waiting list for this therapy.
And then they talked to him a bit, and between the lines (he did this so sneaky in my opinion) he said that he had broken up with his girlfriend a month ago (right before summer vacation) and he was a bit depressed, so he had medication now, and also got help from social work. He was acting like he was not doing very well, and he was a bit quiet also if compared to those meetings normally. The part about his girlfriend was actually faded away in the conversation, but afterwards I talked about this at home with my boyfriend, and this was actually the part that later on would explain why the kids had stopped having that weird behavior. Nobody noticed this though, and nobody listened when I addressed this to social worker or CPS.
After a while I heard from my mother that my daughter had been sleeping at her house one time, and the sun (I believe he was 8 about that time) of the girlfriend that their father had, was staying there also. So my 5 year old daugher with the 8 year old son of daddy's new girlfriend. And my mother had busted them playing sexual games in the shower together. She was in shock (like I was at the time with my daughter and son) and she said that they should not be doing this, afterwards she told the father.
But the father had never addressed this to me, not even when I asked him if he had seen anything weird in their behavior. Never had I thought about the option that maybe this boy (who was a few years older) was the one that was having sexual behavior against my daughter, and my daughter was copying this at her little brother. And why did I not think of this? Because the father always put me on the wrong track about where the kids were sleeping. The only way I found out the truth was when my daughter would tell me.
So all this time he let me believe that the kids were at the grandparents and it was the grandfather that caused this behavior, and not once he was honest enough to tell me that these incidents happened with the son of his new girlfriend. My mother told me there were more incidents like this (that's why I say incidents). If a child is growing up, at certain points they will start discovering the private parts, and of course a certain behavior comes with this. But the father should have taken action after I asked him to keep an eye on this, instead of letting those 2 sleep together in my mothers house.
I now understand what was the issue, he did not want to be forced to break up with her. Because this was the house he could take the kids to in the weekends, and later on I heard she was spending more time with the kids than the father himself. He could simply not miss her, because of babysitting our kids. As relieved I was when we came to the conclusion that this behavior was caused by another child a few years older than my daughter, I could not understand that nobody would even come back to this subject at CPS / social work/ play therapy.
Especially when after a year without him mentioning this, we had a meeting about the kids and she was there with him, introduced as his partner! Nobody took the conclusion that they should keep an eye on this.. I felt so alone in this.. All that time for his own sake he made me believe that the grandfather was guilty for this behaviour, while it were 2 kids playing games they shouldn't have been playing. But if we had known this, they could have taken other actions, and I would not have been having the biggest stress ever during all these months when the kids went to the grandparents...
